Title:	Competition Winning Techniques
Publisher's site:	Independance Productions
Buy from:	Amazon
Price:	£8.99
Date:	2005
Running time:	50 minutes
Available formats:	DVD
Featuring	Alexandre Biamonti

Competition Winning Techniques

If you're going to study how to win competition kumite, who better than a man who has done it on a European and World level over 10 times, and moreover in contact competitions, where the stakes are considerably higher.

This valuable DVD shows French champion Alexandre Biamonti demonstrating some of the techniques and combinations that have helped him to become so successful. Many; maybe even most of the techniques, are recognisable as refinements of combinations that any reasonable GKR competitor already uses, however, the devil is in the detail!

The DVD is narrated in Biamonti's native French and all menus and titles are also in French, but there is an English voice-over option. It's just a shame that the producers couldn't afford someone who could actually speak the language to do the talking! The narration is one step above useless. Here's an example: "In this first seh quence, Alexandre presents to you two blows of fist.: mytee followed by one gyakut sooki". You can figure it out, but whilst you're unravelling the narration, you've missed the action!

In any case, it's what the narrator omits to tell you that really matters. He is usually explaining about how the hands and feet are striking, but if you look, you'll see that without exception, it's the footwork that makes the combinations effective. In particular, Biamonti has the ability to take huge lunges and slides and retain his balance at angles when the rest of us would long before be flat on our ignominious butts!

For anyone wanting to expand their repertoire with a few more exotic sweeps, this is also a great starting place, especially as these are skills rarely taught in classes or on other tutorial DVDs.

What I realy love about this DVD is that it's not just a series of dry exercises: after each one, footage is shown from BIamonti's long career, in which he successfully applies the techniques, so you can have faith that they really work.

Let's get something straight though; all other factors being equal, there is an optimum competition winning physique, especially in medium, light and non-contact karate. Tall, slim, light, with fast reactions, and great flexibility. You can train your speed and develop flexibility, but without the physique, you're always going to struggle against those lighter, taller opponents. Biamonti has that physique, but of course, it's the years of dedicated work that have made him so successful.

I find this DVD inspiring, because it demonstrates that the difference between world class and everyone else is not a million gymnastic techniques, rather, it's the precise, well-timed, perfectly set up application of a few relatively basic ones. Sadly, you'll need a seasoned eye to derive the real value from this disc, because unless you can see the whole picture: timing, posture, lightness, and above all, footwork; these drills will be of little use to you.

Even if you do recognise those things, you'll probably need to spend a lot of time working on your fitness and strength in order to develop the movement that Biamonti demonstrates.

There are few credible training DVDs from people with the results to back up their words, so this is doubly valuable. Well worth a look.

Narration quality
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Overall score					c