Saturday, May 15, 2010

Is taekwondo or karate good for a plus size woman to learn self defense and for exercise / weight loss?

Any traditional martial art discipline will be good for anyone, no matter their age, height, weight, musculature or lack thereof, etc. The point is, the martial arts are for absolutely everyone.





Find a good instructor, a quality school, and a group of good students and they will work with you from the beginning to help you achieve your goals and gain an understanding of the art - whichever one you decide upon. Very few people come to the martial arts already prepared to just %26quot;jump right in.%26quot; Most have to orient themselves either mentally, spiritually, or physically. Beginner classes are designed just for this purpose.





My best advice to you would be to seek out a quality instructor i.e someone you like, trust, can talk to, and someone who engages you honestly and answers all of your questions sincerely. Once you%26#039;ve found such an individual, the dsicipline doesn%26#039;t matter so much, as you%26#039;ll be spending a lot of time with that instructor.





Once you start, just take your time and be courteous to yourself. Everyone feels a little lost and uncomfotrable when they begin something new, and the martial arts is no exception. Hopefully your instructor will do a good job of making you feel at home. comfortable, and engaged. Before you know it, you%26#039;ll be loving it and looking forward to classes.





Good luck on your new martial arts journey





Ken C


9th Dan HapMoosaKi-Do


8th Dan TaeKwon-Do


7th Dan YongChul-Do|||Any activity is good to lose weight, if you work at it. However, in my humble view, Karate and tkd are near useless as a way to learn self defense. This is just my view and many will disagree. I have been in the martial arts for 29 years and of that time I spent some of it learning useless crap that wouldn%26#039;t help me get out of a wet paper bag. For weight loss and exercise I%26#039;d say any is as good as the other, as for real on the street self-defense you won%26#039;t get it from either tkd or just about any style of traditional karate. For self defense you%26#039;d need to look more for non-traditional styles like mma, bjj, krav maga and the like. Again, this is just my xp and I can only speak for myself.|||yeah, if u sweat alot|||i would sat tae kwan do|||I think if you are plus size Karate would be a better option for you. Taekwondo will offer great cardio training but self defense wise it is quite, well.. ineffective (in my opinion).





Though, I do suggest you look into kickboxing.|||Definitely! I took a martial arts class and lost TONS of weight. It%26#039;s also really good for safety, especially with women.|||tae kwon do is one of the best martial arts for weight loss. karate not much its mostly makes your body stronger and self defense.|||Any martial art will definitely help you with weight loss as long as you eat healthy also. Weight loss comes down to exercise and eating healthy. You have to eat healthy, I can%26#039;t stress that enough.





I have been in martial arts my whole life and have tried a lot of different things. I have seen more people lose weight doing judo and brazilian jiu jitsu than anything else, but you have to be dedicated and willing to change your lifestyle for the better. No more soda! That will help more than anything.





As far as self defense goes knowledge is the key component and I don%26#039;t believe Tae Kwon Do will help you out in this area. I would recommend finding a style such as Jeet Kune Do or Krav Magra, as they focus on street fighting and use a few techniques that work well and aren%26#039;t difficult to execute.





There are good and bad aspects to any martial art. For a more in depth look, check out my squidoo lens below.|||Absolutely! For exercise, either one would be good although Tae Kwon Do may be harder for you with all the high kicks and the like. For self defense, I would recomend karate as long as you don%26#039;t wind up at a McDojo Black Belt Factory. Tae Kwon Do, while it does have some self defense application, is mostly taught as a sport. The older styles of karate, such as Shorin-ryu, Kokyushinryu, and Goju-ryu are all good for learning self defense.





In choosing a school I would recommend the following: 1) If the instructor guarentees you a black belt, run away screaming! 2) Don%26#039;t sign a contract until you have tried out the class first. 3) Look at the class and see if it is practical self defense. Is the attacker just standing there while the defender does his thing, not being effected by the technique? Sport, not self defense. 4) Check out the instructors credentials. While that does not mean that all instructors with out credentials are con artists, there are a lot of them out there. They should be able to show you certificates for all their belt levels. Contact their instructors. 5) Go someplace you feel comfortable.





Hope this helps. Contact me if you need any further assistance deciding.|||YES karate is great for that depending on what style and school you go to. I would not suggest tae kwon do although its a great style its more of a sport. I would suggest trying kenpo or a traditional japanese art. Our school is in Virginia Beach and we have a few out odf shape students and all of them lost at least 5 lbs. within the first week or so. If u wana check us out our website is www.fmackarate.com but the website up now is a temporary one untill we post our brand new one with in the next couple of days. Godd Luck with your training!|||I think it doesn%26#039;t matter as long as you enjoy it and stay consistent, you%26#039;ll reach your goal.

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