Martial arts types: Striking and Grappling
Martial arts is confusing.
What do you think of when you hear martial arts?
Top answers:
I think of MMA and those savage cage fighters
I think of kids’ karatee (hiyah)
I think Tae Kwon do, excellence stripes, and dragon patches
I think of Judo, BJJ and Sambo (jacket sports)
I think Phenomenal athletes
I think Discipline
I think skinny and limber person doing movements in the park
I think pressure points and no-touch knock outs
I think Mike Tyson
How can one word make you think of so many different things? In order to understand martial arts, the easy method would be to make an analogy to the word sports. But martial arts goes far beyond that. Because so much is mystified, isn’t researched, and there is ZERO regulation.
In order to understand the types of martial arts out there, you need to think of martial arts on this chart.
All the different types of martial arts fall into this spectrum.
Striking is very easy to understand. Kicking, punching, stabbing, weapons.
Grappling is also intuitive. It involves two bodies trying to control one another. Within grappling, there is another spectrum. Standing and ground (but more on that later)
Grappling is beautiful because a lot of the training falls near the combative side of the spectrum. This is because getting hit in the face or stabbed with a knife is taken out of the equation. We can grapple and compete much more safely at higher intensities than the striking martial arts.
When one gets caught in a full throttle judo throw, one can land safely. If one gets caught in a full throttle haymaker from left fiend, you’ll probably have a brain injury.
If you look at the difference between striking and grappling, one of the things that stand out the most is the distance between the players. You can’t grapple someone that is 10ft away from you. Can they shoot you? Yes. Any shooting or weapons martial art would lean towards the striking category since it is longer range.
More on cooperative/combative in another post.