The furry martial art thread.

Hey fluffy things.

I thought I'd open a thread for any practicing and non practicing martial artists to introduce their martial art side with a post about their martial art; and even for furs who don't study, an opportunity to gain some insight.

Hmm... as for ground rules I was thinking of just keeping this topic focused on promoting one's art to the masses (or at least the furs subscribed to this forum) as opposed to the whole "Oh yeah, well my sensai could beat up your sensei" and "my art's better than your art because..." etc.

Anypoop, I'll finish off with my art

I've been out of the loop for a while and I'm looking at getting back into it. I'm 31 years old now and I started way back in '90 when I was 14. I got into it when I was just getting into high school, fearful that the next 4 years of my school life were going to be worse than when I was going to public school, as I always seemed to fall victim to the insecurity of bullies.

I started off with Shaolin Kempo Karate, which was a hybrid style of Shotokan, Five animal style Kung Fu and Ju Jitsu. I spent about three and a half years studying it and earned my way up to 3rd Kyu brown belt. The "kyu" was the level of the brown belt, represented by a black stripe, which meant I had 2 more levels (kyu's) to go until my first Kyu, and then I'd be ready for my first "dan" black belt.

Anyways, my instructor ended up moving on to become a physiotherapist and a new instructor came in. But I lost interest fast because I didn't like the way this new guy taught. Oh yeah and being 18 and having a job, seriously cut into my martial arts lessons and I had to move on.

I then moved on to other martial arts, but couldn't find anything as fulfilling as Shaolin Kempo was for me. I tried other styles of Karate and Ju Jitsu and even did some Ninjitsu for a bit but eventually my burn out got a bit too much and I put it on the back burner.

After a few years passed, I was reading an article in a magazine on Systema. I was 21 years old at the time and this strange new style caught my interest and after reading the article, I found that the head school was not too far away from where I lived. So I thought I'd go down and check it out. Well after a couple of trial classes, I was hooked.

I found out that the Russians have had their own martial art for centuries but in 1917 the communist government banned anyone from teaching and/or learning the traditional style (although "somehow" Stalin's body guards were still proficient in the use of Systema, hmmm... I guess the government likes to have all the fun . Up until the fall of Mikhail Gorbichev, only certain units within Spetsnaz (Russian Special Forces) were taught the ancient fighting techniques (even though it was still unofficially being practiced behind closed iron curtains).

Anypoop, without testing to see if there's a character limit, I'll leave a couple of videos on the style I used to take, and still practice when I have nothing to do around the apartment.

Shaolin Kempo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1CvTeV-Kk8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07HZaO3ERe8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lbNGvvrSM0

Russian Martial Art (Systema):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKJ5hPL_gJ4

http://virtualtour.tv/russianmartialart2.wmv

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Q9Kl41uN-Dw