Episode 954- Greg Lynham
In today's episode Jeremy chats with Greg Lynham (left) from the UK, cohost of the Conversations on Karate podcast.Greg Lynham - Episode 954
SUMMARY
In this episode, Jeremy is joined by Greg Lynham to discuss his journey in martial arts. They talk about how Greg got started in martial arts, the transition from traditional martial arts to MMA and jiu-jitsu, and the changes in his training approach. They also touch on the importance of kata, the benefits of sparring, and the use of the makiwara. In this conversation, Greg Lynham discusses his approach to martial arts training and teaching. He talks about his preference for orthodox sparring and the importance of balance and technique. Greg also shares his teaching style, which focuses on fast-paced, game-based classes that allow students to learn by doing. He emphasizes the importance of creating a friendly and lighthearted atmosphere in his classes. Greg also talks about his podcast, Conversations on Karate, and how it started as a way to answer questions from his training partner. He shares his plans for the future, including teaching seminars and courses, and his passion for drawing and artwork.
TAKEAWAYS
* Greg's martial arts journey started when he was seven years old after watching the Power Rangers.
* He initially focused on kata and later transitioned to MMA and jiu-jitsu.
* His training approach has become more pragmatic, focusing on live drills and sparring.
* Greg still appreciates the value of kata but sees it more as a form of movement and meditation.
* He emphasizes the importance of applying techniques in live training and refining them through sparring.
* Greg has recently started using the makiwara as a tool for precision and balance in striking.
* Orthodox sparring can be effective, but it's important to be adaptable and switch between dominant and non-dominant hands.
* Fast-paced, game-based classes can help students learn by doing and improve their skills more quickly.
* Creating a friendly and lighthearted atmosphere in martial arts classes can make training more enjoyable and help students feel comfortable.
* Podcasts can be a great way to share knowledge and connect with others in the martial arts community.
* Teaching seminars and courses can be a valuable opportunity to share expertise and learn from others.
*Engaging in creative hobbies, such as drawing, can provide a balance to martial arts training and offer a different outlet for self-expression.
CHAPTERS
00:00 Introduction and Overview
02:13 Greg's Martial Arts Journey
08:44 Transitioning to MMA and Jiu-Jitsu
15:20 A Pragmatic Approach to Training
19:00 The Evolving Perspective on Kata
22:11 Applying Techniques in Live Training
26:55 Using the Makiwara for Precision
32:36 Adapting in Sparring
35:48 Fast-Paced, Game-Based Classes
38:23 Creating a Friendly Atmosphere
42:20 Conversations on Karate
50:14 Teaching Seminars and Courses
59:02 Balancing Martial Arts and Art
Show Notes
To contact Greg Lynham on Instagram: @glynham1990 or @conversationsonkarate✅Subscribe to whistlekick Martial Arts Radio on the following platforms:
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✅You can find whistlekick on all social media platforms using the handle @whistlekick or visit our website at https://www.whistlekick.com or https://www.whistlekickmartialartsradio.com
Show Transcript
Jeremy (00:02.027)
Hey, what's going on everybody? Welcome. You're tuned into Whistlekick martial arts radio and on today's episode I'm joined by Greg Linham. I know this is gonna be a good one stick around We're gonna have some fun. If you happen to be new to what we do at Whistlekick Well, please start at whistlekick martial arts radio comm I know I know it's a podcast I'm telling you to to go check out stuff on a website, but it's worth it Why because we give you a transcript for every single
All the things that we talk about, the websites and everything, you're probably driving in your car and you say, know, I would check that out, but I'm driving and I don't want to get into a car accident. Well, that's why we do that, right? So when you're done with an episode, go check out the show notes, go to the website, because that's the full show notes, the stuff that get in your podcast players and all of it. But if you want to go even deeper with what we do, because what we do at Whistlekick is so much more than martial arts radio, check out whistlekick .com. There's just a ton of stuff over there for all the things we are making.
to connect, educate, and entertain all of you, the traditional martial artists of the world. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for your support. And Greg, thanks for being here, I appreciate
Greg Lynham (01:03.104)
Thank you for having me. It's taken us a while to get here, but we finally got here. Which was my bad, I will say.
Jeremy (01:08.129)
coordinating schedules and it doesn't matter. It matters that you're here. The beauty of this is that if you hadn't said anything, the audience wouldn't
Greg Lynham (01:14.453)
Here we
Greg Lynham (01:18.912)
That's true. That's true. I just I needed I needed to apologize for me. Thank you.
Jeremy (01:23.945)
It's okay. I accept your apology, although it is unnecessary. know, time zones are tough. Busy schedules are tough. Trying to coordinate. I mean, life is just chaotic, right? And we're trying to make everything work and there's no right answer. You do the best you can. Yeah. So where should we start? We got a few places I think we can start. Do you have a preference?
Greg Lynham (01:38.591)
It sure is.
Greg Lynham (01:44.214)
Absolutely.
Greg Lynham (01:54.302)
I don't, I'm happy to start wherever you'd like to start.
Jeremy (01:56.969)
Okay, all right, so then we'll go to the, I try to make this a more fun version, but kind of the straightforward version, which, you know, it's gonna be, how'd you get started in martial arts? But here's how I wanna frame
Jeremy (02:13.993)
It's, you're a kid and you turn on the TV and you see this new TV show that just started and it's about this guy, Greg Linham. And he's a martial artist, but it's the first episode and we need to find out all the things we need to know about him before he even gets started as a martial artist. We have to care about the character, right? So that TV show pops on.
And what do we see in that first episode?
Greg Lynham (02:45.999)
You would see probably a seven -year -old kid staring watching the Power Rangers going, I want to be able to do that. That was what you would see. Yeah, that was my initial kind of introduction to anything martial arts.
Jeremy (03:05.641)
And were you hugging your parents saying, want to do this or was it their idea? did how did that
Greg Lynham (03:12.242)
I've got kind of conflicting memories. I'm pretty sure I have to check, but I was kind of a very shy kid. I wasn't that into sports or anything. So I think when I first mentioned it to my parents, they were dead keen to get me into some sort of martial arts, anything sporting, I think. So yeah, they jumped at the chance to get me into a martial arts place.
Jeremy (03:36.951)
So seven, you know, certainly not the youngest, but you know, it's a time a lot of people get involved. Do you remember anything about that early training?
Greg Lynham (03:47.542)
I do. I remember my very first class. I remember it vividly well because there was one moment in the class where the teacher who would be my teacher for 25, 24, 25 years after that was demonstrating a sidekick on someone holding a kick shield. And the visual of that guy flying back through the air into the wall from the kick was like, wow.
Jeremy (03:50.049)
Really?
Greg Lynham (04:17.194)
that stuck. So yeah, that was a memory that I'll keep that forever.
Jeremy (04:24.395)
So you're in there, you're seven, I assume it's a kid's class.
Greg Lynham (04:28.206)
No, so all of the classes were mixed, adults and kids. Yeah. And we, to be fair, we still do that now, but we're just literally moving away from it within the next couple of months into splitting the classes into adults and kids. Say again. No, no. But, but Joe, who you've had on before, Joe Andrews and I, yeah, we can't, came from similar backgrounds.
Jeremy (04:31.733)
Really? Okay.
Jeremy (04:42.239)
You're at the same school. You're at the same school.
Greg Lynham (04:57.254)
of mixed classes and stuff like that. And we're just now looking into, into splitting them up. But yeah, no, all the classes when I was coming up were mixed. so yeah. we've been thinking about it for a while. I think since we both kind of started doing MMA, Jiu -Jitsu, stuff like that, where the classes are divided, we find that we get a lot out of those classes. And we think if there were kids in the class, it might
Jeremy (05:02.099)
Why are you changing
Yeah, why change
Greg Lynham (05:26.272)
kind of affect the learning for us. So we were thinking maybe the adults in our classes feel like that. And some of the feedback we've had, I think would benefit the adults. And I think it benefits the kids as well. They kind of get more of our attention and stuff like that.
Jeremy (05:39.821)
I'm a fan of both. At our school, we have kids classes and adult classes and then a mixed class in between for people who want to come. Because, you know, it does a few things. It provides an opportunity for parents to do something with their kids because there aren't a lot of opportunities for that, number one. Number two, it reminds the adults that it's okay to have fun, right? I can get the adults to be a little more youthful in what we call our family class. And it makes the kids step
Greg Lynham (05:44.68)
Yeah, that's a good idea to be fair, yeah.
Greg Lynham (05:53.395)
Absolutely.
Jeremy (06:10.273)
because we don't come in at that real low level of expectation in terms of drills and everything, right? Instead of counting to five, we're counting to 10 or something. And so it makes them stretch up a little bit. It's not a fit for all of the children, but it works well for everybody. I like it. I think it's a good compromise.
Greg Lynham (06:31.134)
Yeah, there's definitely benefit to it. And, it's, is a trial essentially kind of the way we we've been doing things a lot is we'll have an idea. We'll try it for six weeks or so, and just try and get feedback, see how it goes. So yeah, it may change. We may stick with it. We'll see depending on the feedback really.
Jeremy (06:50.945)
So you started at seven.
What kept you going?
Greg Lynham (06:57.286)
I just fell in love with it really. I just loved it. I loved it. It got me into, I think shortly after I started, I watched the Karate Kid films and that I just wanted to be like Danielson, you know? And yeah, I just fell in love with it. I was never a big fan of the sparring as a kid because like I said, I was quite a shy kid. So I was always more of a catter guy.
Jeremy (06:59.616)
What about
Jeremy (07:15.777)
Yeah, we all do.
Greg Lynham (07:27.326)
than a sparring guy. But yeah, that's changed over the years. Yeah.
Jeremy (07:33.439)
Yeah? How did that change? Or I guess, why did that change?
Greg Lynham (07:37.712)
for me, it was kind of learning more about what the cutter does, what the cat's for the applications and stuff like that. then sparring more in a way that's in line with those applications. Cause we, mean, in my old club, we used to do a lot of point sparring and we used to do kind of kickboxing style sparring as well. but we didn't really do any like, I don't want to say MMA.
but kind of MMA, you know, the, the kind of sparring where you integrate takedowns and grappling and stuff. So it was kind of just started doing that. I enjoyed that and yeah, that's what got me more into
Jeremy (08:21.889)
And, you know, if we continue that model of episodes of a TV show, you know, we're watching you grow and what happens? Where are some of the things that take the story in a different direction? Do you stop at some point? Do you go off to university and that changes things? Do you join a different school?
Greg Lynham (08:44.51)
Yeah. So the big change was when my teacher stopped essentially, he had a few, a few injuries that were kind of really getting to him and he was, he was always a very involved teacher. He would, he was never a teacher who would kind of sit on the sidelines for the warmup or the hard training or the sparring. He would be in there with everybody all the time. And when
It got to a point that he couldn't do that. He, he just kind of felt like stepping away, which was fair enough. And he asked me if I wanted to take the club on. So, so I did with no kind of real, knowledge of what that might entail really. So I was.
Jeremy (09:29.269)
How old are you?
Jeremy (09:36.893)
How old were you at that
Greg Lynham (09:43.03)
I think I was probably about 25, I think. I wasn't that young,
Jeremy (09:44.641)
Okay. Okay, so it's not like you just started. It's 18 years of training.
Greg Lynham (09:49.478)
No, no, no, absolutely. Yeah. the teaching stuff and the, the, yeah, all that fine. Yeah. Nothing. No problem. It was more the, the logistical stuff and like organized, like it's just, it was just work for me that I didn't really have time to put a hundred percent into. so essentially we, I only had a few of us anyway.
So we kind of turned it into more of an informal session where we would then look for somewhere else to train. And that's when I found Joe. And there's a story there behind which we could probably get into.
Jeremy (10:33.749)
Yeah, I think that would be good, you know, and Joe's been on twice, right? He's had a proper episode. And of course we had him on as part of the project as Suzy was earning her black belt, and prepping and testing and post black belt.
Greg Lynham (10:39.808)
I think he's been on twice, yeah.
Greg Lynham (10:47.742)
as absolutely. Yeah. So, was Sue was one of the ones that came with me from, when we moved over to Joe. So I think she was a eighth Q maybe at the time. yeah. So it was essentially, it was her, a guy called Brad and myself who were looking for somewhere to train. There was three, I would say main ones. And then there was a couple kind
Jeremy (11:11.137)
It was just three of you.
Greg Lynham (11:17.33)
extras who would sporadically train. Yeah, yeah. So a couple of casuals, filthy casuals.
Jeremy (11:22.037)
Yeah.
Greg Lynham (11:26.678)
So yeah, so then we found Joe and yeah, so Joe and I kind of knew of each other through our instructors who did not get on essentially, which neither of us really kind of knew the details of until more recently.
Jeremy (11:38.602)
Hmm
Jeremy (11:47.487)
Is that something you're willing to talk about?
Greg Lynham (11:50.402)
I mean, we can do it. I, be honest with you, I, I don't have too much to say. I know Joe spoke about his previous instructor on his episode, I think. but yeah, so essentially I knew they didn't get on. My instructor wasn't really someone who he didn't really talk about it that much. He just, if ever that, name or place was brought up,
it was known that they didn't get on, but it wasn't kind of actively discussed. So when we kind of found out
where each other was coming from it was a bit kind of like huh okay so you come from that guy and you come from that guy
Greg Lynham (12:35.764)
But yeah, so
Jeremy (12:35.861)
Little bit of a Montague and Capulet, Romeo and Juliet sort of vibe. Yeah.
Greg Lynham (12:39.956)
Yeah, what I was thinking about this is kind of a Cobra Kai thing. It's kind of like Daniel, Son and Johnny joining forces. Yeah, so that's kind of how it happened. Yeah, so when I first met Joe properly and we spoke and he was starting on the journey that I was probably a couple years into in terms of transitioning from that traditional bass into a more...
Jeremy (12:49.175)
Yeah. All right.
Greg Lynham (13:08.114)
I don't like the word applied, but applied karate kind of area. So yeah, we just hit it off well and started training there. Eventually I ended up teaching. I think I taught just a couple of weekend things as part of their club gradings. They would always have an instructor come in. So he asked me to do that. And then, yeah, we kind of just joined up together really from
Jeremy (13:36.073)
And anytime people combine anything in martial arts, even when the schools are part of the same organization and they have the same instructors and the same curriculum, there's still some challenge there. you weren't quite that much overlap. In fact, we don't know how much overlap you had, but what was that merger like?
Greg Lynham (14:00.862)
It was seamless, to be honest with you. It really was a Joe is, Joe, Joe is fantastic. All the stuff that I am terrible at. So all of the stuff, the, the, the self promotion, the avid, like all the stuff I said that I was not good at Joe is fantastic at. so essentially all I do is teach. turn up, I teach, you know, that's it. And I'm happy with
Jeremy (14:02.687)
Really? It's a wonderful surprise for me.
Jeremy (14:25.387)
That's it.
Greg Lynham (14:29.738)
Like that's the stuff I love doing anyway. So yeah, it was, it was really seamless. Yeah. Yeah. It's a really, I think we're a very good team. because we've got slightly different backgrounds as we both come from traditional Shotokan, but my background was also kind of kickboxing as well. my instructor was looking back probably ahead of the times really.
Jeremy (14:31.073)
It's an important part.
Sounds like a great marriage.
Greg Lynham (14:59.102)
in terms of the cross -training and integrating stuff from combat sports into the traditional arts to make them more effective. So yeah, it works well, the pair of us really.
Jeremy (15:12.415)
And how long has that been going, the two of you?
Greg Lynham (15:20.342)
since 2019 I would say, probably officially was when I was teaching with Joe.
Jeremy (15:25.499)
five years so that's certainly long enough to have you know we kind of started this discussion talking about a change in scheduling but what about changes in what you teach or how you teach I imagine there have been some of those
Greg Lynham (15:40.114)
Yeah, it's changed massively, to be honest with you, which probably listening to could be a bit of a concern to some people. yeah, in terms of how our view on karate has changed, our view on the way people should be taught has changed. It has changed a fair bit. So I think when we first started teaching together, we were both very kind of
kata application heavy, shall we say. and then it just kind of naturally shifted forward into, both started doing jujitsu and MMA and got really into kind of, I don't want to say the sport karate because that's a whole nother thing, but just kind of the combat sports, the abilities to be able to practice live, what you teach and what you're training straight away.
And obviously with the podcast that Sue and I do, speaking to all these other people and getting ideas from them, yeah, it just kind of evolved. So now we've, we're kind of set into a good system, I think, of what we teach.
Jeremy (16:50.158)
So then when people ask you, because this is a challenge that I have, maybe you have advice, when people ask you, well what do you teach? What is your style? Do you have a hard time answering
Greg Lynham (17:04.166)
I used to, I don't so much anymore. I just say karate really. don't really. Yeah. I mean, I don't, I don't, I don't say Shotokan anymore because I think it would be unfair to say what we do is Shotokan. so I don't really know what it is to be honest with you. I had this chat with Ken, Ken Knight of, of Ken Fu the other day where we were kind of going at what point.
Jeremy (17:07.787)
What do you say?
That's what I say and a lot of them don't like that.
Greg Lynham (17:32.65)
Does it stop becoming karate when we start adding things? And I don't know if there is that point really.
Jeremy (17:40.479)
What I found, and maybe this is helpful to you, I was hoping you were gonna help me, maybe I'm helping you. When people ask me, what do you teach? it's karate. And enough people know that there are different styles of karate that even if they don't know what they are, it's a follow -up. In the same way, well, what rank are you? I'm a black belt. How many stripes or what dawn?
Greg Lynham (17:46.984)
We'll help each other. It's fun.
Greg Lynham (17:56.99)
Yeah, sure.
Greg Lynham (18:08.62)
That means you can beat up anybody.
Jeremy (18:10.859)
Right, exactly. So the follow -up response that I give to style now is, well, you know, it's a bit mixed based on my experiences, but it comes from an Okinawan philosophy.
And they don't know what that means. So they stop, which works out well for me. But what I found, and we've talked about this on the show, I bet you've even used some of the same language. The first thing that people start training tends to become a language for them. And they see the martial arts that they do through that language. It's the letters, the words, the sentences. And if you teach me any martial art, I'm gonna be approaching
more or less as Okinawan karate and just that's my default and I'm veering off here and
Greg Lynham (18:59.612)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's very true. I even start jujitsu, we kind of look at it through that karate lens. It's once it's in there, it's hard to get, it's hard to get out.
Jeremy (19:12.961)
It's like an accent, right? I mean, I did years of taekwondo and my forms looked like a karate guy doing taekwondo, even if I tried not to do
Greg Lynham (19:14.752)
Yeah, absolutely, yeah.
Greg Lynham (19:22.9)
Yeah, so Sue has been, she was doing some weapon Kobudo training online with James Hatch Sensei over in Japan. They would zoom and she would show me some kata that she was practicing and I very, still very Shotokan in the stances that I do, the big movements. It's so hard to get out even after all this time. It's, yeah, it's still in there.
Jeremy (19:50.177)
still in there, probably always be in there. I don't think that's bad.
Greg Lynham (19:51.988)
Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure it will.
No, no, I don't think so. I don't think so at all.
Jeremy (19:59.019)
So you've mentioned a couple times a.
Jeremy (20:05.779)
I'm playfully say this, don't actually mean it, but you were a former kata, passionate kata devotee, but maybe you're in recovery from that. Yeah.
Greg Lynham (20:13.758)
Yes. I'm in rehab for it. No. No, I still, I still, I love Qatar. I still do. I, but just in a different way now than I used to. More kind of in the way that I originally used to love it. So I kind of used to love it just because I wouldn't get punched in the face doing it. when I was a kid, then I really kind of fell in love with tearing apart, learning the applications and stuff like that.
And then I kind of, now they're more for me, just a form of yoga almost, just movement. I tend to do them fairly slow and I'll be honest, I don't practice them that often anymore in my own time. They are, they absolutely are. So, I mean, we still teach them, we still do them, but I mean, in my own personal training, it's not something I tend to do.
Jeremy (21:04.117)
they part of your school curriculum?
Greg Lynham (21:12.968)
Normally I do it if the kata is boiling or I'm waiting for the microwave or something like that. That's my kata time. Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, no, I love the history of karate, martial arts in general, but the karate history fascinates me. And obviously kata is a big part of that. So that's, I still love that. I still read about it all the time. But as far as my...
Jeremy (21:18.049)
It's a good time for
Greg Lynham (21:39.262)
personal training goes, I wouldn't say it's as catta or application focused anymore.
Jeremy (21:46.347)
Now how much of that is because you did spend a lot of time in that way prior and it even sounds like maybe
to degree that you didn't invest what you could have into more freeform live, kumite, et
Greg Lynham (22:10.718)
Yeah, I mean, for me, the applications to CATA is fantastic. It's great. And I love it. And I learned a lot from doing that and studying under Ian, Abhinethi and all of those guys. And I love
For me, what I would always find is the more I sparred and the more I would just live drill and live train things.
pieces of kata that I hadn't necessarily drilled would just come out. It kind of went back to that old thing of just practice the kata and it will appear in fighting, which nobody really believes.
But it kind of does, it kind of does happen if you're training in the right way. and I, and I've said this before and I maintain you, kind of show a MMA fighter or just a top fighter, a form and say, could you break that down? They would do it in about 30 seconds because they know how to fight. They know how to move. And I think the trouble with trying to dissect.
a form is A, we don't really know what it looked like originally anyway.
Greg Lynham (23:25.618)
And, and B as humans, we're very good at seeing things in patterns that aren't there. It's just what we do. So you kind of end up, you know, coming up with these weird funky applications of sometimes simple movements. You know, like sometimes it might just be a block. It might not be a, a jumping, spinning neck crank or something. Do you know what mean? It might, sometimes it could just be exactly what it looks like.
So yeah, think for me spending too much time analyzing the applications and not enough time just training was a detriment to my own personal ability, if that makes
Jeremy (24:06.431)
Yeah. Yeah. Because at some point you have to take the, the academic things that you're, you're looking at and try them, use them, play with them. You know, whether it's, you know, on the bag or on Makiuaro or sparring with, people in class, right? It can't just, it can't only exist in the mind. It has to be implemented. And I think there are, I think there are people who, because I'm, I'm very much what you're describing. I love digging
Greg Lynham (24:14.602)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Jeremy (24:35.777)
to forums. love understanding all the many things that they could be. Right. You know, one of the things I'll do to challenge myself is say, okay, yeah, 99 times out of a hundred, these three movements are probably doing this, but what else could they be? Right. I enjoy that. think, I think the value, the biggest value in forums is not what they are, but the framework it gives you to ask the question of what else could they be? Right. That I think is the most important part because it keeps you engaged.
Greg Lynham (24:51.594)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. yeah, I love that.
Greg Lynham (25:01.022)
Yeah.
Jeremy (25:07.275)
But then at some point I've got to grab a live body and say, all right, do this. Let me try this out. you know, it doesn't work that way. But if it's, what if it's not that it's this and that starts to work better. And that's something that I'm trying to get my, I try to get my students to do. I'm sure you do the same thing because it gets those wheels turning.
Greg Lynham (25:15.402)
Mm -hmm.
Greg Lynham (25:24.138)
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I know I love as kind of like you said, an academic exercise of analyzing for I love to do that still, but it's kind of it's in a separate box now to my kind of, I don't want to say practical, but live training. And the other thing I found as well, which I still struggle with this in terms of practicing solo cutter is
I don't know this is because I come from a Shotokan background where everything is over exaggerated, it's deep stances and it's kind of very aesthetic based. But as if we look at kata as kind of shadow boxing movements, it needs to match the movement that you're doing with a partner. Otherwise shadowing it isn't really going to give you any benefit.
Jeremy (26:21.825)
Yeah, I do.
Greg Lynham (26:21.938)
know what mean? So if you're shadowing something that's sort of half similar to what you're doing with a partner, it needs to be the same just without the partner there. Whereas the nature of kata is very, like I said, aesthetic in the way we would do it anyway. So there is that disconnect, which I would always struggle with because I would always find myself trying to practice the kata as I would do it with a partner. And then the yukata kind of looks ugly.
But don't want your cat to look ugly. You want your cat to look really nice. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, that was, that was a tough one. But now that's why I've kind of separated the two and I've, I've just gone right. My solo cutter is it's that kind of meditative, yogic kind of kind of practice and the application stuff just comes in when we're doing the live drills.
Jeremy (26:55.211)
There's a conflict there for sure.
Jeremy (27:16.319)
Makes sense. I do my forms in different ways at different times depending on what the goal is. I think it can be, and to me that's the value, right? Is that it's once you learn the movements.
What do you do with them? Right, and you can do so many things with them. You can take that forum and it can be a flexibility drill, it can be a power generation drill, it can be a speed drill, it can be a practical drill, it can be relaxation. You know, one of the things I will do, I will take a forum and if I'm feeling stressed, I'll really turn down the speed and turn it into Tai Chi for lack of a better explanation. And.
Greg Lynham (27:44.008)
Exactly, yeah.
Greg Lynham (27:58.366)
Yeah, I love doing that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jeremy (28:03.477)
Yeah, it's like having one song on your phone and it's the only song you need.
Greg Lynham (28:10.344)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think, I think as a martial art, they're, they're, we're lucky to have them. I think they, they do offer a lot of benefit, even though I don't practice them that often anymore. I think, I mean, I remember during lockdown, COVID times, you'd see the BJJ guys doing solo forms on the ground and you go, we've been doing that for a hundred years.
Jeremy (28:12.415)
Yeah, because what,
Jeremy (28:31.785)
the same people who would often make fun of forms.
Greg Lynham (28:36.51)
Yeah, doing forms. Yeah. Yeah. So they are good to have. They're good to have in your back pocket whenever you kind of need them. Yeah.
Jeremy (28:45.75)
In what other ways has your approach to your own training changed?
Greg Lynham (28:53.531)
my personal training, it's, it's much more,
Greg Lynham (29:03.338)
I would say pragmatic now, as in I'm very, I just like to get as close to playing the game as possible. so it's the drills I kind of like to do are they're not static drills. They're kind of as close to live sparring as possible, but not necessarily full sparring if we're trying to isolate a certain thing. So we kind of have our Tuesday mornings, which is like Joe, myself, Sue will be there
whoever of the adults want to come and just, it's just an open mat really. That's kind of our own personal training time where we really pick things that we want to focus on. And yeah, it is just live drills, sparring.
that is kind of the bulk of my personal training these days. Even kind of focus mitt work's gone down for me. Yeah, I mean, we still do it occasionally. But for me, I just prefer the actual live sparring. I'm not at a point anymore where I feel the need
how do I put this? I'm not, I'm not in the need where I'm thinking I might have to hit someone. Do you know what I mean? So I'm not too worried. I know I can hit hard. I'm not too worried about constantly reminding myself that I can do it. so that's, I kind of don't tend to do that as often anymore. I just like the, the game, the game of sparring really. Yeah.
Jeremy (30:39.797)
Yeah. There's a, it's a real time refinement process, right? Especially if it's someone that you're sparring with frequently, because they're thinking about, okay, what am I doing to get Greg today? And right now, right? And from that last exchange, and you're saying, how can I prevent that and get them? And, you know, I thoroughly enjoy.
Greg Lynham (30:49.545)
Absolutely,
Greg Lynham (30:57.46)
Yeah.
Greg Lynham (31:04.521)
Mm -hmm.
Jeremy (31:08.499)
sparring with new people, but it's the people that I know the best in terms of their movement. They're the ones that challenge me the
Greg Lynham (31:16.534)
absolutely yeah. Yeah, sparring with Joe sometimes you'll go, he's figured that out now. Damn. Like I would always get him with this and he's caught onto it now. I need to change this now. It's good. Yeah. I'll tell you what, recently I've started using the Makiwara a little bit more. I never really... I bought one years ago, like a wall mounted one and I never really had anywhere...
Jeremy (31:24.862)
Hahaha
Jeremy (31:37.045)
Yeah, what prompted that?
Greg Lynham (31:46.654)
to put it. Obviously I have walls in the house but there was never really an appropriate wall to put it on. So when we moved into this new gym for our dojo, I was like, here we go, we can put it here. So now it's up, always. So every time I'm there I kind of try and just use that, which is quite nice.
It's different from focus mitts. It's kind of a little bit more slow and yeah, it's nice. someone who's never really used them before, it's a nice change of pace.
Jeremy (32:17.153)
It's a very quick way to see how precise your strikes are. How much you're dragging your knuckles.
Greg Lynham (32:24.392)
Mm. Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. And the imbalance between left and right is the thing that I kind of went all...
Jeremy (32:36.555)
Say more about
Greg Lynham (32:40.103)
I'm kind of weird when I spar. I'm very much orthodox in my kind of my power shot hand is my right hand. So that's my dominant hand. But I will also switch and kind of have it at the front. I just, my left hand is not, I don't know why it just never has been.
It's great for hook punches, that's my go -to hand for my hooks and my arcing punches but for straights. It's just, yeah. On the makiwara I noticed it, I never really kind of noticed it that way before, it just felt off. It felt different, my balance, it just, it threw me completely and I was like, huh, okay. Something's not right here, I need to work on this. So yeah, it's given me something to work on. Yeah.
Jeremy (33:28.386)
Nice. I'm trying to think of how to form this question. It's a round, I'll tell you what I'm thinking and maybe you can even answer the question I haven't quite asked, which
Greg Lynham (33:39.315)
Okay. Yeah.
Jeremy (33:44.937)
Every martial arts class has a flavor, right? The classes at a particular school, they all run a little bit differently, right? Even if the segments of class might be the same, even if the technique, the drill selection is the same, some classes are more friendly, some are more militant.
Greg Lynham (33:54.42)
Yeah, sure, yeah.
Greg Lynham (34:07.029)
Mm
Jeremy (34:09.137)
what would we find, you know, bring the audience into a class that you're teaching and what does that class feel
Greg Lynham (34:17.6)
So I try and keep my classes, I didn't realize I was doing this quite to the extent that I was until someone pointed out that everyone was exhausted, I try. So I've toned it down a little bit. I try and keep them fairly fast paced. I'm not someone who, despite having a podcast, likes to be out talking at people in the class. I will if I need to, but I like people to, again, get
Jeremy (34:28.342)
Ha ha.
Greg Lynham (34:47.702)
close to playing the game as quickly as possible. Like you're going to learn by doing that's what we do best as humans. learn to walk by crawling and then you start like you don't get told how to do it. You just figure it out. So I kind of like to get people moving as quick as possible. So generally for me, the class would be we do a really quick warm up, five minute warm
I'll kind of have a theme of the class. Usually we've kind of been working around sequences lately. So we'll kind of take, like a striking exchange into some sort of takedown, into some sort of ground submission. And then we'll break that apart and drill it live, do some games to kind of, bring out the principles of those drills. And then we'll spar at the end and then we'll finish off with Kata and some stretching.
But yeah, it's very game based, I would say is my approach these days.
Jeremy (35:48.939)
when different people use that term games in the context of martial arts differently. So tell us what you mean by games.
Greg Lynham (35:51.54)
They do. Yes. I'll try to think of an example.
so I mean, the other day we were doing the, the takedown we were essentially doing was, the single leg takedown. so the games we would do to, to kind of get close to that would be, we'd start off with tag, but your goal is to use your hand to slap your partner's thigh. So that's, that's essentially the game is just going to play tag on the thigh. That's kind of the warmup. So you're getting used to dropping your level, reaching with your hand and connecting to where you need to.
to grab, then we kind of bring the drill further on. So you've got the leg now. So you're to start from this holding position. You're going to try and keep that leg held. Your partner is going to try and release the leg, no takedowns or anything like that. So it's a safe way of practicing a very isolated part of the technique that we want to learn. And we would kind of just build up like that. So then the next part would be now you're actively trying to take your partner down from that position. Your partner is trying to stop you and we'd build it that way.
Yeah, it's kind of the way I do
Jeremy (37:02.433)
And are they smiling while they're doing this? Are they having fun? Yeah. Yeah. OK. Good.
Greg Lynham (37:04.902)
Usually. Yeah. Yeah. Usually. Yeah. Thankfully. Yeah. No tears yet, which is good.
Jeremy (37:11.941)
Hopefully not. And the reason I ask about the smiles is, you that's part of the culture too, right? I've trained at school where, you we'll run the same drills, but the instructor, you don't have fun, right? This is serious. It is bizarre to me as
Greg Lynham (37:16.117)
Yeah, of course.
Greg Lynham (37:24.266)
Yeah, which is bizarre to me. It's really odd. Yeah. We try and keep it as light hearted as possible. And I think, I think we do a good job of that. mean, with their, like most of, especially the kids, they're very, it's not that class where they're afraid to come and speak to the instructor. Do you know what mean? Like we're very open and we, you we try to be as light hearted as possible.
Greg Lynham (37:52.372)
So yeah, I think we do good job of it. I think so. People might tell us differently,
Jeremy (37:58.101)
if they're coming back you're doing a good job with it. Retention is a really easy number to track and it tells you everything you need to know about what you're doing.
Greg Lynham (38:07.112)
Yeah, yeah, true. Yeah.
Jeremy (38:13.557)
So what's coming? And actually, you know what? Let's shift gears. Let's talk about your podcast. Let's talk about that. How did that come about?
Greg Lynham (38:23.272)
So, our podcast conversations on karate is the name, which Sue and I, we do kind of semi -regularly. It started essentially, when I mentioned we used to train in like a group of three of us, Sue, myself, and a guy called Brad. It essentially started because Sue and I would be waiting for Brad to turn up and Sue would start asking me these questions about
martial arts because she was like an eighth Q at the time. So she had all these kind of questions like any student would have. Sorry. Yeah, I should.
Jeremy (38:56.465)
Yeah. And for people who do in training in karate or don't know those terms, that's it. It counts down before it counts up. Right. So, so eight Q yellow, yellow.
Greg Lynham (39:02.975)
Yes.
Greg Lynham (39:06.704)
she was yellow belt. so that's why if you go back, one of the episodes we had is called waiting for Brad. That was how it started. Yeah. Sue, Sue would just ask these questions and, and she kind of said, would be a good podcast. And I was, I've always kind of wanted to do a podcast, but I didn't really know how to do it. And Sue has a background in radio. That's her job. She works for a radio charity and stuff like that. She does.
Jeremy (39:32.129)
She has a great radio voice. She really does.
Greg Lynham (39:36.17)
I'm getting there. It's not quite there yet. My voice has changed. If you listen to the first episode of the podcast to this, it is different, but so yeah, that's where it came from was we just went to the studio one day and we just, yeah, just turn the mics on and spoke. We didn't really have a plan. don't think. Yeah, exactly. And yeah, that's where it started. And then we got Ian Abernethy came on who
Jeremy (39:52.407)
just started recording what you were already talking about.
Greg Lynham (40:05.118)
I'd known for a long time anyway, was kind of one of the, instructor used to, we used to go and train with him way back in the day. Yeah, he's brilliant. so he came on and kind of gave us a little bit of credibility and got people listening. And since then, yeah, we've spoken to tons of, like you guys really, we try and speak to as many different people as possible. And just recently, we're now trying to branch out side of that karate world now into other arts. Like we spoke to Roy Dean from
Jeremy (40:11.701)
He's great. Ian's great.
Greg Lynham (40:34.928)
who's preaching Jiu -Jitsu the other day. We're definitely going speak to you guys as well. We've been talking about that. Yeah.
Jeremy (40:39.733)
Yeah, hey, whenever you want me. Do you find that title, having karate in the name, that making it more difficult to get non -karatika to participate?
Greg Lynham (40:55.966)
I would say I'm not sure yet. We haven't really looked into that. We haven't actively pursued non -Karate people as much yet. It's just something we're thinking of now. Maybe is the answer. don't know. Hopefully not. Because I feel like karate is on the up lately in terms
Jeremy (41:15.553)
Right, because we've got karate as the art, and then there are plenty of people who use karate as a generic term for martial arts, which there are times where that really bothers me, but if we're talking about the title of a podcast, I think I would want them to maybe see it as more
Greg Lynham (41:24.276)
god yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Greg Lynham (41:34.95)
Yeah, I think the thing for us is with that name as well It's the way we kind of look at it is what can we learn from these other people that we can bring back to our karate At least that's the way I kind of think of it So yeah, we'll see we've got a few people lined up that we want to try and get in touch with so Yeah
Jeremy (41:56.299)
Nice, nice. And since we're talking about it right now, where can people find
Greg Lynham (42:02.206)
We are everywhere. we're on Spotify, Apple podcasts. You can go to conversationsonkarate .com, Facebook conversations on karate. Yeah. If you search, search for conversations on karate, you'll find us and then you'll, you'll soon be sick of us.
Jeremy (42:20.737)
I don't know, I expected that to happen and here we are. I don't know what episode you're gonna be, but we're closer to episode 1 ,000. What's that? Two a week for 10 years, I'll get you there.
Greg Lynham (42:27.626)
Yeah, you guys, have a lot of episodes. You have a lot of episodes. It's unbelievable.
Greg Lynham (42:35.85)
That's impressive, I would say. The organisation is something I need to aim for.
Jeremy (42:40.687)
No one
Jeremy (42:45.569)
I have been accused of many things. Some of them are even good, but one thing no one has ever accused me of is giving up too early. If anything, it's the opposite. It's, maybe it's time to let this go. No, I'm not ready.
Greg Lynham (42:57.312)
Well that's good.
Greg Lynham (43:01.746)
Yeah, that's not a bad way to be.
Jeremy (43:06.333)
No, no, I think it works out as a positive trait more often than it
Greg Lynham (43:10.546)
Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I'm to think who was the last person we spoke to. It was Noah. Noah Lagel. Yeah.
Jeremy (43:22.243)
yeah, Noah was on our show not long ago. I think I saw when you released that episode. He's a great guy. I like Noah. And talk about someone who really likes getting into the academic side of things. He is a karate nerd, to be sure.
Greg Lynham (43:26.92)
Yeah. yeah, he is. He's brilliant.
Greg Lynham (43:34.658)
yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Greg Lynham (43:39.55)
He is. He is. Yeah, he's not trademarked that. Somebody else has trademarked that term, I'm sure.
Jeremy (43:45.693)
No, Jesse got that one, but that's okay. That's okay.
Jeremy (43:52.449)
How has, and this is a question that I guess is probably for me, maybe the audience will appreciate this, but one of the things that I've found is that as I talk to people, it makes me think. And that changes how and what I train. Have you found
Greg Lynham (44:09.431)
absolutely yeah yeah massively massively
Jeremy (44:12.553)
Isn't that fascinating? Did you expect when you started a podcast that having conversations would change your training?
Greg Lynham (44:15.975)
No.
Greg Lynham (44:20.282)
It's been the biggest influence on my training. Like, probably of anything, to be honest with you. Yeah, it's massively changed a lot of what we do now. remember as like, Matt Jardine, one of the guys we had on, he would come on and do our UFC breakdowns with us, which used to be good fun. But yeah, he...
his kind of... he said a line once and it immediately went that yes he said the goal i have for my students is i want them to to be able to walk into any martial arts school in the world and just be able to hold their head above water and i went i love that that's great i'm stealing that i'm running with that that it just perfectly summed up exactly what i was trying
express so since that point it's kind of yeah everything has been moving towards that in terms of what we teach how we teach it how we train yeah
Jeremy (45:31.417)
When I started doing the show and making connections and then the direction I thought Whistlekick was going to, not just the show, but the company, I started talking to people and there are these events and they'd say, we would invite you to present, teach at our event, but what is your thing? What are you really good at? And initially, and this was years, I was really sad that I didn't have a
You know, there are a variety of things I can teach about. There are a number of things I'm quite skilled at and can break down well, but I'm not known for any one thing. But what I eventually came to realize was I can hang out with any group of martial artists and hang. Doesn't mean I'm good. Doesn't mean I'm not the worst there, but I'm not going to be in the back of the room completely lost.
Greg Lynham (46:24.566)
Hmm.
Greg Lynham (46:30.526)
Mm -hmm. Yeah.
Jeremy (46:30.781)
not understanding where to put my hands and feet, whether we're talking about a grappling class or a weapons class or Korean, Brazilian, Japanese, Okinawan, Martian, right? Doesn't matter. I can fake it. And I'm proud of that. Yeah.
Greg Lynham (46:44.789)
Mm -hmm.
Fake it till you make it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. No, that's, that's since, since that quote from Matt, that's definitely been where I've, I've been going. And before that, to be honest, I was, I was very kind of, in the self -defense world, which I'm very out of now. It's just not a thing for me. but yeah,
Jeremy (47:00.757)
What are the, keep going.
Greg Lynham (47:14.538)
That quote definitely changed the direction of my training. And there's been others as well in the podcast, but that was definitely the one that stands
Jeremy (47:21.663)
as you moved out of self -defense, what did you move more into to rebalance?
Greg Lynham (47:27.698)
It was more kind of like, it was like I said, I want to be able to go to any, not self -defense club, any martial arts club in the world. And essentially, like you said, be able to fake it if you need to.
Greg Lynham (47:44.266)
And then I was kind of like, okay, so what do we need in our classes, in our system to be able to do that? We need these areas and we need to be practicing these areas. Where does self -defense fit into that? And is it important for it to fit into that? And for me, it just wasn't at the top of the list and it were anywhere on the list really.
Greg Lynham (48:08.054)
So yeah, it's been more, I would say we've moved more into, I don't want to say combat sports, but just enjoy, I'll say enjoying the martial arts for martial arts and not trying to find the self -defense in it. We're just enjoying the martial arts for what they are.
Jeremy (48:28.427)
Sometimes kicking and punching is fun. It doesn't have to translate to saving your life.
Greg Lynham (48:30.876)
Exactly, yeah.
Greg Lynham (48:35.198)
Yeah, of course, yeah.
Jeremy (48:37.597)
Anybody who's learned jump spinning, any things, that's why we do that, because it's fun, because it challenges you. Please don't use it on the
Greg Lynham (48:43.54)
Yeah, of course, absolutely.
Yeah. Well, I would say this to like, I've been to various boxing gyms in the past and not once do you hear now in the street, this might appear like this, like it's just not, it's just not on their radar. But having said that, don't get hit by one of them. but yeah, so
That's my view on it really. just kind of, it just wasn't on the thing on the list. So we moved into that the other direction.
Jeremy (49:22.281)
And what do you think's coming for you? You know, this is a cliche question, but I think it's so revealing. You and I get back together five years from now, we have another conversation, and I say, hey, Greg, what has changed for you since we last spoke? What would you hope that you were telling
Greg Lynham (49:44.158)
I'd like to, I'd like to think that, the club that Joe and I have now is, has grown. That's kind of the main thing that I think we're focusing on at the moment. but also I know Joe's much better at putting himself out there than me, but luckily for me, he puts me out there along with him. So, like I said, he's good at the stuff I'm not good at. So I know we're looking to kind of teach, seminars and courses and stuff.
Hopefully have a bit of experience in that as well. We did our first one a few weeks ago, which happened by accident really. It was with Les Bubka and Ken Knight. Christian Wiedewald was supposed to be there and he had some issues come up there so he couldn't make it and Les kind of called Joe and I and said, can you guys teach? Will you do one day, you do the other? And we were like, okay.
So that was our first, it was really good. It was, it went a lot better than I thought. I was kind of like, why am I doing this? Like, and I spoke to Ken and Les and they kind of reassured me cause I was like, I don't know why I'm here. Like, I don't know what, like you guys are here. What do they, what do you need me for? And they were like, well, that's how we feel too. And I was like, okay. All right, fine.
Jeremy (50:44.267)
Nice, how'd it go?
Jeremy (51:07.15)
The moment you forget that, the moment you stop, because I work really hard to make sure that
Jeremy (51:18.529)
How do I want to say this?
people will sometimes point at the things that I've done or we do and they're like, know, look at that. I don't see it the way other people see it, right? Because I see huge effort result, right? And when we look at what somebody else has done, we don't see all that hard work, we see results.
Greg Lynham (51:36.736)
See ya.
Greg Lynham (51:40.116)
Yeah, no, that's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jeremy (51:44.927)
You know, like, Les has been on the show. Great guy. Loved talking to him. That man's working his tail off. And I see his results and I'm super pumped for him. I know he's proud of himself as he should be because he's killing it. But it's not because of some mystical talent. And it sounds like they were telling you the same thing. No, you're here because you're working your tail off and you have things to say and to share.
Greg Lynham (52:00.672)
Yeah, absolutely.
Greg Lynham (52:12.543)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeremy (52:14.529)
And the reason I point that out is because, you know, folks out there that might be watching or listening to this, I never want any of you to think that what is happening on the other side of these cameras and microphones isn't something you can do because you absolutely can do it. You know, maybe maybe your first episode is a little better or a little worse than somebody else's. But, you know, you put in five, 10 years of something.
And you'll get there and that's, we see that in martial arts all the time, right? You forget who was really good in their first couple months of training. Once they, you know, once they've been training five, six, 10 years, nobody remembers. Cause it's about showing up and putting in the
Greg Lynham (52:57.812)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. No, that's really true. Yeah. That, conversation with them really kind of helped. And we, we, had a thing afterwards as well where we kind of, everybody sat around and spoke about the course and a couple of, a couple of people there were sharing some kind of really, personal things and it kind of, I've kind of went, all right, everybody in this room has something to offer the group here.
And anyone in this room could be stood up teaching and we'd all learn something. I just happened to be the one that was asked to do it. So it was, yeah, it was, was a good, good experience that, that helped me go, actually, okay. Like I'm with you now, Joe. Like if you want to, if you want us to go and do this, yeah, I'm with you. Let's do, let's do this. Let's, let's teach outside of our own group and see what we can
Jeremy (53:48.239)
And you have to be, you have to get so good to teach people outside of your own classes. Because you get so little time with them and they come from these different areas, different backgrounds, different ranks, right? Different reasons for being there. And you're trying to make sure that you're teaching material in such a way that all of them leave feeling good about the experience.
Greg Lynham (53:54.707)
Yeah.
Jeremy (54:12.865)
That's hard. That's really hard work.
Greg Lynham (54:14.27)
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, it's something I'm looking forward to getting into. We've got kind of a roadmap where we're looking... A plan of where we want to go in the next kind of year. So we'll see. We'll see how that goes. I'm not quite sure how far along.
that we're going to share it, but yeah, we'll see. I'll keep you posted.
Jeremy (54:43.105)
Well, if you make it over this way, let me know. Let me know, I'll connect you with some people. We tried, when was this? 2022? We tried to take the model of a musical tour. And I said, can we do this? Are we there? And I'll be honest, I was willing to go anywhere as long as I could make the logistics work.
Greg Lynham (54:45.95)
Yeah, you're not the first to say that, That might be a few years away,
Greg Lynham (55:09.259)
Mm -hmm.
Jeremy (55:09.861)
And it wasn't going to cost me a ton. So I was willing to sleep on couches. You know, I didn't even need money. was just, know, buy me dinner. Just like, let's let's see what we can do with this. And. Even even though there was plenty of response, plenty of people wanted this just planning, it was so complicated. So many moving parts.
Greg Lynham (55:12.679)
of course.
Greg Lynham (55:29.406)
Yeah. Well, I'll be honest, because now you've said that that was our, or I say that was Joe's idea. Joe's a musician. he was like, let's do a, let's do a tour, like a music tour, but we'll do it martial arts. So that's kind of what we were looking at as well. Same, same as you, but we haven't. Yeah. We'll stick to the UK for now. And yeah, we'll go from
Jeremy (55:51.654)
probably a little bit easier. You're all a little closer together than we are. We're a little more spread
Greg Lynham (55:55.304)
We are, yeah, we are close, even though doesn't feel like it. Like I said this to Ken when he came over, like, you guys over there, four hours is nothing for you. For us, that's just unbearable.
Jeremy (56:08.715)
Well, because it has to be, right?
Greg Lynham (56:10.624)
Well, yeah, yeah.
Jeremy (56:16.097)
We did an event over the weekend and one of the presenters drove 15 hours to go because he wanted to, it was less expensive and everything. But yeah, yeah, you you do what you gotta do and unless you live in it, there are a handful of areas in this country that are really densely populated.
Greg Lynham (56:24.438)
Good girl.
Jeremy (56:45.557)
And those folks will say the same things that you are. Four hours is mind blowing. But for a lot of us, to drive an hour or two hours is not a big deal.
Greg Lynham (56:54.582)
Yeah, see, it's so different. Yeah. Like I have approximately like on a good day, I would say it's 45 minutes on a bad day, probably an hour and a half drive to work. And that is just when I get to work, people say, where do you, how long does it take you to get here? People are like, my God, I couldn't do that. I'm like, yeah, believe me, I don't like doing it. Like that for us, that's a long way.
Jeremy (57:17.936)
you
What do you do?
Greg Lynham (57:22.066)
I work for retail. I work in retail essentially. Yeah. And then martial arts on the side. Fun retail life.
Jeremy (57:29.087)
Yeah.
Jeremy (57:34.529)
I did it for 20 years, I understand. Yep, retail teaches you how to work with
Greg Lynham (57:46.78)
It sure does. Yes it does.
Jeremy (57:49.705)
It teaches you how to smile when you are asked very strange and silly questions. teaches you how to not punch people in the throat when they blame you for things that are nowhere close to your responsibility or fault.
Greg Lynham (57:55.741)
Mm -hmm.
Greg Lynham (58:06.526)
Yeah, I mean that'd be my... if anyone wants to learn self -defense skills and de -escalation skills go work in retail for a while and yeah all that non -physical stuff will come out. Yeah.
Jeremy (58:19.105)
For sure. If people want to get a hold of you, where do they go? If people want to get a hold of you, website, social, that stuff.
Greg Lynham (58:25.682)
Say again, sorry I didn't hear that.
Greg Lynham (58:29.846)
So you can go to all the conversations on karate pages I mentioned previously. It'd be either me or Sue that replies, but one of us will. You can search for me personally on Facebook, Greg Linham. My Instagram's at glinham1990. I don't post much martial arts stuff on there to be fair, it's normally just artwork. But I am on there if you want to reach me in. yeah, yeah, I love it, yeah.
Jeremy (58:55.662)
Is that another passion of yours? We didn't even talk about that. Tell us about that for a minute.
Greg Lynham (59:02.042)
I mean, I've always loved kind of drawing and stuff like that when I was a kid and I, I, I didn't do it for a long time until I got an iPad pro with an Apple pencil. And then it just became easy because I was always on my iPad. I was like, this is easy. I could do this from anywhere. And yeah, I just, now I do it all the time. I just love it. Yeah. I've started kind of doing a few commissions here and there. So yeah, it's, it's, it's going well.
Jeremy (59:23.883)
Well, that's
Greg Lynham (59:30.26)
Yeah, mainly comic book stuff I like to draw. As judging by the den of comic book stuff here, yeah.
Jeremy (59:36.393)
Yeah, yeah, there's some, some Funkos behind you.
Greg Lynham (59:40.83)
I do. I have an addiction. I have too many.
Jeremy (59:45.426)
I have a few, what do I have, five, six, none of them are in this room. Yeah, they're fun. They're fun. I like that you, at least the ones I'm seeing, you've taken at least some of them out of the boxes.
Greg Lynham (59:52.82)
There are.
Greg Lynham (59:58.445)
none of them are in the box. no, I tell you I have two in a box just because they come with a like a cover, a comic book cover in the back so you need the box but yeah no apart from that I don't keep them in the boxes. Yeah.
Jeremy (59:59.701)
Good, you're willing to enjoy your toys.
Jeremy (01:00:15.467)
This has been great. Thank you. I appreciate your time. I'm gonna have you close us in a minute, but let me wrap with the audience and then I'm gonna throw it back to you. So, hey, all of you out there, check out Conversations on Karate. Hopefully you did after we had Joe on and hopefully after we did that really cool project with Sue. Hopefully you checked out the show and you're still checking out the show because they're doing great stuff. But if you haven't, let this be your third reminder to do
Greg Lynham (01:00:17.568)
Thank you.
Jeremy (01:00:44.705)
please go find them, support them, anybody doing cool stuff, you should be checking out their show. And I haven't said it in while, but I'll say it again. If you find shows that you like better than Martial Arts Radio, watch and listen to those shows. I believe that your involvement in watching and listening to podcasts is going to keep you training. And that's Whistlekick's mission, is to keep you training. It's not about keeping you listening to my voice, right? That's, don't.
Honestly, I don't care about that. care that you find stuff out there that supports your
Greg Lynham (01:01:19.274)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I just want to say as well, by the way, sorry. The project you did with Sue was awesome. It was really cool. And I hadn't kind of heard anything like that before. The kind of...
Jeremy (01:01:21.301)
So Greg,
Jeremy (01:01:32.096)
That was a combination, I think, of Andrew and I thinking very far out of the box. And one of the things I love about Andrew is he's willing to go there with me and think out of the box. Because I think, and this is probably better documented in that episode, but well, maybe we should talk to her before and after her black belt test.
Greg Lynham (01:01:55.294)
Yeah. Yeah, it was just, it was really cool. Yeah, it was really good to listen to and, and to also get the panic of Sue on the other end going, I'm, I'm doing this. And it, it was, it was just really cool to see all that come together. And, yeah, yeah, that was, that was good. I enjoyed
Jeremy (01:01:56.863)
And it was pretty cool. Like I really had fun with
Jeremy (01:02:14.145)
Yeah, thank
Jeremy (01:02:18.785)
Good, good, me too. Yeah, we'll find another mini documentary sort of project at some point. But now I'm gonna have you close us, Greg. So, what do you wanna leave the audience with today?
Greg Lynham (01:02:32.702)
God, what do I want to leave the audience with? I mean, I would say I would kind of direct everyone to conversations on karate, but you've done that better than I could have. no, but I'll just say thank you so much for having me. It's been great to come on. I've done so many podcasts. I still find it weird when I talk to somebody else on their podcast. It's yeah. It's a different world for me, but I'm getting used to it. Yeah.
But yeah, thank you very much again for having me. Thanks for listening to anyone who listened. And yeah, if you want to get in touch with me or Joe to come and teach, then get in touch.