Martial Art "Food Chain"

[Deldavala]

Depends on how you rank it. Krav Maga is probably the one best suited for general survival. Its also one of the few that has no rules. If your opponent is incapitated or dead you basicly win. You also learn how to turn everyday objects into weapons, fighting with knives, guns, gun removal and so forth.

[lokithor]

Brazilian Jiu Jitsu hands down, the early UFC's in the 90's proves this as Royce Gracie a brazilian jiu jitsu practitioner wiped the floor with every opponent submitting them all then all good mixed martial art's fighter going onto learn brazilian jiu jitsu i think it speaks for itself.

and then wrestlers adapted and now BJJ isn't as dominant as it once was.

[Mumba]

Talking straight up fightning MMA type is the best simply because it is the only purpose and is always refined to remove weaknesses.

[Bigbazz]

MMA isn't a martial art, that should be pretty obvious from the name "mixed martial arts", its a mix. Jeet Kune Do that Bruce Lee developed is essencially MMA, he thought wing chun and other chinese arts were flawed and decided to throw away the crap and mix in all the good stuff.

[Tziva]

Although I only study one school of arts, I very much subscribe to the JKD/MMA philosophy that there isn't a strongest/weakest art and it's all about taking what is useful and discarding what isn't. I'm sure generally there are classes of ones that are more or less realistic, more or less impractical, more or less good for sport fighting. There are probably superior arts in particular situations, or even more likely superior moves from particular arts to respond to other particular moves, but I think the general idea of training in any one art is going to be flawed and imperfect.

That said, you can train in MMA or JKD, even though that's not training a martial art... but it will train you in a variety of useful techniques in a variety of useful scenarios.

[GlassJoe]

I'd never rank MMA as a "top" marital art.
I'd never rank TKD as a "bottom" one.

Personally I've found that WingChun is a very effective martial art. Though I've several times ended situations with TKD with a quick kick, the range and power is usually enough to end most real world confrontations right there. But if it gets in close, WingChun or Krav Maga style martial arts end things quickly. Take people out hard, take them out quick. If that means breaking a joint (say a knee), so be it. You dont get points for style or flashy moves. You get to keep living by winning because it only takes one unlucky punch to kill someone so every second a fight lasts, is a second you are in danger. And put them down, dont ever ever voluntarily go down with them, last place you want to be is on the ground.

I think most experienced martial artists, dont really rank arts. Its pointless. There is so much cross over between them, but you only realise that once you have studied several of them for a substantial period of time. Many WingChun techniques are identical to TKD techniques. The "problem" with TKD is that it was mass taught, so the simplest explanation was given for a move (Low block = block kick! yeah, ok if you want a broken arm). as opposed to the correct more complex one for the movement.

Learn what you are comfortable with, and get good at it. In the real world the "best" martial art is the one that works for you.

Though I personally stay away from grapling martial arts. I learn enough to be competent at it, but I dont see the point in specialising in rolling round on the floor. Yeah its great if there is only 1 opponent.....but in a real fight the last place i want to be is on the floor. People rave about jujitsu..ok, it did well in MMA...try that in real life and the bloke who you are pinning to the ground is beat. but his mate just took you out with a bottle to the back of the head.

Same reason I dont get the whole "MMA" is great thing. Yeah, its great in competitions (much like why many TKD fighters stuggle in real world situations), but its got major issues in real world situations.

I suppose it depends on if you consider martial arts about actual defense, or about winning competitions. I personally stopped competitions once I realised I was learning how not to fight. How to score points and do "legal" moves......sod that. All moves are legal in a real situation, and the only point that matters is the one awarded to the person still standing at the end.

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unfair.
TKD is a brilliant martial art for defense. but its been taught as a sport in many areas so people think it sucks. It really does not. Its a martial art that was designed to be used in actual conflict, its effective if taught and practised correctly, not from a mcdodjo or as a competition sport.

Stop. Stop. JUST STOP. You lost legitimacy at "Wing Chun is an effective martial art". Just stop. Youre embarrassing. Then you proceed to say "mma is great in competition but it has problems in real world situations" and "rolling on the ground bottle back of the head" yadd yadda yadda. What does ANYONE do when they receive a bottle to the back of the head and outnumbered? Please tell me oh Great Master of all that is combat. What do you do with a bottle to the back of the head? Let me ask you. What do YOU do when a collegiate level wrestler double legs you, then proceeds to ragdoll you at will as youre trying one of your "monkey paw" techniques you learned in Kung Fu theater and Jackie Chan movies? Youre delusional, to a points its painful. You don't practice martial arts, just stop it. The fundamentals that work are boxing, wrestling, judo, BJJ, Muy Thai, and Krav Maga. Period. Few elements from Karate and TKD (very few) have been proven to be effective in competition etc. but the percentage that work versus the previous I mentioned is far lower than those. The delusional people that STILL exist even though modern mixed martial arts has THOROUGHLY AND REPEATEDLY proven time and time and time and time again and debunked all of those other laughable "arts" just absolutely blows my mind. I can respect opinions, uninformed or ones I agree with or not. But you sir fit the stereotype of every delusional couch romper that idolized Bruce Lee and Kung Fu matinee and blah blah blah. Youre not realistic. At the place I train (where I get murdered on a regular basis) the wrestlers, Muy Thai, and BJJ guys we have would thoroughly embarrass you. Just STOP.

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Although I only study one school of arts, I very much subscribe to the JKD/MMA philosophy that there isn't a strongest/weakest art and it's all about taking what is useful and discarding what isn't. I'm sure generally there are classes of ones that are more or less realistic, more or less impractical, more or less good for sport fighting. There are probably superior arts in particular situations, or even more likely superior moves from particular arts to respond to other particular moves, but I think the general idea of training in any one art is going to be flawed and imperfect.

That said, you can train in MMA or JKD, even though that's not training a martial art... but it will train you in a variety of useful techniques in a variety of useful scenarios.

But there IS stronger forms of combat than others. That's just not up for debate anymore. You can study Kung Fu your entire life, for 25 years. Pit him into a competition and or real life scenario against a collegiate level wrestler who is also an amazing boxer. I guarantee you 100 times out of 100 (barring some weird freak accident) that gentleman studying Kung Fu will get absolutely annihilated, possibly hurt to a fatal degree. It really is that simple. Theres the movies and fight scenes where guys would come at you one at a time and you would do some ridiculous motion where they would fall down, and there is reality. Wrestling, boxing, Jiu Jitsu, Krav Maga, ,Muy Thai, judo, all reality based forms of combat. Kung Fu, Aikido, etc etc all NON reality based forms of combat.

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and then wrestlers adapted and now BJJ isn't as dominant as it once was.

Absolutely. Thank you someone for finally making some sort of realistic observation based on real life. BJJ still a basic building block everyone needs to know, but man wrestlers REALLY are (in my opinion) the toughest men on the planet. Every one else, including strikers, jiu jitsu practitioners, boxers you name it all try to adapt ways around wrestlers. They are pretty much the Achilles heel of everyone and you HAVE to have a way around them these days to even be moderately successful in mixed martial arts.

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Imo Krav Maga, Israel special forces martial arts. Made for killing, so not sure if it qualifies lol.

If youre going to mention Krav Maga in that aspect, you have to mention Eskrima. Not sanctioned anywhere in the world because of its center on joint manipulation and "dirty" fighting. Not pretty, not flashy, very little talked about. But highly realistic and effective, if you run into someone that's been doing it a while, you've got some problems.

[Tziva]

But there IS stronger forms of combat than others. That's just not up for debate anymore. You can study Kung Fu your entire life, for 25 years. Pit him into a competition and or real life scenario against a collegiate level wrestler who is also an amazing boxer. I guarantee you 100 times out of 100 (barring some weird freak accident) that gentleman studying Kung Fu will get absolutely annihilated, possibly hurt to a fatal degree. It really is that simple. Theres the movies and fight scenes where guys would come at you one at a time and you would do some ridiculous motion where they would fall down, and there is reality. Wrestling, boxing, Jiu Jitsu, Krav Maga, ,Muy Thai, judo, all reality based forms of combat. Kung Fu, Aikido, etc etc all NON reality based forms of combat.

I agree, but none of that is in conflict with what I said. To reiterate: I think the idea of any one art being the best is flawed. The best approach is to train in the ones that are good and have a holistic approach. I'm not saying that some arts aren't more successful for fighting than others, I'm saying that there isn't a "food chain" hierarchy so much as there are multiple good arts, and the best fighter will probably be a person who is trained in multiple of those arts rather than just one of them.

If youre going to mention Krav Maga in that aspect, you have to mention Eskrima. Not sanctioned anywhere in the world because of its center on joint manipulation and "dirty" fighting. Not pretty, not flashy, very little talked about. But highly realistic and effective, if you run into someone that's been doing it a while, you've got some problems.

I think you might mean panatukan (Filipino "dirty" boxing) or another art. Escrima (also known as kali or arnis) is common and widely practiced (then again, panatukan is and has in fact greatly influences western boxing afaik). In fact, the primary expert and one of Bruce Lee's three sanctioned practitioners of JKD, Dan Inosanto, also teaches it and his seminars are packed. Granted escrima and panatukan go hand in hand as Filipino martial arts but they're not interchangeable. Escrima has empty hand stuff but is largely weapons based, while panatukan is exclusively empty hand (unless you count the use of cockfighting blade rings and whatnot).

Or you might mean something else altogether. Your "joint manipulation" kinda throws me off. Maybe you mean Silat, the Indonesian art?

[tiporispit]

"Avoidance" arts immediately go to the bottom of the list. It's great, in theory. It's worthless, in practice. You can watch the greatest of the greats in ANY sport, and they can go down like a sack of potatoes from a single mistake. Trying to dodge everything an opponent does, with no way to end the fight other than playing ballerina, is a merely a waiting game for that slip-up.

Now, if the avoidance technique is to simply take off running, then I would put that at the TOP of the list. Physical confrontations are silly little machismo games that lead to unnecessary ass-kickings. You don't really impress anyone outside a bar beating up the "Star Wars" kids, anyways. Do some burst training. Do some stamina exercises. Everyone is already a grand master of the technique. Grats.

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and then wrestlers adapted and now BJJ isn't as dominant as it once was.

They adapted by adding BJJ to their own arsenal...

As for Krav Maga, the primary goal isn't to kill. That's complete nonsense. The primary goal is to survive. You attempt to use any means necessary to facilitate an ESCAPE, not a killing blow hahahaha

[Huckfealing]

They all have their own flavors. I myself have been in several martial arts over the years, and can say I've learned something unique from just about every one. Philippine martial arts taught me flow, tae kwon do, tsught me control, boxing taught me stance, Silat taught me speed. But the food chain is kinda unnecessary. Sure some are more commercial than others, but they all have their own niche.

I've always had the standpoint of martial arts that, they are all by the nature of the name, not that effective in real life situations. When you train in say TKD, you are training against other TKD practitioners. Furthermore in real life fights you don't train for those X moments. Another person joining the fight. Them bring out a weapon. Loosing your footing on unknown surroundings.

I mean, sure, M.A.'s are flashy and very good at teaching you aspects but they don't apply well to real life. So a food chain is unnecessary, since I would consider them all just stepping stones. If anyone wants real training for being prepared for those moments where shit meets the fan, they should look into Combatives.

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Imo Krav Maga, Israel special forces martial arts. Made for killing, so not sure if it qualifies lol.

Absolutely wonderful system, time tested, field tested. It's one of the best in the world.

[Sand Person]

it's truly impossible to have ratings on martial arts. it's just a complicated game of paper, rock, scissors. style A beats out style B. which, in turns beats style C. who then, beats style A.

[Huckfealing]

Stop. Stop. JUST STOP. You lost legitimacy at "Wing Chun is an effective martial art". Just stop. Youre embarrassing. Then you proceed to say "mma is great in competition but it has problems in real world situations" and "rolling on the ground bottle back of the head" yadd yadda yadda. What does ANYONE do when they receive a bottle to the back of the head and outnumbered? Please tell me oh Great Master of all that is combat. What do you do with a bottle to the back of the head? Let me ask you. What do YOU do when a collegiate level wrestler double legs you, then proceeds to ragdoll you at will as youre trying one of your "monkey paw" techniques you learned in Kung Fu theater and Jackie Chan movies? Youre delusional, to a points its painful. You don't practice martial arts, just stop it. The fundamentals that work are boxing, wrestling, judo, BJJ, Muy Thai, and Krav Maga. Period. Few elements from Karate and TKD (very few) have been proven to be effective in competition etc. but the percentage that work versus the previous I mentioned is far lower than those. The delusional people that STILL exist even though modern mixed martial arts has THOROUGHLY AND REPEATEDLY proven time and time and time and time again and debunked all of those other laughable "arts" just absolutely blows my mind. I can respect opinions, uninformed or ones I agree with or not. But you sir fit the stereotype of every delusional couch romper that idolized Bruce Lee and Kung Fu matinee and blah blah blah. Youre not realistic. At the place I train (where I get murdered on a regular basis) the wrestlers, Muy Thai, and BJJ guys we have would thoroughly embarrass you. Just STOP.

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But there IS stronger forms of combat than others. That's just not up for debate anymore. You can study Kung Fu your entire life, for 25 years. Pit him into a competition and or real life scenario against a collegiate level wrestler who is also an amazing boxer. I guarantee you 100 times out of 100 (barring some weird freak accident) that gentleman studying Kung Fu will get absolutely annihilated, possibly hurt to a fatal degree. It really is that simple. Theres the movies and fight scenes where guys would come at you one at a time and you would do some ridiculous motion where they would fall down, and there is reality. Wrestling, boxing, Jiu Jitsu, Krav Maga, ,Muy Thai, judo, all reality based forms of combat. Kung Fu, Aikido, etc etc all NON reality based forms of combat.

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Absolutely. Thank you someone for finally making some sort of realistic observation based on real life. BJJ still a basic building block everyone needs to know, but man wrestlers REALLY are (in my opinion) the toughest men on the planet. Every one else, including strikers, jiu jitsu practitioners, boxers you name it all try to adapt ways around wrestlers. They are pretty much the Achilles heel of everyone and you HAVE to have a way around them these days to even be moderately successful in mixed martial arts.

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If youre going to mention Krav Maga in that aspect, you have to mention Eskrima. Not sanctioned anywhere in the world because of its center on joint manipulation and "dirty" fighting. Not pretty, not flashy, very little talked about. But highly realistic and effective, if you run into someone that's been doing it a while, you've got some problems.

You make a lot of good points, but also some that I just do not subscribe to. As someone who's been in street fights, the whole ground fighting techniques are worthless when it comes to other people joining the mix. I've been in several martial arts since I was 11. TKD when I was very young, moving onto Eskrima for 4 years, Into boxing for 2 years, and then Silat for 5 years. Now I'm in Knife Fighting, and urban combatives. The X factor is everything in determining a fight. And that's what people need to see and train for. It's not always going to be 1v1 so you can get down and do a scissor hold.

[QQingshaman]

Stop. Stop. JUST STOP. You lost legitimacy at "Wing Chun is an effective martial art". Just stop. Youre embarrassing. Then you proceed to say "mma is great in competition but it has problems in real world situations" and "rolling on the ground bottle back of the head" yadd yadda yadda. What does ANYONE do when they receive a bottle to the back of the head and outnumbered? Please tell me oh Great Master of all that is combat. What do you do with a bottle to the back of the head? Let me ask you. What do YOU do when a collegiate level wrestler double legs you, then proceeds to ragdoll you at will as youre trying one of your "monkey paw" techniques you learned in Kung Fu theater and Jackie Chan movies? Youre delusional, to a points its painful. You don't practice martial arts, just stop it. The fundamentals that work are boxing, wrestling, judo, BJJ, Muy Thai, and Krav Maga. Period. Few elements from Karate and TKD (very few) have been proven to be effective in competition etc. but the percentage that work versus the previous I mentioned is far lower than those. The delusional people that STILL exist even though modern mixed martial arts has THOROUGHLY AND REPEATEDLY proven time and time and time and time again and debunked all of those other laughable "arts" just absolutely blows my mind. I can respect opinions, uninformed or ones I agree with or not. But you sir fit the stereotype of every delusional couch romper that idolized Bruce Lee and Kung Fu matinee and blah blah blah. Youre not realistic. At the place I train (where I get murdered on a regular basis) the wrestlers, Muy Thai, and BJJ guys we have would thoroughly embarrass you. Just STOP.

post count 1, and that's the tone it comes in. well, what do we have here?

But there IS stronger forms of combat than others. That's just not up for debate anymore. You can study Kung Fu your entire life, for 25 years. Pit him into a competition and or real life scenario against a collegiate level wrestler who is also an amazing boxer. I guarantee you 100 times out of 100 (barring some weird freak accident) that gentleman studying Kung Fu will get absolutely annihilated, possibly hurt to a fatal degree. It really is that simple. Theres the movies and fight scenes where guys would come at you one at a time and you would do some ridiculous motion where they would fall down, and there is reality. Wrestling, boxing, Jiu Jitsu, Krav Maga, ,Muy Thai, judo, all reality based forms of combat. Kung Fu, Aikido, etc etc all NON reality based forms of combat.

the swiftness and power that a 25 year student of any Asian martial art would move with would be far too much for a collegiate wrestler. I'm not sure if you have watched any tkd (not saying i think tkd is especially effective) but the speed at which they can go from a standing position to a foot firmly planted in a guys face is astounding.

Absolutely. Thank you someone for finally making some sort of realistic observation based on real life. BJJ still a basic building block everyone needs to know, but man wrestlers REALLY are (in my opinion) the toughest men on the planet. Every one else, including strikers, jiu jitsu practitioners, boxers you name it all try to adapt ways around wrestlers. They are pretty much the Achilles heel of everyone and you HAVE to have a way around them these days to even be moderately successful in mixed martial arts.

i do agree with you on this point, wrestling is the base with which most MMA fighters build on. But there are exceptions. Chuck Liddell was a terrific wrestler who rarely used it offensively, Lyoto Machida looked unbeatable for a while because he utilized Karate and noone knew how to fight him. You can't deny how effective other forms can be.

i think that wrestling is the most consistently utilized style of fighting, and the basis of mma is b/c it is the style that benefits from being a freak athlete the most(which all the top contenders are), you can just out will you opponent and it comes down to a battle of wills/conditioning.

[Hraklea]

the swiftness and power that a 25 year student of any Asian martial art would move with would be far too much for a collegiate wrestler. I'm not sure if you have watched any tkd (not saying i think tkd is especially effective) but the speed at which they can go from a standing position to a foot firmly planted in a guys face is astounding.

Those asian martial arts requires range for their movements. If you get close enough, they don't have enough space to hit you hard enough to stop you from taking the fight to the ground, and those asian martial arts have no techniques to deal with ground fighting. Then the wrestler wins.

I think the idea of any one art being the best is flawed. The best approach is to train in the ones that are good...

Those things are not exclusive. "The best is to mix style A with style B" does not mean that training only style A can't be better than training only style B or vice-versa.

[Tziva]

Those things are not exclusive. "The best is to mix style A with style B" does not mean that training only style A can't be better than training only style B or vice-versa.

I didn't say they were, but it would depend on what A and B were.

[Huckfealing]

I stand by what I said previous. That, Martial arts are good when you are learning systems. Flow, control, power, ect. But it falls short in real life application. Which is why I prefer to immerse myself in more time tested arts, and training in combatives.

[Deleted]

[QUOTE=GlassJoe;22434949]Stop. Stop. JUST STOP. You lost legitimacy at "Wing Chun is an effective martial art". Just stop. Youre embarrassing. Then you proceed to say "mma is great in competition but it has problems in real world situations" and "rolling on the ground bottle back of the head" yadd yadda yadda. What does ANYONE do when they receive a bottle to the back of the head and outnumbered? Please tell me oh Great Master of all that is combat. What do you do with a bottle to the back of the head? Let me ask you. What do YOU do when a collegiate level wrestler double legs you, then proceeds to ragdoll you at will as youre trying one of your "monkey paw" techniques you learned in Kung Fu theater and Jackie Chan movies? Youre delusional, to a points its painful. You don't practice martial arts, just stop it. The fundamentals that work are boxing, wrestling, judo, BJJ, Muy Thai, and Krav Maga. Period. Few elements from Karate and TKD (very few) have been proven to be effective in competition etc. but the percentage that work versus the previous I mentioned is far lower than those. The delusional people that STILL exist even though modern mixed martial arts has THOROUGHLY AND REPEATEDLY proven time and time and time and time again and debunked all of those other laughable "arts" just absolutely blows my mind. I can respect opinions, uninformed or ones I agree with or not. But you sir fit the stereotype of every delusional couch romper that idolized Bruce Lee and Kung Fu matinee and blah blah blah. Youre not realistic. At the place I train (where I get murdered on a regular basis) the wrestlers, Muy Thai, and BJJ guys we have would thoroughly embarrass you. Just STOP.

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This is a hilariously misguided post. Tae kwon kicks MIXED with BJJ and Wrestling are proving very effective in the UFC at the moment. See Anthony Pettis for example. Or Max Holloway vs Dennis Bermudez for outstanding turning back kicks.

The point is no one martial arts is better than another. A good mix and healthy understanding/ respect for other arts is much much more effective.

You can be the best wrestler in the world but if im quick enough to catch you with a spinning heel kick, axe kick or roundhouse kick your going to be in trouble. Vica versa if your quick enough to get me down im in trouble.


And to say that MMA isnt a martial art because it takes moves from all arts is hilarious given the amount of cross over between traditional martial arts.

[Tziva]

And to say that MMA isnt a martial art because it takes moves from all arts is hilarious given the amount of cross over between traditional martial arts.

It's just semantics. I didn't mean it as an insult to MMA or some statement on MA purity, but more of a comment reflecting the philosophy behind it. Mixed martial arts is supposed to be a blending of the best stuff from a lot of arts. In that regard, it's not one single art, but it wasn't intended to be a discrediting statement.

People say the same about JKD but it's at least a lot more formalised than MMA would be. I mean, maybe it shouldn't be, but I think it is. That's probably just the unavoidable result of it being spread through a limited number of people and the lineage so young.

[nbm02ss]

Most effective is Long-distance running; especially if you're outnumbered.

Seriously though, if you're going to fight someone who is surrounded by their friends your failing at basic survival. They're not going to line up one-by-one to give you their wrists so you can flip them through tables.

[QQingshaman]

Those asian martial arts requires range for their movements. If you get close enough, they don't have enough space to hit you hard enough to stop you from taking the fight to the ground, and those asian martial arts have no techniques to deal with ground fighting. Then the wrestler wins.

There are asian styles of martial arts that are designed for clinch fighting. But even in the case of striking styles, range comes before close quarters. If all you have is wrestling and you attempt to fight a blackbelt it is like bringing a knife to a gun fight.

[Hraklea]

The point is no one martial arts is better than another.

Wrong. A pure BJJ fighter beats a pure TKD fighter 10 out of 10 times.

If all you have is wrestling and you attempt to fight a blackbelt it is like bringing a knife to a gun fight.

Actually, you can easily find videos of the Gracies destroying a few "Kung Fu masters".
You're talking like it is impossible to get close to an asian martial artists. That's simply not true.