• albigu
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    11 months ago

    I wouldn’t say “best” because it depends a lot on what kind of fight you’re interested in. Say striking (karate), or grappling (judo), and even weapons (kendo). Though Capoeira both looks super cool and also teaches you some downright brutal moves that don’t rely too much on upper body strength, and people in Brazil (specially on the regions it’s practised more) are generally on the shorter side. It also comes with a more culture and community focused approach, whereas most martial arts clubs (in my experience) focus mostly on beating the shit out of sandbags and doing tournaments. It also has less gymbros and weebs.

    But lots of good martial arts were developed with shorter people in mind, if not by actual short people. Funakoshi, the developer of Shotokan Karate, is believed to have been around 1.55m tall, and Maeda from BJJ was also around 1.65. I’m very amateurish on this but if you’re short you might want to avoid striking martial arts that rely too much on throwing punches.

      • albigu
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        11 months ago

        Yeah, but thankfully most I’ve seen were more about showing it off on a higher level and having a bigger event than having a “winner” and a “loser.” Once they start handing out precious metal medals, trophies and belts though, they’ve already forgotten why the art was developed in the first place and have become the coloniser. Apparently there’s even going to be a “world championship” in Curitiba of all places. (For the foreigners, the South is skin cancer crackerland in Brazil, with some of them even wanting to separate from the country)

        • Compadre de Ogum :Ryyca:@ursal.zone
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          11 months ago

          the only interesting championship i’ve seen was the Bambas tournament, where Saci Fiu managed to knock out the other guy with a scorpion, which i’ve never seen before.

          the rest was forgetable.