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How strong was Bruce Lee?
- Thread starter fireflame
- Start date
I get that. I said that the argument that weight does matter reminds me of the clip, I didn't post it as scientific evidence. Just a funny video.
Even though I'd argue it still shows that weight is a factor, since their sparring kinda makes skill (another obviously important factor) irrelevant.
It's always a factor. And an important one. I don't think you and i even have an argument, haha. The outcome of a real win depends on a lot of stuff. Weight certainly being an important factor. We're just trying to guess the outcome of fictitious fights.
No we don't, and that makes me glad, because I like you.
Fictitious fights are the best anyway. Gotta love Kengan Ashura and Kengan Omega. More exciting than any real fight tbh.
you guys get it, a younger version of me training MA full time weighing 60kg's vs current me at 77kgs barely trains 2 times a week but strong AF. Older me wins, I drank the koolaid thinking weights would slow me down boy was I wrong
Yes I am, because there is a sweet spot for advantages related to weight and size. I'm not an expert at kinetics, but I'm pretty sure someone with better knowledge in this specific field could easily explain this. Guys above a certain weight and size can be pretty much useless in a fight, because of their energy deficit.
If you weigh 180kg you're going to gas much faster than a 75kg guy - based on the same principles of physics that also make a heavy guy's punches hit harder.
Your advantage of hitting harder has diminishing returns - if you get hit by a trained 180kg guy vs. a 75kg guy that's like the difference between like getting hit by a Smart at 50mp/h or a SUV...you're "dead" either way. Bigger reach is a much more important factor if you ask me, but on the other hand a bigger guy is also a bigger target.
What I mean by kinetics is for example that a footbal player like Roberto Carlos, a rather short guy, still holds the record for one of the fastest free-kicks in professional football.
The human body is a complex machine and this combined with technique makes the equation much more complex than simply calculating pure force by using velocity and mass.
Look, the real question is:
Could Bruce Lee in his prime beat Bruce Leeroy after he unlocked the power of The Glow? And how would he fare against Sho'Nuff, the Shogun of Harlem?
I'm still going to go with "weight difference usually favours the heavier of equally skilled fighters" as the rule of thumb.
Could Bruce Lee in his prime beat Bruce Leeroy after he unlocked the power of The Glow? And how would he fare against Sho'Nuff, the Shogun of Harlem?
I guess the advantage/disadvantage you get from bigger size and more weight is on a (bell?) curve. Depends on what moves they can/are allowed to use as well.
I'm still going to go with "weight difference usually favours the heavier of equally skilled fighters" as the rule of thumb.
The prime example would be Bob Sapps K1 carreer. Dude ran out of gas extremely quickly and became a punching bag for his opponents, but if he managed to hit you while he still had something in the tank, it was often game over because of his weight and frame/force. But Sapp also had terrible technique and a glass jaw so there might be other examples.
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There were times where i swear Sapp was crying from pain in the ring. He really was a punching bag and shouldn't have ever entered the ring.
But hey, he did show heart and he made some money i think.
I'm still angry the ref stopped the fight between him and Hoost.
Yeah also a sad story. Too tall... And way too slow. Dude had to stop fights because the lowkicks he received made him collaps under his own weight.
I also think he was on the verge of actually crying a couple of times.
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It is pretty black and white. 2 fighters of similar skill in fighting, the larger one is most likely to win. Physiologically, it harder to overcome a larger opponent than it is an opponent of equal size and reach, and a larger person will have a much easier time against a smaller opponent. Think of it like this: ever wondered when you play fought with your siblings or friends and that one smaller kid never really was able to get free of any holds? It's not that they lacked the will to tussle with the rest, it's just really, really difficult to break free with your strength when someone of bigger mass is exerting their strength. Imagine if MMA fights allowed heavy weights vs light weights. It would be a whole lot of hilarity for the first few rounds then just plain boring.
Favours? Yes, but is there such thing as equally skilled? This terminology doesn't apply to reality. A cheetah may be the fastest land animal on earth, but a hyena can maintain it's top speed at a far bigger distance. There are always pros and cons.
And for several reasons we don't see those match-ups. In sports for obvious reasons. In real life it's more likely that one of the two will pull a knife or a gun. Two drunk guys in bar? Anything can happen.
I wouldn't call it a glass jaw. If you're to slow to react with your low stamina making things worse a titan jaw won't help you if a Crocop high-kick hits your head. Sap suffered from many disadvantages due to his size and weight. And yes, on a professional level everyone can land a lucky punch and turn around a fight in theory and Sapp's weight surely helped compensating for the complete lack of technique, BUT a lighter guy will have a much easier time developing a technique that takes full advantage of his body. You can't make an Elefant jump around gracefully like a Gazelle.
At the higher weights obviously size doesn't matter as much. Any top heavy weight can knock out another top heavy weight. Even if there are big differences in weight.
But when you get to the lower weights this is not as true.
Bruce Lee was a product of his time. But he's also the god father of mixed martial arts. He blended in different disciplines and styles. Bruce Lee was a legit badass. Extremely fast and insane balance. But he wasn't some unstoppable god in anyway.
Because of the stories of the people who witnessed him spar, some of which are from the champions of the time. Chuck has spoken highly of his ability as did Jim Kelly, another Martial Arts champion from the same era. So while he didn't compete officially, he did spar and train with champions, all of which have spoken incredibly highly of his ability. His speed, his form, and his strength. There's really no reason for them to speak of him so highly if he didn't have the talent to back it up.
F = MA
The impression of Lee that I've always has is that was was pretty arrogant. At least that's how he comes across in the myriad documentaries about him.
Also, he's an actor not a professional athlete. Saying he's the greatest martial artist is like saying the Harlem Globetrotters are the best basketball players.
The impression of Lee that I've always has is that was was pretty arrogant. At least that's how he comes across in the myriad documentaries about him.
Also, he's an actor not a professional athlete. Saying he's the greatest martial artist is like saying the Harlem Globetrotters are the best basketball players.
Tons of gym stars appear to be world killers but crumple under the bright lights of real competition.
Which has what exactly to do with what I said? The post I was answering said they don't know how Bruce got the reputation of being one of the best. I explained how that came to be.
But even if you want to talk about the "bright lights of real competition," there's a marked difference between being center stage in a widely broadcast competitive bout (like say a boxing world championship) and the never broadcast championships of the Martial Arts tournaments of the time. So even questioning the effect of the pressure of competition, competing in those tournements would've been more akin to something like Amateur divisions in other contact sports in terms of actual exposure. Hard to speculate nerves/pressure in such an environment.
I didn't really mean bright lights as in a big show. When you spar, its usually as part of an overall training regime and even hard sparring is limited. No matter the rule set, most fight don't usually last more than a few minutes. Most people dont just meet up with a fresh sparring training and decide to g HAM for 5 minutes and then be done with it.
Its way easier to get a reputation within the controlled environment of closed off sparring sessions than doing it "live" live.
The championships are point comps. So they're much closer to sparring than what you're suggesting. I think you're also underestimating how sparring actually works when you're talking about champions and "masters" (as in teachers/owners of schools). People get knocked out in Boxing and MMA sparring. At high levels, you don't spar at half speed, though you *are* supposed to try to avoid trying to hurt your sparring partner. The purpose of sparring is to emulate real fight conditions as much as possible with reasonable safety precautions. Otherwise it's pointless as preparation.
We do know that Bruce did have at least one real fight against another Wing Chun teacher who is considered a master and while the accounts of that fight vary widely, it's generally accepted that it lasted 20 minutes or so. Given those accounts, and the accounts of actual World Champions from the time... it's pretty safe to say that Bruce was an extremely talented Martial Artist.
This isn't to say Bruce was the greatest fighter of all time or anything so grandiose as that. But it seems pretty clear from the accounts we have from people who are knowledgeable and experienced enough to carry weight in the discussion, that he was more than "just an actor" when it came to Martial Arts ability. It's not a David Carradine situation.
He was a great martial artists, but he was no super hero. What he had was an amazing presence, star quality, and a sense of mystique that he communicated through his almost poetic way of explaining concepts that came from his martial arts teaching, and ideas of spirituality. Also, audiences of the time weren't used to seeing an Asian so prominently featured in the media, so there was something exotic about him, which added to the mystery. He was a POWERFUL presence on screen.
In a martial arts competition? I'm not sure he'd be an unbeatable World Champion. That's not really what he was about.
In a martial arts competition? I'm not sure he'd be an unbeatable World Champion. That's not really what he was about.
I mean it's hard to say how good he would've done in actual competition because full contact kickboxing wasn't really much of a thing until after he died.
Full contact kickboxing was thriving in Southeast Asia, Vale Tudo was a thing in South America and knockdown Karate was pretty big in Netherlands/Germany. It wasn't a big thing in the US, I agree.
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Yeah that's what I meant.
A lot of those point fighting guys from back then did transition pretty well into full contact though.
Very strong. He spent a lot of time building up all the parts of his body, including unfortunately the fluid around his brain. RIP.
He was and another thing about him was he loved dancing, even entering and winning the Hong Kong's 1958 Cha-cha Championship.
The movie is a fiction. I actually loved the shit talking full of himself Lee we saw in the movie. It's a different take.
A person trained in karate can do all of those moves. Arguably a lot of them are useless except in point trading or katas - like back fists or reverse kicks but even a midrange purple belt can kick like a mule and absolutely hammer an untrained otherwise equal foe.
The primary principles of karate can be applied rapidly and forcibly to good effect. A front kick to the torso of say a surprised mugger is going to feel like getting hit by a car. And rapid follow through with more kicks and simple punches will feel like going under the wheels.
They'd still get dismantled by an mma fighter or boxer with equivalent training tho. Shorinji Kenpo is a bit more practical since the emphasis is on sparring and strike force.
One weird thing about most karate is that you're trained to stop and pull strikes in both katas and (no/low contact) point sparring so shaking off those habits would be tough.
I know people like to say this stuff but the idea of mixing martial arts is way older than Bruce Lee. Greeks did it thousands of years before him with boxing and wrestling. Japanese have been mixing judo and Karate for awhile. Shit, the actual modern MMA was birth out of Carlos and Helio issuing challenges to all the best martial artist.
If anyone deserves the titles it's the guys that were actually on the ground fighting 40 min fights against bigger and stronger men
I'm not denying that weight plays a big factor in fights; that's why there's weight classes. I'm just saying there's lots of exceptions, and it's not the be all end all.
Again, in Muay Thai taller and heavier fighters have gotten tossed around, and these aren't just cans, they're legitimate fighters. In MMA there've been a number of fighters who've fought at weight classes higher than their own, Sakuraba, Kid Yamamoto, and BJ Penn among them.
There are actually a number of old ridiculous matchups from the early Japanese MMA promotions featuring light fighters versus much heavier ones, and a surprising number of them end up with the lighter fighter winning.
Strong for his size? That means not very strong at all. Its funny how a lot of non athletes say he could beat anybody though. They watch to much anime. look at some of mike tyson speed punches. Those are punches with power and weight behind them.
That's what hitting pads is for. You can hit them with all your power so it's not like your muscle memory will pull strikes in a real fight. It's just a case of consciously telling your brain to hit the person in front of you as if they are a pad.
