MAKING THE TRADITIONAL MAKIWARA PAD

The man known as the KARATE HACKER became discouraged with the Karate world after fifty years of training. The typical way he was expected to teach often violated both the philosophy and also the mechanics of original Karate. It was less effective for self defense, and less accessible to people who were not athletic. He decided to weed out all practices that were not reliable for self-protection. This resulted in a kind of “Karate shorthand” that was easier to do and more effective. He stopped teaching at his successful school to develop this further. The project picked up steam when he almost died and was left with physical limitations. The silver lining to this was that he could now see what an older person with delicate health and joint problems could still perform. Now his own body was the laboratory in which he tested techniques. A small group of students joined him in testing these methods and this became the COMMON SENSE SELF DEFENSE course. You can read more about it at