The Secret (To Martial Arts Mastery)

A large part of my life story has evolved from a simple introduction to Judo from my father when I was just a little one. During the summer breaks of my Kindergarten and First Grade years, dad sent me to Judo lessons like he had done as a child. I had some fun there but never thought much about it after those two summer lessons were done. When I think about it though, from that point on I always had a fascination with the Martial Arts. This finally lead me to pursue Karate on my own as a Junior in High School. That is where my story really unfolds.

My first real instructor was Bully Endo, a Kempo Black belt under Marino Tiwanak of Aliamanu and also a Black belt in Aikido. I can't remember his Aikido affiliation but can attest to his prowess in applying it to a tough young man who at only 17 years of age was much heavier and stronger. Ouch! He was an old school, hard core type that commanded our respect and focus during class.

After training with him for a couple of years, he started bringing up some special "Secret Training" he was willing to do out of his home for only a few dedicated students. We would have to prove ourselves first, by not missing any classes and working harder than we ever had before. Week after week he would ask who wanted to take part in the private classes and every week the same four of us would raise our hands, only to be told that we needed to work harder at our exercise and perfect our forms better. After I don't know maybe six months of this he finally agreed we were ready and scheduled the first of our weekly Saturday "Secret Training" I was the youngest and least experienced one to make the team.

I still remember how thrilled I was to be included in this special class, I really thought I had "made it" as an elite Martial Artist. How many people could say that they had earned the right to receive special "secret training" from their Master. Saturday finally arrived and we all showed up half an hour early so as not to possibly get delayed and be late. (Why doesn't that apply as much to my students? Guess I gotta get tougher on them.) Visions of flashy moves, Pressure points and Dim Mak were racing though my head. First class starts, OK get warmed up, go run around the block about three times, so we head down the street, turn the first corner and look up the long hill of the "block" - errr, this is going to be hard. We run around at as fast a pace as we can muster, to impress upon him how serious we are. Running back to our starting point, huffing and puffing we automatically line up in our formation by rank. OK knuckle push ups, we look down, standing there in an asphalt parking lot with all kinds of loose gravel and tiny remnants of broken beer bottles from late nights past. We drop down, not daring to brush some of the gravel aside, and start. We never had a count for our exercises or moves, he would just clap his hands and we would do one slow push up and hold on top until the next clap. Clap, clap, clap on and on. The clapping started to get a little fainter after a while and using our peripheral vision (we wouldn't dare turn our heads) we notice him walking over to the neighbors yard and talking to him, all the while, clap, clap clap. And so it went on through our whole, same exercise routine that we did every day in our other, non secret classes, only it was about doubled in length. After that we lined up in formation and started back on the very same basic, day one moves we had learned years ago. Line up, horse stance, straight punch, right, left, clap clap clap. Reminds me of Vince Lombardi's now immortal words, "Gentlemen, this is a football". After two and a half hours of this we were finally excused, "Good job, see you all back in class Tuesday".

Back in class on Tuesday, Sifu told us that we did really good and were on our way to learning the true secret of the Masters, we just needed to get in better shape first and perfect our basics, then we would be ready. And so it went, each week in class we were told to stay focused so we could move along with the secret training more quickly and each Saturday we would do a horrendous work out and repeat what we had learned in class years before. Front kick, side kick, round house kick, straight punch, back fist, clap, clap, clap.

Then it happened, one student asked "when are we going to learn something new?" I'll talk to you about it after class, he was told. Next Saturday he wasn't there.

About the same time I had Graduated from College and was ready to go out into the world. After much thought and discussions with my instructor, I decided to move to Maui. I told him that his class was the biggest thing keeping me from moving on and I really wanted to stay and train with him. He told me that I was a young man and I would have the rest of my life to train and to move on, follow my dream.

After I moved the special training died off as there were only two of them attending and one guy had a new job that didn't allow him to make every class. I did however come back home to visit my family twice a month and would always show up for one class at the dojo while I was there.

I appreciated my time training at that small dojo in my friends back yard but always wished I could have finished my secret training. It took me years to find another Karate class that even came close filling my need for hard core training. At my other classes in the coming decades my instructors would always comment on how good my straight punch was and my side kick, my round house kick. I was used time and time again as an example of how everyone should be training. I was even told a couple of times that my intensity and focus was too much and I needed to relax a little bit, "you don't need to put so much power into every punch, you might give yourself internal injuries" I need to mention here that was in reference to my moves in the air or on the heavy bag and punching board, I always had far more control than most of my training partners in live sparring.

Fast forward thirty years and I'm Teaching a class at Brazilian Freestyle Jiu-Jitsu in Wailuku Maui. After some minor whining by a few guys I start telling them about training in the old days in Hawaii. I had just finished a really gruesome work out and every one was beat. I told them about my old instructor and how we had to do hundreds of knuckle push ups in the gravel. I told them about the secret training that was even harder than all the regular classes. I was starting to tell them that I never found out what the secret...was........really........about, when it hit me. I had known it all along and just didn't recognize it! I was a model student and excelled through every art faster than anyone else in my classes. And I had just put my own students through the hardest training and most repetition of basics they had ever encountered. Train, Train, Train, Train. Clap, Clap, Clap, Clap. That was the secret, silly old guy never told us and silly young guys never figured it out until we got much older.

Since then I have trained many students in BJJ and Mixed Martial Arts with incredible results, I have helped to create many Champions and I don't tell them but I use the "Secret" all the time.

aloha Ermin Fergerstrom