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Do you ever speak to people from other clubs (or maybe seen someone at your own club) who has their black belt and you think that there is no way they should have?

For example:

A lady came to the club I train at. She had just moved to the area and was looking for a place to train up until she went for her black belt (she is currently on a 'probationary' black belt - never heard of a club that does that before).

Before I go on, in the region where I train, my club is the only one that allows and welcomes people from other styles to train or have a go

Well she was discussing with me and another senior kyu rank (we were the instructors for the night because none of the dan ranks showed) what she wanted to achieve while she was with us.

It was mainly to maintain her current fitness and to learn some new things.

Now she is going for her black belt in a few months...

We started off the lesson with a run - run for a minute, complete 10 pushups, run another minute, complete 9 pushups etc until to one. Then go up, but with situps instead (we run seniors and juniors together - that's why it was fairly easy). Well she didn't last 3 minutes. She pulled out gasping for breath and our pace was a fairly easy jog.

We had a light sparring session and she pulled out because she was too exhausted.

Pretty much overall, our junior white belts were more knowledgable, fit and had better techniques then her (white is 10th to 7th kyu).

We let her practice her own techniques when we were completing the warmup session before the run and they were horrible. Even for doing a different style, they were bad.

If that lady was in our karate club, she would've lucky to have been at 8th kyu.

It is so obvious when clubs just hand out belts rather then make the students earn them. Like where I am, we get one grading a year, two if we are lucky (more likely to happen in junior ranks). We have about 4 practice gradings leading up to the grading to see if we are ready. If not, the grading is either put off or we have to wait for the next one.

This lady had been training 3 nights a week for 2 years to earn her black belt.


Anyone else have any stories?

Yeah it is, I used to be friends with a girl that had been doing taekwondo for 4 months and was promised her black belt in another 18 months.

She tried to bag me out about it saying how I've been training for 8 years (a that time) and still haven't reached 1st dan. She won a few regional comps at her level and a national. She had that huge of an ego, she asked me to fight against her to see who was better (this was 8 months into her training).

So I accepted, turned up to a few of the taekwondo lessons and joined the sparring team. I went up against her and caused her to colapse within 15 seconds. She did a slow front kick to my solar plexis, I did a quick knee block and corked her thigh. She couldn't walk for a bit and started going off that I was brutal. I threw a few slower punches next time we fought and she couldn't even keep up.

She ended up quiting, but I have no idea why the head instructor would promise her a blackbelt in under two years of training.

I can see why you quit. There's a lady that I train with, she's one kyu rank below me and got really shitty when I went for a grading last time and she didn't. She got even more shitty when she found out I'll soon be going for my third kyu in about 6 months.

Thing is, she puts no effort in, she is extremely unfit and won't push herself and she thinks because I get a lift there with the instructor that he is showing favourtism towards me (he does a little when it comes to working with higher ranks or learning new things such as weaponry, but not when it comes to gradings).

She can't keep up with the group sparring, she fakes injuries and trys to get out of anything too strenuous (sat out when we were told to do 30 pushups, situps and leg raises). She's not going to get anywhere.

Fitness doesnt have much to do with rank. Show me one 10th dan that can run 1/4 mile ^^. Rank of black belt should symbolize that you know all basic techniques katas history and that you could perform and pass on that knowledge to the next generation with skill.

But unfortunately this is europe/america where the almighty dollar talks above all principals. Children whose mommies sent em to 5 classes a week as a daycare have blackbelts in 2 months. Skilless people with big wallets walk out after a test skipping 2 belt ranks. Or better yet the Die hard martial artist with little money who practices 3 times a day 7 days a week, who has amazing skill gets 1/2 belt when they test.

My instructor is 4th dan I think (all the head instructors wear black belts with their katakana name embroided into it, so it's a bit hard to tell what rank they are unless you ask). He runs at least 6km every second day.

Also, my friends' boyfriend was 2nd dan and he was crazy. He cycled 5km to some lake where he used to live, then run around it once with the bike on his shoulders (about 3km), then run around a again stopping every few minutes to do 50 pushups and 50 situps. Then got back on his bike and cycled home.


Yeah, I know. It's quite sad actually. Those who truely work hard persevere to slowly creep up the ranks. These are the students who deserve to achieve any rank they set their mind upon.

But I've seen 6 and 7 year olds running around with a 'junior' black belt at a taekwondo club. When they hit 15, they are given permission to grade for a 'senior' black belt.

Children that young don't know the responsibilities of learning a martial art. They do not understand concepts such as self control. Even some adults don't really appreciate or understand the responsibility and reward of earning a 1st dan ranking.

This girl I know started TKD last year. She says her black belt exam will be in sring 08'. I've been training since 03' and I'm only a sonkyu. She told me to kkep practicing and speed up. rolleyes

Most 10th Dan ranks are given to instructors who "progress" the art or something political within the art or what not. They're like lifetime achievement awards given to old instructors who are well in their years or sometimes given posthumously. Even still, these guys are usually in decent shape.

Physical conditioning isn't exactly necessary for rank per se; however, if you're doing a physically demanding activity such as martial arts consistently for a few years, you theoretically SHOULD be in decent conditioning due to the training. Yet most schools aren't very demanding physically or students are too lazy and take shortcuts or don't take martial arts seriously enough to adjust their lifestyle accordingly.

The sad truth is capitalism folks. Instructors who want to make any sort of living off of teaching martial arts (or even to pay for upkeep of the equipment/gym fees) need money and to get that money they need paying students. Instructors fear making the curriculum too physically demanding out of fear that students may quit due to the difficulty. They also test often and give out belts in an effort to appease students. People (especially in the fast food American consumerist society) want instant gratification (which is why "loose weight fast" schemes/pills/exercise machines is big money as is "fast food") and they want to see results for their effort quickly or they might get bored and quit and find another school that will reward them for their "effort" more easily (And considering there's practically a handful of martial art schools in any town, loosing students to your competition is an understandable fear). There's also the sad state that a lot of schools are basically day care centers now and of course since instructors need the money they're not going to refuse students regardless of their age and you can only do so much when teaching little kids. There's also a lot of students who aren't looking to be the next Olympian or cage fighters and are only looking for an excuse to work out, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but because martial arts is just an exercise hobby for them they tend to take the training less seriously.

Consumerism is just a fact of the times. Martial arts instruction isn't a sought out or necessary commodity in contemporary peaceful society. People aren't seeking martial art instructors to teach them how to fight in a war because martial arts aren't necessary for war anymore. It's no longer customary for students to petition instructors in order to allow them to be their student. Nor is there the quality control that gym busting used to offer, weeding out weaker schools. Martial arts are now primarily sport and are merely optional. In order thus to survive financially as a martial arts instructor, you generally have to compromise in terms of who and how you teach a martial art. Watered down teaching led to watered down students which led to watered down martial arts.

It would be odd if what she was about to be a black belt in was TKD, but other than that, you have to understand that all arts are differant and so are the schools that practice them. Maybe your school emphasizes physical fitness to accel, I've seen TKD schools that center on the ability to strike and damage; and others where students never touch each other yet still go to competition and spar for the judges.