What advantages and disadvantages does a woman have in martial arts vs a man?

Question

Also, is there a particular style that enhances their advantages?

Answer 1

Women are a lot smarter than guys...haha.

Anyways, The biggest physical difference is in the size and weight distribution on your body, i.e., men heavy in the chest and shoulders, women in the hips. 2/3 of a woman's power is in her legs, so a kicking art would enhance your advantage in that.

Mentally, a woman fighter thinks differently than a man does. A man thinks kill, kill, kill (i guess, i've never been a man), whereas a woman is slighty more methodical and logical during a fight.

Women ARE NOT more flexible than men! look at Jean Claude Van Damme and Superfoot Wallace for starters. Men simply focus on strength instead of flexibility when they are younger because that is what society expects of a young man, but women are supposed to be able to do splits, so that is what we focus on when we are younger. Mental mumbo jumbo stuff there.

Women have a killer instinct that men lack. Look at a lion pride. Who does the hunting? the lionesses. The men sit on their butts all day long while the women hunt. Look at a black widow spider! What about a mama bear with her cubs? When we get in a fight, this ancient "protect the young, kill the enemy, bring food home to the pride" instinct kicks in and gives us the advantage in a fight.

Answer 2

This is an interesting question, I think women are generally at a disadvantage. Ideally a man and a woman with equal training should be compatible fighters but that just doesn’t seem to be the case. I know I’m not as strong or as fast as a man and if I got hit I would probably go down. If I hit a man it would be questionable if he would go down.
Generally we are more limber than a man but that doesn’t really help that much. One of my kicks just won’t do as much damage as a man’s. And kicks are relatively slow techniques compared to a punch.
We are generally out weighed by 50-100 lbs and men are also generally taller, if that’s a disadvantage I don’t know what is.
On the other side of the coin, I don’t think men really spar as hard with women as they do with other men and I think this puts men at a disadvantage, Obviously there are exceptions and there is some very hard sparing going on.
I agree with Keri_2362 that men generally underestimate women, at least until the first technique connects.
Women generally have less muscle mass and it takes a lot of strength (speed, technique whatever you want to call it) to make it through all that muscle to do damage. This is of course in fighting.
Now self defense is a different story. I think women are a distinct advantage, or at least we are at an advantage because most men don’t think women know how to defend themselves. Men have multiple vulnerable areas, probably more than women, and I have absolutely no doubt that I could disable a man enough to get away.

I feel there are certain kata’s in Shotokan that suite the female form and I think you can score better in a kata with those forms.

The real question is why would I want to fight a 6’ 200lb man? I’m 5’3” and 125lbs

Answer 3

You need to watch fight girls, and elitexc. They've had some bouts with women, and they're pretty good. The weight classes are much lighter, but women are starting to move up. It's possible, because the magic element here is skill. Any two people can take the same art for the same amount of time, but can be at drastically different ability levels based on a number of factors. There's always going to be someone better than you, worse than you, at your level, and so forth.

Answer 4

The physiological perspective here says that women have lower centers of gravity and therefore are more balanced. Also the lack of bulk causing testosterone creates an ability to be more flexable.

The Japanese have a weapon based martial art which was created specifically for women it is Naginata. The naginata is basically a staff with a sickle at the end. The form is highly circular and focuses on keeping your attacker at a range which they will be unable to hurt you. In Japan this style is still taught to girls in gym class while the boys do kendo.

Answer 5

generally only height and stregth.

with weapons training it is pretty much only height. Height gives you more range, however this is true of men too.

Any style that can negate a reach advantage and that actually teaches you properly to do so.

A woman's best style would be a weapon style where a woman can delude a man (admit it, we naturally think a woman is weaker till we see them actually fight) into thinking she is weak, and all it takes is one shot, one cut or one hit to kill (or would be if it wasn't under safe sparring conditions).

Actually with a firearm bieng big is not neccessarily a benefit, there is more of you to hit.

Answer 6

I agree with first poster. There's no real disadvantage or advantage between men and women beside size and strenghtness. However men have higher kill instict though.

However you don't have to be strong to be a good fighter. I'm not that strong but I regularly fight guys who outweight me by 10 to 25 lbs and win.

Also in my old grappling class, a girl who was not very highly ranked was only person ever to tap the instructor out. She did this by outsmart him and got lucky. No one else has even come close to tap the instructor out after that.

Answer 7

As girl we are being at disadvantage because we have less strength, power, and stamina.
The only advantage is that girl usually more flexible than guy.

In physic, the equation for momentum is P=m.v. Assume, if I want to hit someone with the same momentum as a guy twice bigger than I, then I must kick at speed twice than him. I can kick a bit faster than him, never reach twice of his speed. So, (at least in theory) I can only hit someone with less momentum than a guy.

Answer 8

We're also very sneaky! We have a lower center of gravity(in our hips and butt) than men (chest area) Its true than women are generally more flexible than men. But, none of these advantages work unless you have the confidence to use them; and that can be a problem because too many women are brought up to believe that they should 'be a lady' at all times!
To the guy that said our weak spot is the bewbs.......just remember when women get hit there, it doesn't drop us to our knees:)

Answer 9

Women are usually more flexible. & have relatively more lower body srength than men. This is most advantageous in arts that emphasize kicking, such as Tae Kwon Do, Tang So Do & northern Shaolin Temple Boxing.

Disadvantages are size, strength & agressiveness.

Answer 10

The woman finds many advantages in practice of the martial arts. On the one hand it's a sport which she can practise during all its life, in addition, she can acquire techniques to be defended against the aggressions.