sparring in MT

[cfr]

To add to the others questions about sparring; Let me first start off with the disclaimer that I dont train at a full blown MT gym. I dont want to step on any toes here.
I train at a school from Dan Inosanto's lineage. We mix MT into some other stuff. Anyways, I heard a rumor that lots of people in MT dont do all out sparring. That what happens is the instructor holds pads where he wants you to hit, you hit them, he looks for openings and lightly counters you. The logic being that due to the brutality of MT, too many injuries would occur from all out sparring. I also stopped by a MT gym a couple of years ago and he made reference to the same sort of training. Is this how most of you full time MT practitioners spar? Im curious.

[dbok1]

To answer part of your question I guess, usually when I hold for students I always counter an attach if I see an opening. For example if I see that there hands are low/down I will throw some light punchs to the head to let them know to keep there hands up. This is nothing new, seems more like regular pad holding then sparring.

As far as sparring is concerned we do all kinds of mix sparring (just hands, kicks, knee's clinch, combo of all) at different levels of speed and intensitiy. I don't know of many gyms that do "all out" full sparring but I'm sure some do, there are many gyms.

If you read the post by Khun Ko he explains it best in one of the other threads about sparring.

Hope that helps.

[alexjxaver]

That is the thai theory of sparring. But since the majority of us dont fight twice a month like the thais, we dont have to worry about getting hunt as much. If a thai gets hurt he wont be able to get fight and wont get any money that would hurt him, his gym, and his family. so they have to be careful. Since fighting is not how most of us support ourselfs, i think it is OK to try to kill each othere once in a while. But light sparring also has its less painful bennifits. They are both good

[thaibxr]

sparring

where I train we use thai pads focus mitts for certain drills but we also put the gloves on and its a lot more fighting than sparring and the only protection we have on is the gloves,cup,and mouth gaurd

[Damian Mavis]

Thaibxr, you spar bone on bone kicking eachother in the legs? No shin guards?

Damian Mavis
Honour TKD

[thaibxr]

bone on bone

yes we train bone on bone if we get bruising we just dont use the injured limb until it is healed.I have done it this way for a while now and it takes a preety good shot to cause an injury.It takes some getting use to we start out very light and then slow build up the power.

[OctaviousBP]

I don't even like to do pad drills if the holder isn't wearing shin guards, let alone sparring bare shins.

[thaibxr]

its not for everyone