Isshinryu Canada The Canadian Isshinryu Way Everything Karate & Kobudo Volume 7, Issue 4 Sept 2011 Make your Goals Achievable Inside this Issue: As many Dojo are now restarting after Set yourself some goals for this com- summer breaks or reduced classes ing year and work hard to reach hopefully most students (and instructors them. Remember that the best goals Higa Matsu 2 alike) are starting to decide on goals for you can have are usually hard to the upcoming months. achieve. Don’t be afraid of challeng- ing yourself, it will bring out the best When setting goals, I strongly believe in you. that in order to reach them, you need to Sam Sheridan’s 3 make sure they can be divided into Keep training and improving! “The Fighter’s manageable tasks both in achievement Mind” and practice. By Mario Drouin No matter your goal (whether it be im- proving an aspect of your Martial Arts or Meaning of Karate 5 in life), making it something you can Do by Richard Essential Isshinryu has been move toward regularly (daily) and incre- Ruberto Released! mentally is very important. For more information on the first Lake of the 6 Many small steps will lead you a long Canadian Isshinryu book, visit Woods Promo- way, learning and accomplishing things www.essentialisshinryu.com! tions is incremental. If you try to force your- self into a situation where you must im- The Challenges 6 mediately do something, it’s very diffi- ATTENTION NEEDED! cult to accomplish. Whereas, if you practice a little every Do you know of someone great Canadian Black 7 day for an entire year, you will certainly in Canadian Isshinryu? If so, Belt Promotions have grown a great deal if you compare please e-mail [email protected] yourself from day 1 to day 365. with the contact details to be pro- filed in future newsletters. The News 10 Upcoming Events Seminars Peter Carbone in Tournaments Thunder Bay Oct 1st. Hanshi Mady in Bran- don, MB Oct 21/22. Other Strike when the Opportunity Presents Itself Page 2 The Canadian Isshinryu Way Higa Matsu Understanding the history of Isshinryu and karate At 5’ 2” and 140 pounds he was a large man by can provide the Isshinryu Karateka with a greater Okinawan standards. Through his constant prac- knowledge of the masters of Karate and their con- tributions to creating Isshinryu. Understanding the tice with the Bo and Sai it is said that his fore- people involved leads the student and instructor arms grew in both size and strength to the point alike to a deeper respect for the evolution of the that he was able to crush a coconut between his art. bare hands. The origin of Higa Matsu’s Tonfa or Tuifa tech- Higa Matsu nique is a rather interesting story. In the late (1790– 1870) 1820’s while he was still a relatively young man there was a visiting Chinese master on Okinawa who specialized in the “Iron Ruler” or Tuifa. Al- Who he was ready well known for his Bo technique, a match A student of Matsumora Kosaku and part of a was setup between the two. Whether this was well known martial arts family. As second son setup by the combatants directly or others is not he distinguished himself for his fighting skill. known, however the match did take place. As with any fight involving weapons the risk was tre- mendous. The Chinese master attempted to con- Key Instructors trol the fight and pressed the attack, but every time he did so Matsu was able to deflect the at- Unknown—He was a Kobudo expert and guard tack and regain control. The two fought for al- in royal service. He was also influenced by Chi- most thirty minutes before a draw was declared. nese martial arts. The Chinese master was so impressed both with Key Students Higa Matsu’s technique as well as his calm atti- Ufuchiku Kanakushiku (Kinjo Sanda) — Po- tude during the battle that he offered to teach lice commissioner and well known Kobudo mas- Matsu his Tuifa technique. This Tonfa technique ter. He added many weapons to common became a staple of the Kobudo community along Kobudo training and many consider him the first with Matsu’s Bo and Sai work. modern Kobudo master on Okinawa. The next newsletter will continue to provide The Individual Kobudo masters that helped to shape Isshinryu. Rather than outline the training and many de- Kobudo is an important part of Isshinryu Karate, and it’s history and included aspects are impor- tails of his life, which exceeds the space allo- tant knowledge for student of Isshinryu. cated for this article, I will instead share a spe- cific incident from his life. Higa Matsu developed the local weapons of Bo and Sai and became renowned for his skills with the Bo. In an era where piracy was prevalent his skills were frequently put to the test. One notable physical attribute of Matsu was his size. Volume 7, Issue 4 Page 3 Sam Sheridan’s “The Fighter’s Mind” By Mario Drouin In 2010, following his book “A fighter’s Heart: One Man’s fight and in other sports like marathons. He asked Roach Journey Through the World of Fighting”, Sam Sheridan about the debate on who would have won in between wrote a second book: “The Fighter’s Mind: Inside the Mohammad Ali and Mike Tyson. His answer was: “Ali Mental Game.” To create this book, Sheridan met, inter- would have fucked with his head and made Mike a mess viewed and studied boxers, wrestlers, MMA and UFC going into the fight. Pure power for power, Mike would fighters, coaches and trainers as well as extreme ath- have knocked him out, but Ali could have got to him letes. mentally, and I think he would have, because Mike was so weak mentally.” His view is that Tyson was a great puncher which would make the fights end in usually less Freddie Roach, nicknamed the “Choirboy” is one of the than six rounds. But if he would hit you and you would trainers Sheridan met. Roach owns and operates “Wild still be there, he would mentally break. Sheridan refers Card Gym” in Hollywood. He was Trainer of the Year in to Ali as ‘one of the great psychological warfare practitio- 2003, 2006, 2007 and 2008. Manny Pacquiao, Mike Ty- ners in boxing’. Ali had made George Foreman believe son and Oscar de la Hoya are some of the boxers he that he had used a witch doctor before their fight in Zaire coached and helped. Freddie Roach says there are two and it worked. sets of minds for fighters; the ones who gain from a loss and those who get destroyed by it. The two best exam- Sheridan then met David Horton, an ultra-runner from ples of these opposites are himself and Manny Pacquiao. Virginia. Horton once held the Appalachian Trail record, a race that runs 2,175 miles, from Georgia to Maine and he Freddy Roach was a well-known boxer; he had a hundred did it in 52 days and 9 hours. He also crushed the record and fifty amateur fights and twenty-seven pro fights be- for the Pacific Crest Trail, a 2,650 miles race which he did fore he got knocked out. He sums it up as: “I skipped the in sixty-six days. When Sheridan asked Horton what kind fear because I started so young; I never had fear in a of mental game he’d play with himself, his answer was: fight until after the first time I got knocked out. I was “There are two statements that I use. The first is simple: never even hurt by anybody – I was invincible. Then one this too shall pass, it will end. It can’t last forever . day I never saw the punch coming, and I woke up on the because sometimes things will feel that way. The second floor. I got up, the guy rushed me and put me down one is very, very important: It never always gets worse.” again, and fuck, and then the ref stopped the fight. From His reasoning is that our body is capable of so much that point on, I knew I could get knocked out and that more than we think possible, it is all psychological. Hor- changed my whole game, my attitude. Before that I ton has been is some races where he had felt finished would go in reckless. I would take a couple to get mine and then, a day or two later he had started feeling chip- off too. But then I knew what could happen and it made per and good. He says: “When you’re in a bad race, and a big dent in my fighting career. I wasn’t fearless any- it is ten miles into a fifty-mile race and it is hurting bad more. It put a question mark in my head. That was the right now, what is it going to be at forty? It may feel a beginning of the end, the start of a downhill slide of my lot better…and there is only one way to find out.” fighting career.” To expand on the mind set a fighter has to be in, Sheri- In contrast to Freddie Roach is Manny Pacquiao. He is a dan talked to Josh Waitzkin, a chess champion since he very popular person in the Philippines. In an interview, was six years old. When he met him, Sheridan says: “you the Philippines’ secretary of the environment said: could feel him watching you with those soft brown eyes-- “Manny Picquiao is our greatest national resource”.