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didn’t mind getting hit, and I didn’t like to lose.
    On one of these walks, I signed up for my first karate class. I was twelve and had gotten into the show Kung Fu Theater , which aired late on Friday nights. They put on demonstrations during the break that taught how to kick or throw a punch, basic moves, and I thought they were fantastic. It was something I wanted to try. A lot of people I knew were getting into jujitsu. But martial arts in general were a big deal in Southern California—the movie Karate Kid was a huge hit at the time—and I was such a big fan of all the different disciplines I started getting a subscription to Black Belt magazine.
    I wanted to join one particular dojo in town. My mom and I went by it three or four times on our walks, but it was always closed. So, one day we walked into another place, Koei-Kan Karate-Do, which was run by Jack Sabat. I was lucky the other dojo was never open because Koei-Kan was perfect for me. There are dozens of different forms of karate. Some—such as tae kwon do—are more sports-oriented and focused on learning self-defense. But the style Jack taught, Koei-Kan, while still about discipline and concentration, was more combative. It concentrated on debilitating opponents, not just keeping them at bay. It utilized pressure points and emphasized good striking technique. Koei-Kan was about building fighters. And it perfectly fit with Jack’s personality. He had grown up outside Detroit and served four years on an aircraft carrier during Vietnam. While in the military he wanted to find, he says, “the most hard-ass” system he could. And Koei-Kan was it.

    That subscription to Black Belt magazine paid off. I’d eventually earn my own black belt.
    The dojo was open seven days a week and I was a gym rat. During the school year I’d go to work out after football or wrestling practice. And during the summer, I spent every day there, sometimes until Jack locked the doors at midnight. For me, it was never about getting the next level of belt. I just wanted to learn. If you’re going to be good at anything, you’ve got to be willing to learn as much about it as possible. At first I was really good at roundhouse kicks, they just came naturally to me. But I still needed hours of practice to perfect them.
    The instructors at Koei-Kan emphasized technique and being self-motivated. They’d show us something once and tell us to go off into a corner and do it five hundred times. Then they’d come over to check on us, point out a small flaw in our technique, and tell us to do it five hundred more times. We did high kicks, jabs, hooks, straight punches, reverse punches, roundhouses, side kicks, back kicks, elbow blocks, knee blocks, outside blocks. It was real Mr. Miyagi, wax-on, wax-off, Karate Kid stuff. I’d be there for three or four hours trying to master these precise and specific movements, and my body would ache, without ever taking a punch. But the repetition helped me understand what I could do with each different technique; the movements became a part of my muscle memory. We’d grind away, and pretty soon my body only knew one way to respond when I needed to use that move. The repetition helped us build seamless combinations and gave us a clear perception of what the move was, how it was used, and how to apply it. And, really, hitting is what I wanted to do more than anything else.
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    MY FAVORITE ACTION MOVIES:
Best of the Best —1989, starring James Earl Jones as a coach who takes a team to the world tae kwon do championships.
Karate Kid —1984, Ralph Macchio as a lonely kid who learns karate and finds himself.
Rocky —1976, if you don’t know…
Diggstown —1992, Louis Gossett, Jr., an old boxer, fights ten men in twenty-four hours.
Bloodsport —1988, Jean-Claude Van Damme in the Rocky of martial arts movies.
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    I couldn’t get enough of sparring, which Jack let all of his