Fightgear

Hi guys I was a member about a year ago but need a little help. I remember that a member of the club had a signature image I used to love; it was a Z in colour against a rugged (kind of Grand Canyon) backdrop which was dark and in black and white. I have been trying to describe it to my g/f but she hasn't got the faintest what I am on about. Anyone point me in the right direction? pleeeez!

Have to disagree with Markzx. They did make some manual versions. The autobox is one of the best going and handling them is pretty easy unless you change the set up and forget about its tendency to go out a**e first on a wet roundabout. I have to say this, my wife's TT (a '91 model with povpac suspension and no traction control) feels far more spritely than my 300zx tt, my previous GTO or my Soarer V8. There is a ton os straight line fun in a Soarer and a lot of fast cruising which will leave most other standard sports cars behind.

I've had two Soarers. A Uzz32 (Active suspension) and we currently have my wife's Soarer Twin Turbo. They are very fast. The suspension isn't a problem really. Main problems tend to be related to whether the turbos are knacked. Usual turbo examination rules apply. Look for smoke and listen for noise. There is tons of room in them and they will carry four people comfortably. My wifes TT (2.5 litre) was faster than my V8 4ltr at acceleration. Typical mods are a straight through exhaust and a BFI induction kit. If its a late model VVti then its a rarity and a great built car. If it is an early one (like my wifes) they run superbly but have a harsh ride. A lot of the Supra parts (including suspension) will fit. Are they reliable? Yes if they are looked after. I would recommend the Lexus Soarer Owners Club over its rival Toyota Imports Forum. People are much friendlier and the help you get isn't loaded around using the owners garage with people bowing and scarping to him as though he was a god (he told me that my active suspension pump and power steering pump where seized and therefore the car wasn't worth repairing when a belt snapped - in fact it was a tensioner and pulley that was seized which cost less than £100 to repair - had he had his way my car would have been scrapped). In short, the TT Soarer is VERY fast and a sod to handle in the wet. It can fishtail easily. Positives are it is very comfortable, very well built and very fast. If you find a well looked after one it is a superb car capable of easily doing a sub 5 seconds with very little work. Negatives are that parts are quite expensive, people are scared of them because of that and the perceived complexity of them. If you can work on a Supra you can easily do a Soarer. As has been said, the digital dash (proper digital with bar style speedo) can be problematic if it hasn't been fixed (there is a Soarer electrical guru called Luke based in Southampton), the lights do fog horribly and replacements are around £150 each. I'd say it probably is a little faster than the 300zx at least in my wifes modified Soarer. In Soarer circles the TT is considered to be the most 'Savage' of the breed.

Belts have nothing to do with bragging rights. If anything, its the other way around. I have students who have trained with me for 15 years and were presented with their black belts and who would gladly acknowledge it was one of the proudest moments of their life. At my schools, black belts are awarded when i decide and without any announcement. A lot of instructors are like that as well. It tends to be only the McDojo types that do big organised gradings where the quality is low and therefore the grade is irrelevant. For me and my students and many martial artists, grades/belts are for several reasons; 1. They give other students an idea of lines of seniority 2. They allow students to see where they are in terms of performance levels 3. To give them a clear idea of what the next stage of advancement is 4. To gain a sense of achievement I've had many students who have said they don't want to grade and most of the time it is related to their own inadequacies (many want to be able to beat other students while being 'seen' as a lower grade or ungraded (ie beginner) or contrary are afraid of presenting themselves at a certain level and the expectation that comes with this. Thats just my view but its one with many years of consideration behind it.

On flexibility, there is a dvd available by a guy called Kurz. A few of my students have used his methods (no equipment) and reported big improvements in their flexibility including ability to go beyond splits in one case. Here is a link to the guy http://www.stadion.com/column.html And here is a link to a video of him As for equipment, I had the original stretchasizer from Century about 15 years ago. It's okay but natural stretching tends to be more effective.

I was once hired to do a demo fight with Bill Wallace down in London in the late 1970's. He did a round of full contact with three of us, me, Lance Lewis and Arthur O'Loughlin. The sod told me where he was going to kick me (triple kick to the head, roundhouse, reverse roundhouse and another roundhouse). I thought 'yeah right' and he just did it. I couldn't stop him. He then proceeded to do it twice more. Most embarrassing three minutes of my pro career. Still, my friend Arthur who at that time was British and European champion, got the worse of it as he lost his rag a little at being so easily outclassed. Bill let out a few techniques and nailed him twice. Awesome guy. We went out for a burger with him the next day and his appetite had to be seen to be believed. He had three burgers and could have eaten more. A real larger than life character. Still tell my students about being kicked senseless by 'Superfoot'.

Nope, sorry can't say I know him. I originally started training in 1972 under Joseph Cheng, then John Darwin. After that I worked with Grandmaster Ip Chun and Wong Shun Leung. Also trained under Duncan Leung and Hawkins Cheung in the USA. Wing Chun is wonderful and something which is still close to my heart.

Been involved in martial arts since 1971 and its my profession (well one of them). Qualified in Wing Chun, 3rd dan in karate and one of the few original Jeet Kune Do instructors in the UK. Was qualified by Carlson Gracie as an instructor in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu back in 1997/8. Also train MMA/Cage fighters and have a large club at the University of Teesside. Involved in manufacture of MMA fightwear and used to write for UK and US magazines. I used to know Tony Leung many many years ago. Before the 'Mantis wars' broke out lol.

Awww... my favourite breed! Is that a long haired Akita? We had one for nine years, a beautiful long haired one from Redwitch kennels. His pedigree was so good that if he could talk he wouldn't have spoken to the likes of us! One of the most soppy and yet tough dogs on earth. Still a National Treasure in Japan as well. Shame they get such a bad press.... I put it down to crap owners.

I've had Vista since it was a beta release and love it to death. Currently running Vista X64 on this machine and Vista 32 on less powerful computers around the house. Main difference between the two versions (X64 and x32) relates to the fact that X64 is meant to be run on dual or quad core processors. Vista 32 will operate fine on a dual core but x64 is just a little bit faster and smoother. Makes better use of the processes. There is a shortage of drivers for x64 though and many software manufacturers have yet to catch up or get their finger out in developing them. Zonealarm being a major bug bear of mine. I started running X64 a year ago and in all that time I have had TWO system crashes which ran fine with system restore. If your machine is fast enough, go for X64 but if you are worried about compatibility (especially virus checkers and firewalls) and drivers, use the 32 bit. Unless you are a power user you won't really notice the difference.

To my knowledge it can't work with vista. The password is software/OS based. The CMOS password is a different thing entirely. Vista can't access the cmos. If there isn't a seperate Admin account, unfortunately it means reinstalling vista which is a pain. Sometimes the admin log on is not visible when logging on...

At my club at Teesside University, we have a Capoeira club there. Some of my students cross train in it and some of their students cross train with ours. Funnily enough, there is also a chunk of Freerunners and Breakdancers training there as well. I remember seeing a Capoeira master fighting in a Brazilian MMA contest and getting slaughtered. It's a great thing to work at like Chinese Wu Shu and Tai Chi but doesn't really have any street value in terms of self-defence. Great for fitness, fun and 'look at me' value though!

Got mine today. Great stuff! Thanks

I'd tend to disagree with the stuff about Soarer's being super reliable. They are the same as most other Jap cars. Built well but if they aren't looked after they will fail and fail BIG time. There are a handful of specialist garages but some of the repairs done are incredibly bad and VERY costly. The TT's are more prone to problems than any of the other versions due to the fact they are known to be fast and get abused accordingly. There are two owners clubs for the Soarer in the UK; one is okay while the other is basically a dicatorship run by one of the specialist garages. Soarers these days are cheap but repairs are anything but.

I loved my GTO TT. Probably one of the best cars I've ever owned. We have a Soarer TT on the drive now and that is more comfortable than the GTO but less brutal. The GTO had more 'oomph' and would get much more attention. The Soarer (I had a Soarer 4ltr Active and my wife has a TT) is great if you want a powerful four seater but I much preferred the GTO. Best compromise between the two is undoutedly the 300. If you want a real killer then I'd include an Aristo in the mix.

Having long been a member of torrent and p2p sites, I have to agree with Daves_Zed. These days all the p2p sites are almost useless. You do a search for something and all that comes back are either deliberately mislabled files, old versions, incompletes or deliberate porn substitutions. Plus they are more likely to be trojan or virus infected. E-mule and E-donkey used to be the best but they too have fallen foul to this. Torrents are by far the best option these days although even now, the best site (Demonoid) was screwed by the Canadian Recording Industry. Not sure why as there isn't much worth listening to comes out of Canada anyway! Bitcomet is about the best and easiest to use of the clients although I used to use a client called ABC which had the best interface but wasn't quite as fast and didn't work too well with Vista 64.

We went to see it on Boxing Day in an all most empty cineplex. Saw the reviews which were typically 3/5 so we weren't expecting Star Wars or Gone With the Wind but it was a good film. We have a pretty awesome home set up with a Sony 46", Hi-Def dvd, Dolby 5.1 etc and I know it looked better at the pictures. Some of the animation on the trailers (on-line and tv) looks blurry and vague but on a massive theatre screen it looks good. I think it was well worth the £12 it cost to watch it! That said, I would like to see the DVD as well as I get the feeling there were lots of bits cut out so the extra scenes would be worth seeing as some stories seemed too short.

I absolutely hate New Year. Always seems full of sadness and a time of 'should haves' and 'wish I hadn't haves'. Always felt like that, now just wish I could sleep through the time.

The police might not be able to strike by civil law but employee's agreeing to a no-strike rule are ruled by contract law and therefore capable of prosecution. As a secondary issue, who would arrest the police should they decide to strike? I heard an interview on Radio 4 not too long ago where the government said that they were accepting of the fact that the law against the police ability to strike would not hold up in European courts nor could they ever see a situation where they would prosecute a police officer taking part in an official strike action should it appear! Also, should the military decide to 'strike' it would be classified as desertion and dereliction of duty and the potential would be that they could face a firing squad or military prison or dishonourable discharge. I have said I believe the government should stand by their agreement with the police but my argument here is that the police always make out they are hard done by. They aren't. Bearing in mind the mention of the US police earlier, I believe that a 1 year service police officer in New York is paid around the equivalent of £17k per year.

When was the last time you heard of the nurses striking? Doctors? Army? Navy? Airforce? Coastguard? Lifeboat crews? A number of organisations/companies have engaged staff in a 'no-strike' employment contract where striking is automatically seen as gross misconduct and as such, they would be sacked immediately for refusing to work. In return for signing away these and union representation rights, the employees are given better wages and working conditions. Let's be totally honest here and factual..... the police are NOT there to service the public in a REAL sense. They are there to serve the government. The government set the BV (Best Value) KPI's (Key Performance Indicators) which dictate how fast certain crimes/incidents are responded to if at all. This is the reason why there has been so much outcry about response times for burglaries and why there is such an emphasis on road offences.

I just checked up on the comparative pay rates for military and police personel; A policeman gets more on starting than his military counterpart can earn without promotion regardless of time in service for the soldier. While a military Sergeant gets less than a policeman having served over 8 years. This same difference carries on up the scale from the bottom to the top with senior generals earning around 20-30k LESS than a chief constable. I recognise that the police don't attempt to say there is no case for the military being paid more which is to their credit but when did we last hear about military personnel threatening to strike or withdraw labour for their poor rate of pay. My case is this, the police are NOT a special case, no more than nurses, firemen, soldiers, sailors, airmen, lifeboat, coastguard, sewage workers, and many many more. How about the poor sods working throughout Christmas behind the counters in the stores? They get an absolute pittance. Hotel and restaurant staff get paid poorly as well but get paid tips, when did anyone last tip the guy behind the counter at Tesco or Curry's? How would we react if all the shop workers came out on strike now? Yet when do we hear outcry at this? Just imagine for a minute that all the shop workers just suddenly walked out on strike, the country would be crippled in a matter of minutes. Some jobs are forced on people not through choice but necessity and the market dicates the value by skill factor, employee availability and desirability (shop worker/miner/sewage worker/postman/etc). Some people though choose a career by personal desire. (I want to be a teacher/policeman/nurse/pilot,etc.). Complete parity isn't possible but there should be a sliding scale which allows for desire-ability, skill, etc. Like jobs should be grouped at a scale but, sadly this wouldn't be viable as people always think 'my job is more important than his' added to by the 'yes but....' scale. The police have got a superb career structure than most other people would kill (and therefore get arrested) for but (in my opinion) simply don't appreciate it.

Viniboy & SirMixalot: I agree that there should be more 'fairness' with the police pay BUT, why shouldn't that be performance related? Looking at the detection rates and the amount of time it takes the police to turn up for a burglary is not a great indicator of police efficiency. I understand that bureaucracy ties them up doing unrewarding things such as paperwork but let's face it, the police these days (being so target driven) will go for an easy score. Example, the old lady who had an attempted breakin; while she was told not to worry, she admitted having an electric stun gun under her bed in case she was attacked (I believe this lady was disabled as well). The police promptly arrested her!!! Fairness should rule but it should be fairness all round - how many civilians would get away with driving at well over 100 miles per hour as did a few police in well publicised cases over the past twelve months??

PaulG: I have to agree there with you. I lived in Barnsley until around 1982 when the strikes were on. I VIVIDLY remember being home on leave and being in a pub called the White Hart in Barnsley town centre one Friday night. There was a massive police presence in the town as this was during the height of the strike and there had been a big parade/gathering earlier in the day outside 'Camelot' (the NUM headquarters where 'King' Arthur Scargill was based) however, this was several hours earlier. We went on the usual Barnsley pub crawl and noticed police gathering in big numbers at three different locations. The tension was very noticeable. Anyway, we were stood quite happily in the aforementioned pub when suddenly all hell broke loose. A group of guys ran through the pub from the front exit to the rear and out the back. They were quickly followed by police in charging through the pub LITERALLY hitting anyone in their way. I myself saw a girl get punched and several totally innocent drinkers get struck and some even arrested. As I think back, I believe that was when my image of the police was shattered.

Yeah I saw a white one on the A22 near Polegate between Eastbourne and Hailsham. My blue one is waiting for me to get the ICE sorted before it gets road use plus, the current weather is more suitable for the Freelander.

Hey there Any idea of when I can expect my membership pack please?? :)