Episode 555 - Why Everyone Should Consider Tournaments
In this episode, Jeremy and co-host Andrew Adams talk about Why Everyone Should Consider Tournaments.
Why Everyone Should Consider Tournaments - Episode 555
Tournaments and competitions are divisive topics that make martial artists either excited or mad, teachers either interested or not at all, and schools either go a lot or not ever. There are positives and negatives of joining tournaments but what’s certain is the pressure it creates brings out the best and worst of martial artists. In this episode, Jeremy and co-host Andrew Adams, who are not strangers to competitions themselves, talk about why everyone should consider tournaments.
Why Everyone Should Consider Tournaments
Show Transcript
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey there. Welcome. This is whistlekick martial arts radio episode 555. Today, we're going to talk about why everyone should consider tournaments. My name is Jeremy Lesniak. I am joined by Andrew Adams and we're here on this show to talk about traditional martial arts. Why? Because everything we do at whistlekick is in support of the traditional martial arts. If you want to see everything we do, all the things that we've got going on, check out whistlekick.com that's our online home, a place to find our store. And if you find something in there that catches your eye use the code podcast15 to save yourself 15%. If you want to check out stuff for this show specifically whistlekickmartialartsradio.com that's the place to go, that's where you're going to find every episode that we do, we put out two a week and it's all with the goal of connecting educating and entertaining the traditional martial artists of the world. If you want to contribute to that work, you can do a number of things. You could make a purchase like I said, you could share an episode, you could follow us on social media, tell a friend what we've got going on, pick up one of our books on Amazon, leave a review on podcast platform or Google or Facebook or somewhere else that I didn't think of or support the patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick it's a place where we post exclusive content and if you contribute as little as $2 a month you're going to get access to some of. The more you willing to contribute, the more we're going to give you access to.
So, tournaments. Competitions it's a divisive topic, it's one that gets some people really excited and others really mad and Andrew this was your idea to talk about, so I want to give you the opportunity to intro it.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, thanks.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Why you want to talk about it.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, so tournaments are things that happen whether you do or don't like them they're going to happen, and they happen all over the world and I have been at schools whose main purpose or I haven't been at them as a student, but I've been to schools where their main focus was competitions, and they might do 15 to 20 tournaments a year and then I have been at schools that don't do any at all ever. And I've had instructors who were against tournaments for various reasons and I have had instructors who were neutral on the subject. So, I think there's a wide range of things to discuss in this, but I think there's a lot of good reasons to consider doing tournaments, as long as you understand some of the negatives that may happen as well.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And when you say do tournaments, you're talking about attending tournaments not necessarily hosting or promoting tournaments, right?
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, that's correct. I'm talking about the school going as a school to a tournament to compete.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, and we talked about this subject little bit back, way back on 52, but you brought up in listening to that one, you know, we really talked about it, I talked about it more from the side of promotion and hosting because it was right around the time, we were getting ready to host a tournament, the first and only whistlekick tournament. So, if you want to see that.
Andrew Adams:
The episode was a great episode to talk about what make—what could make a tournament, a good tournament? But that's not what I think we'll be discussing here.
Jeremy Lesniak:
No and I like the title that we have why everyone, everyone, should consider, right? So, we're talking about everybody who is training but we're not saying everybody has to compete. We're not saying that it's a good thing for everybody, but I think everybody, and I agree, everybody needs to understand the up and downside to competition and if it lines up with your values as a martial artist
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely, yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
When I was growing up, we—I wasn't in a tournament school by any means I mean I think my time in competition probably exceeded the time in competition for the rest of the school combined except maybe the instructors. You know I competed heavily, and we had a number of people who would you know go watch or something and that was actually at the instructor’s recommendation they said “you know look there's something to be gained in competition and you don't really know if it's for you unless you try it. So give it a whirl and see what you think” and that was really the theme of a lot of what we did in that karate school that I was raised in. That you know, let's give it a whirl, let's see what happens you know, how about you what was your kind of introduction to competition?
Andrew Adams:
When I was in high school, the traditional Dojo that I trained at decided to become members of the—had all the kids become members of the AAU the Amateur Athletic Union and we ended up going to four, maybe three or four tournaments that year, it was not mandatory for students to go to the tournaments, it wasn't a required thing but it was definitely advertised as something that was available and so I did a handful of tournaments at high school age 15, 16, 17, somewhere around in there. And then I probably didn't attend another tournament until, not probably, I didn't attend another tournament until I was a black belt
Jeremy Lesniak:
And what did you think of those early days?
Andrew Adams:
I enjoyed it. I'm one that really, I don't know how to say it, excels in tournaments. I don't mean—I do well, but I do well with pressure and stress, and I enjoy competition. Regardless of whether it's martial arts or you know for those many of you out there may know that I do music as well and I compete in an organization within my music as well and I enjoy competition. So, for me I like it. I got a lot out of it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, I could see that. I'm very similar in that, I like the pressure, I like the platform of competition. Martial arts competition is probably the--it was the first place where I felt special and that came not just because I started doing well, but because it was a rare time where everyone was paying attention to me and I like that. I like that feeling of being the center of everyone's focus at least for a little while.
Andrew Adams:
And you brought up a great word which is pressure. There are--I've had an instructor who said there are three times when you're truly pressure tested. One is a tournament, that you are put under the gun and put under the wire and you've got to perform in front of people. The second would be testing, you are definitely put under the pressure when you're going for your next rank. And the third is an actual altercation somewhere out in the real world. So, pressure testing is definitely a pro in my opinion for tournaments. You get to see how well you do in a situation where you have to perform and not have to worry about that, you know, if you're on the street and you're being pressure tested, well, something could really go wrong. Well, nothing's really going to go wrong at a tournament you might not perform well but that's also not the end of the world.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I would say there is no safer way to inoculate yourself against the anxiety of performing martial arts in front of people when it matters than doing forms in a competition.
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak:
When you talk to anybody who teaches self-defense and combatives you know, not just martial arts but you know higher level stuff where the likelihood of utilizing those skills is much greater. They talk about they need to perform under that pressure, and I think we can all agree that you know we might do great in training, but when you've got to use it, you know, someone tries to mug you or whatever your use of those skills is going to have a strong correlation with your ability to handle the stress of that situation. So, training under those stressful situations you can only take that so far in your own space you get used to the people, you get used to the environment, you got a competition and it's different and it's like you said it's one of three times and I think it's so valuable in that respect. I can stand up in front of crowds, massive crowds, and give presentations because of my time performing forms and sparring in front of a bunch of people.
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely. It's a matter of stepping outside of your comfort zone and making your comfort zone bigger and then you step outside of your comfort zone a little bit more and make it even bigger and then things can become more cheap, much easier to do. Now, I say the word can because some people's anxiety is such that it would not be beneficial for them to go and I think that can be a con for going to tournaments, that if you may have kids who have such anxiety, that if it's something that is required for them to do, they might just stop altogether and leave your school.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yep. Yeah, I completely agree and I'm not a big fan of mandating competition. I think there are ways that you can achieve that stress level attach important, you know it could be setting up a mock competition environment in the school, you know you could do a lot of things like that that are lower key because everybody's got a level that they are able to perform at, right? If the person showing up to class, they have a level that you can work with and so you just need to find what’s a little bit more and that's that iterative progress of martial arts that we do inherently with everything else that we do, just from one to the next to the next and you get a little bit better and you can apply that with pressure as well.
Andrew Adams:
Sure, but it requires an instructor who's willing to—I don't want to say willing cause I think everyone would be willing, but that is able to see and recognize students who might become too anxious and recognize that other students in the school might not realize cause not that all participants at tournaments or kids, but I think of vast majority would be. Would you agree?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, at any of the competitions I've been at across multiple circuits under 18 children have certainly made up the majority of competitors.
Andrew Adams:
And so, if that's the case, I think it's also important to recognize that, let's say it going to this particular tournament is not mandated but you have a large number of kids who are going, and you have a student who has such anxiety that doesn't want to try it or doesn't want to go recognizing that other students may inadvertently pressure that student to go and that could also be a downside.
Jeremy Lesniak:
For sure. What else? What are some of the other—I bet you got a list in front of it.
Andrew Adams:
Of course, I'm a list guy.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm a list guy too but I didn't have to be a list guy cause you're the list guy. I'll let you be the list guy. It was your topic. What's the next one?
Andrew Adams:
So, pressure testing was number 1. Number 2, sportsmanship and understanding that it's okay to lose and how to be a good winner.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Now, I bet people listening are saying “Yeah, but you know everybody deals with that, everybody knows—No. Nope. Not even a little. Look at our society today.
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
People cannot handle losing or not being the best or being heaven forbid wrong at with something, right? And we're facing a lot of problems in society right now with that. Now, I'm not going to pretend that we're suddenly going to get a bunch of adults to join martial arts and go to competition and that they will you know, in a short period of time become more sportsmanlike but we still have children you know maybe we have to skip this generation and go on to the next.
Andrew Adams:
So, I think that that can't be overlooked, the ability to learn that which leads into the next couple of topics which is teamwork and friendship. Teamwork being if you're going as a school you're going as an organization and you're working together you might not necessarily be directly working together unless you're doing a like a team kata or something but learning how to work as a group and supporting each other is also a very important skill I think for kids to learn.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. Sport is for everybody to learn. And one of the things that I've noticed you know, you talked about the distinction between schools that really embrace competition and those that don't, the ones that embrace competition I'm going to be you know, I'm going to make a statement that may not appeal to everyone. The schools that embrace competition, in my experience, have higher quality students. Overall, it does not mean that there aren't exceptions, I do not describe the school that I went to as embracing competition and I would like to think that I did well as a competitor and that I am a competent martial artist. But here's why I make that statement, the whole point of going to competition is to get better, right? You go, you perform, you have a result, you hopefully go back to the drawing board and find how you can improve. Well, the more people you have going back to the drawing board, the more you're going to see people picking up ideas from each other, they create a culture, maybe there are different classes and maybe you reject that concept in martial arts and I don’t mean you Andrew and maybe a listener but if you take a look at every sport, every athletic endeavor, does that not tend to happen? Football has training camps; the Olympics brings people together not just from the same sports but from a bunch of sports and they train in the same environment. You're creating an environment that has expectations, then those expectations are established by the group, by the culture and once you become part of that culture you tend to go along for the ride.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, I would agree. Absolutely. The last thing which kind of ties into what you were just talking about is students become exposed to different martial arts and because you're likely not, I mean not that this doesn't happen there are tournaments like this, but most tournaments are not only open to one style. Again, I know there are some that are like that but certainly the most of them are open tournament, so if you are a Shotokan school you're going to go to this tournament and see Taekwondo forms, or see some Kung Fu forms, or other styles of martial art that you haven't had exposure to which can help you as well grow as an individual within your learning and I think having a discussion after a tournament with your students as to what they saw, can lead to some really great teaching and learning moments.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I agree. Absolutely. By getting out of the environment that you are used to you're going to see a lot of different things. I made friends on the competition circuit, I learned refinements to my existing techniques, I learned new techniques, I learned forums, I met people who I went to train with. The one of the reasons that I went to College in central mass was because there was a martial arts school I wanted to attend. It wasn't the main reason, but it was definitely a factor, “oh and if I go here, I could train there”. So, by getting that exposure to more and different you start to see how big and broad the world of martial arts is and for most of us when we train in our school were—whether we want to realize it or not we're to pretty small group you know most martial arts classes don't have more than couple dozen people in the middle of time and we're working with one perspective on what martial arts is and if you don't know how many different perspectives there are, sometimes conflicting, it can be really easy to think “Oh well, this is just how it's done” I've seen that. I've actually lived that. I've been to other schools and thought “I didn't even know this was a thing”, “I didn't even know that you could do it that way”, “I didn't know that a class could run in this different way” and the more you're exposed to them, the more you determine what you like, what works for you, what doesn't, and if you go on to teach someday, you get to incorporate those ideas and that all starts from exposure and there's no better place for exposure than competition.
Andrew Adams:
Yep. Yeah, I would agree. So, that goes through my list of pros, but I think this discussion wouldn't be complete without discussing some of the things that may turn people off to competition and explain why some schools they have chosen not to because maybe they put more stock in what we're about to discuss which might be some of the things that are not as good.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, what do you got first?
Andrew Adams:
So, the one that I always hear, and this doesn't mean necessarily thinking this is true, but this is an argument that I hear often which is that for in regard to sparring, that it teaches students how to pull their punches and not actually and I'm putting this in air quotes effectively do a technique. I remember hearing stories of and I've been in traditional dojos where once you do a technique and you let's say you flip someone doing a judo throw or some such, you are not allowed to hold your hand out and help the student up because it teaches you're helping your enemy and you know, I don't know how true this story is but I've heard it from multiple different instructors that there was once someone who was confronted on the street by someone with a knife and did the technique you know, the person tried to mug him and the martial artist effectively disarmed his attacker, and then when he was done through the knife down on the ground next to the person that was attacking him because that's what he was used to in the Dojo. So, the argument there is that going to tournaments where you're not necessarily punching full force at an opponent teaches you to not be effective that's the argument that I have heard.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And I keep hearing your voice that you don't fully agree with that and I'm going to call big old BS on that argument and here's why. If let's say that's true, let's say there's a school and they don't attend tournaments because sparring and utilizing less than full force is conditioning them to not perform as well, if the need arises. That's a good summation of the argument.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Alright. How are they training?
Andrew Adams:
Exactly.
Jeremy Lesniak:
If you're not pulling your punches, and competition is training you poorly then that only leaves two possibilities in training, you're not doing anything that approach is sparring thus you're not training any kind of focus at any range, right? You're not working with people in that way or even worse you're going full force among all your training partners all the time
Andrew Adams:
And breaking people
Jeremy Lesniak:
And that's not going to work either. Here's how I see it. Does point sparring any kind of competition sparring is that directly applicable to street confrontations? No. Does it train some of the things that are necessary for a street confrontation? Yes.
Andrew Adams:
Timing, distance, balance.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All the things that are appropriate. Now, here's the thing. It is not and let's be honest, if the only way you know how to determine the range of a technique you should throw is based on, let me say it differently, if I go to competitions and I'm constantly coming really really close to that person that I'm sparring and let's say I'm exceling and I'm winning and I'm getting close or maybe I'm just barely making contact you know not anything that would harm anyone, are you saying for a moment that my ability to judge that range with that person moving cause remember they're not just standing still waiting for me to hit them, it's not a heavy bag, my ability to do that will not translate into making contact? The person is in a different place each time, I have to adjust my range, I have to adjust the point that I'm focusing on. Now, yeah, I do need the ability to take that further. I need to be able to rotate my hips that much more or reach out with my foot that much, whatever the technique is, is it a state slightly different skillset and more importantly mindset. Absolutely, but what's the alternative? Everyone is broken or you never train with partners.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of this argument either. Having said that, I do understand the not helping people up in the Dojo but that's something also totally separate.
Jeremy Lesniak:
There are times when it's appropriate and times when it's not.
Andrew Adams:
Exactly.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm not a big fan of sweeping generalizations. When I say, let's take that example of some kind of grappling scenario and whether or not to put my hand out, if I'm working with someone in the school and I'm throwing them down and they're gifting me their body to work on and we're doing you know more than two, I'm absolutely going to help them up because I want them to help me up because then combined we can put more reps in. We can get better at the park that's important. But let's say I'm working with that same person doing that same exchange in a demonstration, if I'm trying to make it really dramatic, maybe I won't. If it's a grappling competition, I'm not going to help them up until the quote unquote “combative time” is over. I have seen—so here's a great example, most of the competitions I go to are point sparring based on the sparring site and you'll see people who are going incredibly hard I mean there's a lot of intensity and let's be honest, most high-level point sparring tournaments have far more contact than even rules permit and so people saying that you know it's fluffy are probably not paying attention. But the moment that point is called or the match is stopped quite a few especially the best fighters, will help each other up. They'll give each other a high five “hey, that was a good point” they’re trying to get the best out of each other and if you want the best example of this, no, this wasn't point sparring, but it was competition. Bill Wallace and Joe Louis fighting when was that? at 1990, 91? they were best friends, I don't mean they kind of knew each other I meant that they were literally best friends, and they had an exhibition match and the moment that fight started they were beating the tar out of each other and the moment that fight stopped they were best friends again
Andrew Adams:
Yep, and there's that sportsmanship.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes. the two can coexist.
Andrew Adams:
I've also heard the argument and I've seen this personally that it can teach students to be driven by a thing. By getting the trophy or getting the medal and that's why they do it as opposed to at least in traditional schools doing it for growth of the person and I have seen that.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It can happen. And you know when it stops happening? After about the first dozen trophies.
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Ask a kid “hey” well you know let's—well, I'll speak from my personal experience cause that's what I know best. When I started competing and I earned a trophy it was like “Hey. Yay, this is cool. I won a trophy.” and then I remember a couple years later, driving back from Hartford Connecticut, with my arms over two trophies that were five and a half feet tall while the person I went to the tournament with she had one as well, so there were four of us, and these taller than me at the time not that I'm much taller now, trophies in a Dodge Caravan. Driving back 3 1/2 four hours. That wasn't fun. I didn't want those trophies we talked about. Leaving them there they're still in my mother's basement. Now, why do I bring up that example? Because at some point for everyone, the physical manifestation of that success is no longer the important thing. You figure it out. We tend to normalize the things that we have, right? And even little kids you give them a trophy every weekend because they kick some butt, they win, eventually that trophy is not going to mean too much. So, what does? And that's where it becomes special and different. Different people are motivated by different things. I've done it in an episode on participation awards, I should look up what episode that is, and how wrong those are but if finding motivation in some kind of external reward is wrong then belts are wrong, promotions at work are wrong in some cases, there's a lot that is very similar to giving someone an award.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, I see that side. I totally agree with that.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And if you disagree with any of this stuff by all means I want you to
Andrew Adams:
Oh, you know me well enough to know
Jeremy Lesniak:
I do. I look at this news to know that I'm not stifling you.
Andrew Adams:
No, I don't feel stifled. You don't que me on things too and not to say. So, the last topic that I had in regard to the pros and cons, I will admit that I don't know that I have enough experience to see whether this has or hasn't happened, but I have to imagine it has, but I've heard a lot of people say that politically there have been issues where one school is not treated as well as another school be for various different reasons and I would be surprised that that doesn't happen so I have to imagine that it does.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh, it absolutely happens.
Andrew Adams:
And so that can be a downside the instructor may say you know what we're not going to turn because they are quote unquote “not fair” because XYZ. You know we are students will not be judged fairly going to the tournament and so we're just going to allow all of our students to not do well and that's not going to be good for our students, so let's not go.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And so, here's my response to that. Yes, it happens. Yes, that is true. Yes, that is a very compelling reason to not bring people to competition but is that attitude a good philosophy for life? and I would suggest it's not. Most of us have had an employer or co-worker that didn't treat us fairly, we've had some kind of circumstance maybe a teacher or professor who didn't like our work, my writing was absolutely hated in high school and college and let me see I'm the only person who went on out of my high school group when my teachers would continually give me terrible feedback on my writing. I went on to be a managing editor for an online publication one that served in IT company that makes computers and statistically you all have one of them or have. Let's say that they're that big. Just because someone doesn't like you your school, your form, your style, does it mean that you can't get all of the other benefits that we've talked about today? Pressure still defies. It even applies more. I had somebody once score me down on a form and they told me, they were very open about this, they didn't even do that form or the style that I grew up with that that form came from but because they once remembered seeing a video of the styles founder doing that form and his memory of it was different than what I did he scored me down.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, my goodness.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Like it was wrong in about three ways, this was an open competition that wasn't supposed to planned but so what? Okay. So, next time I competed, I made sure that I was that much better. You've got to make it so compelling that they can't help but call your point or score your form highly.
Andrew Adams:
It's very subjective which is what makes this so—which makes it so difficult for some students to wrap their heads around when they don't do well. It's subjective. It's you know that, yes, there are some things that the judges can't be looking for to level the playing field but it's definitely subjective. When I was in my late 30s, I went to a tournament. It's the first one I've been to in many years and I did a Sai form. That I had just taken I just taken an empty hand form gave myself a pair of Sai and how would I do this? And I went to the tournament and in that particular event I took second, and the person that took first and third there were only the three of us, it was a very small contest, but they both did very flashy, spinny, extreme martial arts style Bo forms and after it was all over and I got second the head judge came up to me afterwards privately and said you know I know you only got second but I want you to know that you are the only one that knew how to actually fight with those weapons. Check, that was interesting. But you know, it goes to show that that's another side that people may not understand, that why they're not doing as well.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Right, absolutely. I don't have anything to add.
Andrew Adams:
Which leads to my very last one actually, I thought that was my last one, but I lied.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Good
Andrew Adams:
There are many schools out there that don't do Kobudo or don't do any weapons stuff and that's fine. Every school needs to decide what's best for them, but if there are schools that don't do weapons, they may start to feel obligated and pressured by students to start doing them, so they have something else to do with tournaments.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And I suppose that that could be true. I think my counter to that is if you go to competitions, you'll see that the weapons divisions are smaller. They you know you might have 100 people across an age and rank group doing empty hand forms and maybe 5 to 10 of them will do weapons. Yeah, so if anything, it's an argument against it. Just based on the numbers sure. And more generally.
Andrew Adams:
Sure.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And let's say your students come back and they want more with regard to competition if you can't deliver that that's the exact sort of reason why I advocate for cross training or at least the option of cross training you can't provide everything to everyone. Just no one person can do that whether you're a martial artist instructor or something else. It doesn’t work that way. I think that's a lot, that's a good summary of the pros and the cons.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, we got on the weeds quite a bit.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, and I like that we do and that's why you're here to help me get into the weeds and come back we don't want the canoe stranded. If anybody spend time in a canoe, you know what I mean.
Andrew Adams:
I'm more of a kayak guide myself
Jeremy Lesniak:
You can get the kayaks rated too.
Andrew Adams:
Yep
Jeremy Lesniak:
Anything we want to add before we wrap this up?
Andrew Adams:
No, I think that was a good episode.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Alright. Well, for those of you listening episode 52, episode 189, 189 is a participation award, one if you want to check those out there in your podcast app, they’re at whistlekickmartialartsradio.com and you know what else is over there? All the photos, all the videos, all the links and transcripts for all the episodes are there and if you're up for supporting us and everything that we've got going, you've got a lot of option. You can make purchase at whistlekick.com and use the code podcast15 or you could leave a review, you could buy a book, you could help out with our patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick. If you see somebody out there wearing something with a whistlekick on say hello, if you have feedback for us you can find us on social media @whistlekick or you can email me with feedback or guest suggestions or anything else if you just want to chat hit me up jeremy@whistlekick.com. Until next time, train hard, smile and have a great day.
Andrew Adams:
Have a great day.