Old Guy Transitioning to Softer Martial Arts?

From age 20-40 I trained MT and Enshin (kyokushin offshoot) hard and heavy. Hit my 40s and age and injury shut down the heavy stuff. Now in my mid fifties I find myself missing the training and learning and am considering taking up a form based art like tai chi or even wing chun.
Has anyone here made that type of transition? If so, did you struggle with turning off your mind and previous heavy striking or mma experience? I

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Not an old guy (yet) but have you considered BJJ? Plenty of older guys can train and modify the pace, but still scratch the itch of learning plus sparring without the recovery time of a striking art.

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Why were you training so hard in the first place?

First of all, training hard is fun. Taking hits and giving them is exhilarating and the physical and mental development is very different from lower contact.

In my mind and experience, the abrupt change in form from Kyokushin-based form to the Chinese-based forms of things like tai chi would be dissatisfying for you. Wing Chun maybe. However, I’d recommend staying in the same Budo from where you originated. Moving to more a pure Judo or an even lighter form such as Aikido would take advantage of movements you have already trained and help you expand them in ways you have not trained yet. You will find that the enhancement of your striking skills is significant. More importantly, it will be fun.

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I think form-based martial arts are great if you’re real about how martial they are. Tai Chi is more similar to Yoga than Muay Thai. It’s not a martial art in my opinion. I have no experience training Wing Chun, but you see plenty of older guys doing it. I am not convinced it is a good combat system, but that doesn’t matter if your training goal isn’t oriented towards that.

I’ve got a decent bit of BJJ experience and I can assure you it is sustainable movement, but only if you can shelve your ego and train with people who are of similar mind.

Not in the same way you’re describing, but in BJJ you can curate your own experience as long as you’re ready to swallow the pill of your training being less about combat and more about learning a movement. Some gyms do this without even realizing it.

If you want to learn how to use your bare hands to control a violent man, you’re going to need a more intense training experience, ideally with the strongest, most athletic men you can find to train with. If you just want to learn this week’s move, you can just do that and dip out before rolling (live sparring). Or find a partner to drill with after class. Rolling is optional, or it should be in a gym that welcomes hobbyist trainees.

If you find a room with similarly-minded and similarly-aged people I doubt you’ll have a hard time finding good people to spar with at lower intensities, as long as you’re able to do your part and moderate your own intensity. You can still improve as a martial artist, still get a great workout and still have a very fulfilling experience.

You’ll be fine as long as you don’t go around starting fights, and if you do, start them with people you’re confident you can beat up easily.

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In this case, was. The end goal of training shouldn’t be not being able to train at all by the time you’re fifty.

At his age, with a body that’s beaten up, Judo would make things worse. In mma, more injuries occur during wrestling training than striking.

That’s the thing, you train bjj to get better at bjj, not for exercise or to work out the stresses that life gives you. If you walk into a bjj school looking for a “combat” experience, you will be disappointed at best and get hurt at worst. It’s hard to recommend a martial art when the goal of training is not specified.

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I find it very interesting to dictate what someone else’s end goal should be.

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This had me thinking about a few questions:

  1. What about the training do you miss? The concussive physical intensity? The physical performance and discipline? The competitive camaraderie? The “human speed chess” nature of combat sports?
  2. What do you want to learn? Variations on striking arts (boxing, wing chun)? Explore something new in the grappling area (gi jiujitsu)?
  3. What do you mean by “form-based”? Do you want to learn and practice katas and specific movement patterns (TKD, kung fu, tai chi)? Do you want to learn an art with a large vocabulary of standard movements that still have a lot of room for creativity and self-expression (boxing, jiu-jitsu/grappling)

Good luck - curious to learn what you eventually come up with!

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I’ll inform my instructor of this. He’ll be very disappointed to learn that he hasn’t exercised in years and likely has pent up stress because of it.

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God damn I appreciate your dry sense of humour dude :rofl:

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@setshotbuford
I’d echo that Tai Chi probably wont scratch your itch if your back ground is in harder styles, possibly keep that for days you want to train lightly.
Not sure if you are thinking in terms of street effectiveness but personally I LOVE wing chun, and do think it can be effective IF you’re aggressive and willing to explode into it straight away and realize that you’ll still end up on the floor a lot of the time (but how often are you likely to fight anyway?)

Below is more of my reasoning, (you’ll see why I rarely post as I tend to waffle)…
Im a 58 year old who 5 months ago started “martial arts” training again after stopping around 25 years ago. I used to do wing chun, then joined the Guardian Angels when they started in London and trained in grappling styles, then eskirima, silat and anything anyone was doing around me.

Then life, work and partying got in the way and it all fell to the side. I’ve gone to the gym and trained really badly all the time, eaten badly and have jobs that tend to be quite hard on the body so I am have very bad shoulders and until recently lower back problems that flair up easily.
I’ve just joined a martial arts gym where you pay a monthly fee and have unlimited classes of boxing, MMA, MT and BJJ.

The club has groups that compete in competitions although that doesn’t interest me and I’m never likely to be good enough if it did. For me fight training is about self defense, then fitness (and I love the mechanics of it all too ) so MMA is what I gravitate to although all of them obviously have the benefit of getting used to being thrown about and manipulating someone. I personally don’t like the fact that in BJJ you get to a point you say I can hold the person there for a count of three, that’s 3 points! I use that time to think if i could punch them in the face repeatedly.
I don’t like kicks to the side in MT as I’m pretty sure if I’m in a situation I can kick someone effectively in the body, rather than stamp on a knee then I’m probably picking on someone and deserve a kicking myself.
And I don’t like in MMA that you don’t think of hitting the groin, poking eyes or spitting in someone’s face in a clinch but all of the above styles are interesting to train, get you down and dirty and are great exercises.
I thought I was I ok shape until I started BJJ, I’ve now lost a few kilos and have not had a bad back in months due to the constant core exercises I’m doing.
Whatever you do will be a benefit to you and whatever you start now you can change if needed anyway.

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@setshotbuford
I’ve just reread my post and would like to apologies for going off on a tangent and making it all about me.
Obviously its not just about the style you go for, your physical limitations etc. but its a huge deal where you train.
The club I’m at now I feel really good at, another local one I looked at I know I’d have stopped going very quickly even though it’s much more of a fighting gym and a bit cheaper.
Maybe try out a couple of places and styles till you see what and where fits?
BJJ may really fit the bill but if you don’t like the gym the excuses not to go will get longer than my ramblings…
It would be great if you update us and tell us where you end up.

You do understand that he asked the question about training? No one is forcing him to heed my advice but, I can still train hard and not need to switch to slow motion “martial arts.”

That’s a side effect. If you didn’t care about self defense you would just do crossfit or something. Remember, you chose a bjj school that is not all about sport for a reason.

I understand, yes.

I also find what you wrote quite interesting :slight_smile:

I’m more or less in the same boat as you are. I did full contact martial arts for many years in my 20’s, 30’s, got into some real fights, got into near fatal car crashes that has left me with a lot of wear and tear in my fifties. I know with some of my injuries the last thing I need to be training in is an art where I could be picked up and slammed on the ground like Judo, or where I could have a limb suddenly cranked on such as doing grappling.

Through Okinawan karate I have good background in forms training and I am good at it so for me it was not hard to incorporate aspects of Tai Chi into my training when I started learning Tai Chi. But I know from fellow classmates that there are some very tough fighters who could not do a form to save their life but if you got into a real fight with them it would be your ass. If you are more towards that end of the spectrum a form based art may be a challenge for you.

Luckily there are different types of Tai Chi, and it’s not all slow motion. Personally I don’t like to do the super slow technique all the time, and if you have unjuries you have to be careful of moving really slow, because a position such as a deep stance can put a high load on a joint such as the knee that is not good for it because you are in it for a long time.

Tai Chi is cool stuff to learn. One of the things you develop is a greater sense of body awareness. Sometimes a very slight change in body positioning can have a big affect. When you slow a technique down and feel it progress through your body you can notice things that you don’t notice when throwing full speed full power. For example you may have a kick you are good at throwing full power, but when you try to slow it down you can’t keep your balance.