Posted: Oct 29, 2011 1:26 am
I had a friend who owned a karate school. He was quite highly skilled and an excellent fighter, but was forced to teach children's classes to keep the doors to the gym open. Part of his black belt training included how to keep 'increasing' the kids power & improvement.
He would keep poplar boards around the gym, which the kids would try to break, most of the time unsuccessfully. Before the kids belt test, he would tell them that he knew they would be successful, and to concentrate and use all their power during the test. The day before the belt test, he would buy pine boards at the lumber store and bake them in the oven for hours until they were dry as twigs. You can guess what happened the next day. The kids would smash right through these brittle boards and 'pass' the belt test.
I asked him why he did this and he told me that parents want to see little Johnny succeed and if they did, time went by & money came in. I could tell he wasn't proud of it, but it was a means to an end. He had other tricks for adults: a carefully hidden x-ray film hidden in his gi that made quite a cracking sound when he let someone hit him. That coupled with a carefully timed wince of 'pain' convinced many to keep paying for fighting 'ability' they didn't possess.
One of his other parlor tricks was to break a baseball bat with a kick of his shin. The bat also spent days 'curing' in a hot oven.
He would keep poplar boards around the gym, which the kids would try to break, most of the time unsuccessfully. Before the kids belt test, he would tell them that he knew they would be successful, and to concentrate and use all their power during the test. The day before the belt test, he would buy pine boards at the lumber store and bake them in the oven for hours until they were dry as twigs. You can guess what happened the next day. The kids would smash right through these brittle boards and 'pass' the belt test.
I asked him why he did this and he told me that parents want to see little Johnny succeed and if they did, time went by & money came in. I could tell he wasn't proud of it, but it was a means to an end. He had other tricks for adults: a carefully hidden x-ray film hidden in his gi that made quite a cracking sound when he let someone hit him. That coupled with a carefully timed wince of 'pain' convinced many to keep paying for fighting 'ability' they didn't possess.
One of his other parlor tricks was to break a baseball bat with a kick of his shin. The bat also spent days 'curing' in a hot oven.