Karate do, tae kwon do, kickboxing, boxing, aikido, muay thai or thai boxing, judo, olympic and greco-roman wrestling, jiu jitsu, brazilian jiu jitsu, lima lama, wushu or traditional kung fu, sanda, sambo, are some of the best known martial arts.
In the wide world of sports, martial arts have their own multiverse in which they occupy a very special place, since generally those who start their learning do so with the main objective of learning self-defense.
All of them offer different techniques or styles in modalities of forms, combats and weapons. According to masters of these disciplines, martial arts strengthen the mind and stimulate self-confidence.
Some are Olympic sports such as boxing, judo, tae kwon do, karate and Greco-Roman wrestling. The latter is one of the oldest Olympic combat sports and, on the other hand, karate is the most recent, appearing for the first time in the last games in Tokyo.
Martial arts have their origin in Eastern countries and spread with great success to the West, which also adopted and adapted them, as occurs in the American continent with capoeira, from Brazil, as well as Japanese Jiu jiutsu that in the Amazonian country. he also developed his own style. Currently there are more than 30 types of martial arts, the combination of several of these gave way to mixed martial arts, often known by its acronym in English MMA (Mixed Martial Arts).
Un samurai cuautlense
Erick Javier Santamaría is a martial artist who does not stop in his intention to continue growing in knowledge within martial arts. His last achievement was the graduation of black belt teacher in the discipline of karate do within the Shudokan style at the school located in Cuautla.
At 40 years old, he is the first to achieve a certification from other systems or styles, he commented during the graduation ceremony led by the director of Shudokan Cuautla, David Moreno Quiroz, who was accompanied by Gabriel Moreno Quiroz, one of the initiators of karate. in Cuautla, in addition to sensei Luis Camaño.
Santamaría was welcomed as a new teacher member of this organization that just turned 47 in June. He entered the world of martial arts as a way to defend himself against bullying at school, “because as a child he was short and thin, so I had to learn to defend myself.”
He is currently a sensei holder of the black belt in karate do, in Brazilian Jiu jitsu, Japanese Jiu jitsu and capoeira where he also holds the fourth Dan black belt, while in Russian Sambo, Keysi and Lima Lama, he is a green belt.
“I started at the age of seven with my father who was in the pentathlon and taught my brother and me some karate; That’s how my beginnings were, of course, from father to son it’s more difficult, he taught us stretching and strong techniques that we couldn’t stand, ”he commented.
He added: “My mother took us to the Ayala Social Security to continue training, then to the Cuautla House of Culture. Unfortunately, my father, who is an academic teacher, and my mother, a nurse, did not have much time and they changed our group and schedule, that was when we tried tae kwon do, but it was very difficult for me to stretch and do complex flexibility movements, so that it didn’t take long for us to resume karate again”.
self defense vs bullying
He indicated that having problems with bullying at school made him decide to continue learning martial arts as a way to try to defend himself against older and more abusive children.
“At that time, combat cartoons were in fashion and the greatest wanted to grab us by the punching bag to practice their techniques during breaks or free time between classes, and that is why in my case, I had to learn to defend myself.”
He explained that already in his university stage he entered the Tecnológico de Zacatepec “but there was no karate there, and I was forced to try other martial arts.”
“I started to practice lima lama, which was very crude, a lot of hitting with the shin is used, like muay thai, which at that time still did not have much of a heyday; the most practiced at that time were tae kwon do and karate, since the lima lama was also just beginning to emerge”.
At the university level, he also met practitioners of other martial arts: “the bullying there was heavier and I had to impose myself with character and spirit, because not everything is fixed with blows,” he added.
At that time he began to practice the technique of capoeira for a friend whose father was an Italian retired soldier; “For me it was a new, unknown, rare technique, and it was how he began to train me by meeting Brazilian teachers. At the same time, he also continued training karate in Cuautla with the students of teacher David Moreno, such as sensei Ludwig and sensei Lucero; I did all this together with my brother who is a year younger than me, we always trained together and even competed with each other and that was not very good since one had to win”.
Teach what you have learned
The Santamaría brothers, in social work, supported by teaching children and young people in public spaces such as churches, assistantships, sports centers and even in the Youth Institute in Cuernavaca, “we gave many free courses,” adds Javier.
He recognized that each technique has its own style: “In karate, for example, very hard movements are made, and capoeira is softer, when I made this drastic change at the beginning that made my colleagues laugh because the style of each martial art.
Finally, he said that his intention was never to be a teacher, “but there came a time when I already had so much knowledge that it changed my course; I began to merge each learned style, until now that I resumed my studies in karate with Master David, who is a very cultured person like many of the senseis I know, each one of them has given me their contribution and a different vision, nurturing in my martial arts that I know and practice”.
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