From The Legend of Master Legend:

Ace and Master Legend

Master Legend races out the door of his secret hide-out, fires up the Battle Truck and summons his trusty sidekick. “Come on, Ace!” he yells. “Time to head into the shadows!”

The Ace appears wearing his flame-accented mask and leather vest; Master Legend is costumed in his signature silver and black regalia. “This is puncture-resistant rubber,” Master Legend says proudly, pointing at his homemade breastplate. His arms are covered with soccer shinguards that have been painted silver to match his mask. “It won’t stop a bullet,” he says, “but it will deflect knives.”

“Not that any villain’s knives have ever gotten that close!” the Ace chimes in.

Profile: Nyx
“I am Nyx–formerly Hellcat, Felinity, and Sphynx (I had a penchant for name-changes). Like the night, I cannot be proven or disproven…”

When Master Legend bursts into a sprint, as he often does, his long, unruly hair flows behind him. His mane is also in motion when he’s behind the wheel of the Battle Truck, a 1986 Nissan pickup with a missing rear window and “ML” spray-painted on the hood. He and the Ace head off to patrol their neighborhood on the outskirts of Orlando, scanning the street for evildoers. “I don’t go looking for trouble,” Master Legend shouts above the engine. “But if you want some, you’ll get it!”
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Many martial arts bloggers (Striking Thoughts, Mokuren Dojo and Dojo Rat to name a few) have published their opinions on the veracity of chi projection, empty force (ling kong jing) and no-touch knockouts. Naturally, I have a few opinions of my own–but I do not intend to share them here and now. No, my purpose today is a humble and scientific one: to gather data.

The plural of anecdote is data, right? So, please take this multiple choice poll. [Read more →]

10:41 PM. Responding to an assault call, Officer Tim Hoffman takes statements from the two parties involved.

John’s story: “I just came down here to relax, man. So I was sitting at the bar, and I heard this man and woman arguing over there in the corner. I could see the situation was getting out of hand, so I walked over there, and calmly suggested they should lay off. The guy just blows up, gets in my face, starts swearing and threatening me. I knew I’d have to defend myself, right? I got into a defensive stance. [Read more →]

Loyal readers, I have a simple request for you today:

1. Name one thing you like about this blog.
2. Name one thing you dislike about this blog.

Your honest answers will help me improve the content of Martial Development. As a small token of my appreciation, I will randomly select two respondents to win free DVDs. [Read more →]

I posed the following survey question to a group of martial artists:

What is the nicest compliment that anyone has ever paid your martial art performance? Or, if you can’t remember, then what compliment would you most like to hear?

Here are some of their answers:

The sound of tapping. ~Fraser

“For a fat guy twice my age…you left me in the dust” was the best one I ever got. ~Jerry

I get people telling me “you’re really good” all the time. Or “I always learn something rolling with you.” ~Trav [Read more →]

“John Chang”
a.k.a. “Dynamo Jack”

The Final Qigong Demonstration of John Chang remains one of my most popular posts. With the help of Youtube’s new viewer demographics feature, we can learn more about the people who find this video so fascinating. [Read more →]

Over the next few weeks, I will be conducting a series of reader polls and surveys. The first question is:

For how long have you practiced martial arts?

To participate in these ongoing polls, or to view the results, look to the bottom of the right sidebar. (RSS and email subscribers must click through to the website first.)

If you would like to suggest a future survey question, please do so below.

It seems my critics are right: I am a little slower than average.

Patrick Parker (of Mokuren Dojo) and I were discussing the feasibility of intelligent responses to physical attack. Patrick asked:

What exactly do you have to do to get the faster intelligence that Chris says we need? Well, really we can’t. From my understanding of the neuromuscular machine I don’t really think that you can make the brain/spine/muscle machine work faster than it already does. There is hardwired into us about a ¾ second delay (if not more) in the OODA loop.

A search for evidence supporting or refuting this unavoidable delay, led me to the Human Benchmark reaction time test. [Read more →]

Photo Credit: Bene16

As a busy software developer and martial art hobbyist, I rarely have enough time to entertain the proposals, projects and invitations I receive from fellow bloggers.

Of the time I can spare, I have dedicated a good percentage to outspoken criticism of martial arts excesses, leading some traditionalists to ask why I bother at all.

Today, I shall kill two birds with one stone: I am starting a meme dedicated to taking myself down a notch. [Read more →]

A Bullying Blog Carnival
At some point in our lives, we’ve all fallen under the predatory gaze of a bully.  Maybe you’ve suffered some verbal harassment or minor physical abuse.  Or, if yours was a severe case, you may have been physically and emotionally crippled.  Hopefully, you managed to learn something from the experience.  Will you share it with us?

How have you dealt with bullying and social dominance rituals, at school, in the workplace, or elsewhere?  Were your responses effective?  Do you have any prevention tips for the rest of us?  I invite you to write a comment below—or a post on your own blog—about your bullying and harassment trials.

Two weeks from now, I’ll write up a summary of your stories and strategies (with links to your blogs). Thanks for your participation.