Quite a few people have imposed that I do JKD ; I am flatter and honor but I am not a JKD practitioner. I never had one JKD lesson in my life. I was and still am inspire by Bruce but being inspire does not make me qualify to say I teach JKD. I never found an interpretation of Jeet Kune Do that suited my needs I guess. When a man dies, his art is inevitably left for interpretation by others and today I would like to consider some of these interpretations in hopes to invite discussion and learn from my JKD friends. 

    Interptetations: 

1  JKD as a martial arts system 

2 JKD as a martial arts concept 

3 JKD as a philosophy

JKD as a martial arts system

      THis is popularize as original JKD sometimes and I guess the basic  premise is to only do , practice and refine what Bruce Lee did physically as a fighting art in his life time. And this system is divide into different period in his life ( seattle, oakland, LA  ) When I look at that premise, the first question I have is: if people are going to try to do what he did,  are they going to do what he taught or what he use in a real fight? IS there a difference?  

   When I was younger and I was into researching Bruce Lee, I made sure not to believe in the general martial arts media,; the only source that I believe in was the people that actually train with him. And according to people who actually knew him , train with him and in some case actually saw him get piss off or in a real fight, this is what he did : 

  In seattle he just close on people with straight punches combined with a fencing lunge as soon as he felt intent, follow up with blasting  and used pressure sticking as a back up plan. His close apparantly was so explosive, non-telegraphic and fast that  most people he moved in on could not make a simple response before they were hit.  Supposedly, as his martial arts skill evolved, his methods change. However, according to his LA students , the tactic didn't seem to change at all when he was serious : Dan Inosanto ( LA student) , " when ever he was serious about a fight , he would move in with a blast" . Dan Lee (LA student) said Bruce was bouncing , sparring and playing around but as soon as Bruce  was hit,  Bruce got piss off and move in on him and blast him to a KO .  Ted Wong ( LA student) said that when ever he was sparring , Bruce would be bouncing and moving around but whenever he got serious he would be motionless and as soon as you are about to move , he would be on you with whatever tool he wanted. Even in HK before he die , someone climb over his fence and challenge him to a fight , Bruce close with one kick and it was over. Or during a challenge fight on the set of enter the dragon he dance and spar with the guy but as soon as things got serious,  he again close , trap and pummel the guy.

    So it seems that there is a common theme according to those who knew him  : whenever he was playing he would move around and spar ( SPARRING METHOD) but whenever he was serious or piss off he was able to read people's intent  and close with an attack sucessfully before most people can react ( FIGHTING METHOD). This seem to be a common thread from his early to later fighting method. Essentially, this tactic is basically like the quick draw artists of the old west: you sense intent and you draw first and shoot him dead before he have a chance to even touch his gun. And when I think about it , it defintely make sense . If you knew someone is about to shoot you , would you a) step back, pull your gun out , bounce around and fake a couple of times and then shoot the guy ? or b) wait for him to shoot first then shoot back? or c) draw first and shoot him dead since you knew you had a high proven chance of sucess?  He consistenly use the last tactic when the situation got serious and why not ? I suppose thats why he called it Jeet kune Do, the way of the intercepting fist. So if his tactic didn't change throughout his career, what did?  It seem that what did change was the tools - from machine gun punches to one punch/ kick kill ability. 

      Another interesting thing according to those that knew him was that Bruce got hit a few times by people much slower than he was when he use his sparring methods: Dan Lee hit him square in the jaw , Herb got him with a upper cut in the mouth etc , this is normal because everyone gets hit when they spar. However , no one he move on ever stop him or came close to touching him when he used his quick draw fighting method, I like that. This included air force boxing champs, Ex pro boxer, Judo champion, Kali teacher, amature boxing champion etc. 

     For me,  when I was a kid, I only wanted to learn Jeet Kune Do for self defence not for sport and as a result I was  only interested in the fighting method and not the sparring method ( 90% of what is taught in public) . I was not interested in what he did when he was playing and sparring with his friends but I was only interested in what he did when he was serious in a real fight or when he was piss off - in another words I was only interested in the real stuff haha! The problem is 90% of JKD in the public seems to be teaching his sparring method but not his personal fighting method... 

    Years later I found the reason why : when I got a chance to meet his students , they said Bruce did not wanted people to know what he was up to, he would teach his sparring method but would never show his fighting method. According to one of Bruce's student, Bruce Lee  once said  " why should I teach someone to beat me? " . In 2011 looking around in MA , it obvious now that morality has gone out the window ,  trash talking , bragging , picking fights , glorifying violence - all common marital arts behavior . Perhaps Bruce saw the future when he refuse to share his personal methods.  

    So  looking at some of the key attributes that made up the fighting method - what he did when he was serious: THE THREE KEY ATTRIBUTES

1 Being able to read intent - did this came natural to him? Is there a way to develop it ? 

2 Being able to move with his  direct tools - what was his direct attacking techniques? Can anyone learn it? 

3 Being able to move explosively enough to score on experienced people before they can make a simple response - how does one develop that kind of speed in movement? Is it just about speed? 

  Since Bruce said he didn't want to teach his personal fighting method to people, I wonder if people who claim to teach JKD after he died can help me achieve those 3 things he didn't teach and here is my opinion /assumptions: 

1 Being able to read intent like Bruce - a) natural ability- I don't have it  b) happens naturally if you are used to people attacking you - in that case no need to take JKD   c)  Specialized training - Can JKD teach me that , the ability to read the non-physical ? Hmmm what is the non physical ? what is the supplemental training for it?  Would the common school be able to train that non physcial stuff like reading intent or even know it exist ?  Most are still only talking about half beats and broken timing ..

2 Being able to learn his ( Bruce) direct tools- Motor learning is a GENERAL thing, each human being inevitablly will move differently as it should be but can I learn the general pattern of movement itself from JKD lesson? - Off course!!! awesome. Time to take some lesson but if you were to just learn the GENERAL movement , do one need lesson? hmm not sure , gotta think about that one ....  

3 Being able to move explosively like Bruce through JKD lesson ? - I don't think so , if it was possible , there would be JKD teachers all over the world moving explosively like Bruce Lee's speed. O wait, actually in the last 10 years on the scene , there's finally a JKD teacher named Tommy Carruthers that can move like Bruce but ironically JKD people critize him and most who criticize him can't move that well at all , unbelievable. I found that weird because If I was a JKD guy , I would be happy that finally someone can move like that ... 

    Some people have suggested that this " quick draw idea" is basic simple stuff and when I hear that my response is , if it's so simple and low level ,why can't you do it or why can't anyone do it like him OR why couldn't anyone stop him when he used it? 

    Another thing about his back up system is that it went from the reliance of pressure sticking to simply pot shotting holes according to his last private student but the thing is in my opinion after the first beat since he was getting people before they can react , it matter very little what he did to finish someone once they were that screw.

In part 2 i might look at JKD as a concept ....