Co-Ed sparring

CriosDubh

Whenever possible, the association to which my dojang belongs tries to avoid co-ed sparring among adult students (basically 16 & up). How about yours?

One one hand, I appreciate not having to spar people who dwarf me physically, given that i can only kick so high due to hip injuries. My sparring strategy for people taller than me: block the kick, dash in and start punching. Not very interesting. On the other hand, it's not like we have scads of women enrolled, so I spar the same people over and over again, also not very interesting.

Frankly, I don't understand the reasoning behind this, given that we only allow light to medium contact in sparring, anyway. I can understand matching up opponents in height, but not by gender.

mfanyafujo

I think, to be a well-rounded fighter, you have to practice against people of all types. I think women especially get benefit from sparring with bigger men, but I would be glad to practice with anyone, as long as they were serious about improving.

Many women do martial arts for self defense. Who are they trying to defend against? Usually men. Therefore they should practice against men. I definitely think everyone involved should be considerate and careful, but restricting the sparring match-ups so much seems like it would be detrimental.

ETA: in my school, you can fight whoever you want, or multiple opponents, or with weapons. It's all pretty relaxed. We do throws, but always let people down gently. We pull punches with newer fighters, but as the level advances, the fighting gets much more intense.

Dragonwolf

I think, to be a well-rounded fighter, you have to practice against people of all types. I think women especially get benefit from sparring with bigger men, but I would be glad to practice with anyone, as long as they were serious about improving.

Many women do martial arts for self defense. Who are they trying to defend against? Usually men. Therefore they should practice against men. I definitely think everyone involved should be considerate and careful, but restricting the sparring match-ups so much seems like it would be detrimental.

ETA: in my school, you can fight whoever you want, or multiple opponents, or with weapons. It's all pretty relaxed. We do throws, but always let people down gently. We pull punches with newer fighters, but as the level advances, the fighting gets much more intense.

This, completely. My dojo has the exact same mindset (though granted, one of our main stated purposes is self defense) when it comes to sparring partners. The only restrictions on sparring are what you can do based on your belt level, so white belts can't spar at all, yellows can grapple starting from a kneeling position, blues can start from standing, etc. and things like striking are added into the mix as you advance, until you're doing complete, full-contact sparring.

I'm about average sized for the people in my classes, but it's not unheard of for me to spar with some of the guys who are half again my size, or even about twice my size.

If my dojo didn't have co-ed sparring, I'd almost never get to spar. :frown:

ChasingStarlight

Mine separates by gender for adults, at least in the coloured belts, but we have big classes of 30 to 40 adults and a fairly even gender split, so it isn't a problem. It might be different for the black belts.

trackercasey76

We spar both genders and against all belt ranks,I am a yellow belt male and Fought a black belt female yesterday in class (and got my butt kicked) I think it helps to fight all sizes and abilities.

CriosDubh

We adults do practice and get graded on free-form no-rules one steps against all opponents. I guess this is supposed to be the self defense portion of the curriculum. Our instructor will also haul out the Red Man suit a few times a month so we can attack him like we would someone in real life.

In class we spar more freely between the genders. I guess that's part of belonging to a small school with few adult students. NHowever, at testings and tournaments, mixed-gender sparring is generally avoided. Women who are not testing are requested to show up to all testings in order to provide partners for one another.

bushidowoman

Adult women in my system are few and far between, and there is only one other that I see regularly. If I spar, or practice any other self-defense, grappling, throws, joint locks, whatever, it's mostly against men. It makes many women uncomfortable--few get past green or purple belt level before they drop out.
I've asked my hubby many times how he feels about this. There have been times where he has said honestly that it has made him a little uncomfortable, but he has always encouraged me to continue.

raygunn_viola

I am the only adult woman in class, so I fight boys all the time. I have never had a problem. The higher ranks also fight the lower ranks on a regular basis because there are so few students.

fatty_to_fitty

I am the only adult woman in class, so I fight boys all the time.

Me too! Having said that I don't think it matters anyway. It's about height, weight and ability. I can punch harder than most men that I know. Splitting the groups lets women think they shouldn't be part of what the men do like its any different. It's just a body and the groups should be mixed. A man wouldn't knock out another man during their first class so would it be possible to show restraint for a woman who was new? Having said that if a male black belt went up against a female black belt and didnt strike properly he should be stripped of it. That person in front of you is an attacker don't make snap judgements based on gender do what you are training to do.

I appreciate when training solely for competition you know you are going up against your own gender you need to be prepared but I still think over all no difference should be made based on gender alone.

CriosDubh

It's so great to read these replies! I guess I need to push for more co-ed sparring opportunities. I've never had a problem with anyone hitting me too hard except for one woman and a couple of teenage girls. The irony of it! I think the leaders of our organization are a bit too old fashioned.

How about breaking? We have to break every testing. We use re-breakable boards that are color-coded by difficulty. People are assigned boards by age first, but at testing, women can't break higher than blue (there is brown and black, too). I have no problem breaking black or brown with many techniques, so the restriction annoys me!

I hate being told I can't do things because I'm female. I mean, it's one thing being told I can't do them because I'm uncoordinated or injured or whatever, but female? Let me try before deciding that I can't do something,

CriosDubh

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jesusHchris

I was raised my entire life to never EVER hit a female. I honestly would have a hard time sparring with a woman and putting any sort of effort into the strikes. When I spar with dudes we are trying to hurt each other.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for empowered women and have even been known to make a sammich or two myself at times. I just honestly can not get over that deeply ingrained desire to keep a female from coming to physical harm, especially at my own hand.

I know there are a ton of very skilled female athletes who could kick the crap out of me no matter what my intentions were, though.

Is this sexist?

Edit: I have sparred a girl before in western boxing, basically worked on technique and defense. So I guess I have no problem with this, I would just fight a little differently than with a dude.

CriosDubh

I respect the way you were brought up. The same issue was brought up by several men in my dojang. However, I believe that ere is a huge difference between violence against unsuspecting women off the mat and sparring one's female classmates. Women in the sport signed up knowing that sparring is part of the curriculum. Women outside the sport, indeed all innocent humans outside the sport, are not fair game for the martial artist.

Edited, no not sexist.

jesusHchris

all innocent humans outside the sport, are not fair game for the martial artist.

I completely agree with that statement. Unless they are wearing a stupid t-shirt I don't like. Or if they do that thing where they pay $1 to get their song played before mine at the jukebox. Or, of course, if they just happen to be standing at the perfect angle for me to practice a leg kick and no one else is watching.

Otherwise, yeah, no innocents.

beautifulstronghealthy

I do jiu-jitsu, but my gym also has sparring. Men and women always fight each other. I think it has a great advantage since there are not as many women as men in most classes. I am the only female in jiu-jitsu evening classes and get to roll with a dozen guys. It's awesome because even if the guy is way smaller than me, he generally is stronger than me with all that testosterone. And I'm a strong woman. It totally helps me train harder.

CriosDubh

LOL I have my own fantasy list of people deserving a nice palm heel, but I keep it to myself.

cjsmommy7

Hi I do kickboxing and mma there is only me and one other lady in both groups, we spar with the men all the time and as we are both competing soon we do have some intense sparring sessions with the men. There is a lot of respect between all of us and we spar to the level we know our opponents are at. Sparring with the men goes a long way when it comes to fighting.

jfinnivan

At my dojo, everyone spars with everyone. Gender doesn't enter into it.

And this quote amazes me. Do they actually not allow you to try?

How about breaking? We have to break every testing. We use re-breakable boards that are color-coded by difficulty. People are assigned boards by age first, but at testing, women can't break higher than blue (there is brown and black, too). I have no problem breaking black or brown with many techniques, so the restriction annoys me!

bathsheba_c

I used to be the only girl in my class, so of course I only went against men. Honestly, it makes them more uncomfortable than it makes me, and I find it very frustrating when a guy goes easy on me because he's afraid of accidentally brushing up against a boob.

I get a lot from going against guys, especially this one person who is much taller than me, so it throws off all of my reflexes when it comes to blocking.

CriosDubh

I can try in class, just not at testing,

raygunn_viola

In our class, the girls have to do everything on a test just the same as the boys, including the board breaking...I had to fight LONGER on my blackbelt test than the last guy...and had to fight off a 275lbs guy that took me down and was on top of me...It was scary, but good practice so that if it really happens I won't freeze. One day I was teaching class and we had a new guy, the rules are that the students don't get to choose who they fight. I just wanted to work with him a little, but he REFUSED to fight me. So I hit him harder and harder until he fought back. The way I see it, if I join class and put on my gear, I am taking responsibility for what happens...(unless the guy is crazy and intentionally trying to hurt me), and I have the same right for a good fight as everyone else in class, whether or not I am a woman. If you only fight women, you won't be able to take it if a guy ever attacks you and starts hitting you.

bushidowoman

I was raised my entire life to never EVER hit a female. I honestly would have a hard time sparring with a woman and putting any sort of effort into the strikes. When I spar with dudes we are trying to hurt each other.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for empowered women and have even been known to make a sammich or two myself at times. I just honestly can not get over that deeply ingrained desire to keep a female from coming to physical harm, especially at my own hand.

I know there are a ton of very skilled female athletes who could kick the crap out of me no matter what my intentions were, though.

Is this sexist?

Edit: I have sparred a girl before in western boxing, basically worked on technique and defense. So I guess I have no problem with this, I would just fight a little differently than with a dude.

I don't think this is sexist; I call it being respectful. I appreciate working with respectful guys.

The way I see it, sparring, competing, and fighting are each very different entities.
I don't ever want to fight anyone, man or woman. In a fight, someone, possibly both parties, are going to get hurt. I don't want it to be me, and I don't want to hurt anyone else. A big part of my training is avoiding a fight.

A competition is no fun if the competitors are unevenly matched. I'm pretty small compared to most guys, so I've never been matched against another guy in a fight-like competition. (I have competed against guys in kata/weapons kata.)

But sparring and practicing defense--We are all there to "sharpen our weapons" and you can't sharpen your own weapon if you are putting it against a dull weapon. You would be doing your partner (male or female) a disservice by not putting any effort into your strikes. If your partner is below your level, put just enough intensity that they have to pick up their own intensity. Give them something to learn to defend against. I wouldn't expect my partner to "try to kill me" when we are sparring. Nor would I would try to "kill" my sparring partner, just to prove a point, if I'm paired up against a guy who is below my level.
I've encountered this in class quite a few times, when I pair up with a new guy who is unfamiliar with me. But I'm very intense, I'm there to WORK, and I'm not going to let any partner of mine get by without putting some effort into it.
I've had more than one guy tell me that he enjoys sparring with me. I don't spar like a man. I spar like a devious woman.

ChasingStarlight

This thread has inspired me to swap to a guy partner sometimes. I think the reason why we tend to not go opposite gender is just because we have such an even gender split we don't need to.

But I can definitely see the advantage of getting one of the guys to do a choke hold on me, because if I am ever in that situation, i would be surprised if it was a girl!

Rokwell

Mine does Co-ed sparring.

ChasingStarlight

We were practicing our knife defence today, so we had to walk around the dojang and try to stab one of the people practicing their defence at random. So inspired by this thread I picked one of the guys and he was so surprised he totally failed to do the defence. He got it on the second try and then got all awkward when he had to do the throw and needed to be reassured it was ok! I tried!

grover0ca

Our sparring is co-ed, it has never come up as a issue or something that I have ever really considered before.
Gender/Belt level is not a concern..higher belts will go lighter on the beginners but otherwise we just spar with whoever shows up!

I can say the person who is most agressive with me is usually my son..he is a black belt, has more experience than me/trains competitvely and just get's a laugh out of trying to show mom up and me-well I just liket he challenge of trying to spar with him

Going into a tournament I have never been intimidated by my oppenant so I suppose my history of sparring with a variety of people who are more advanced than me has had it's benefits.