The history of how this Manual of the Lost Techniques was developed is an interesting one. For those who know my other writings on Kenpo topics will know that I normally do not give much personal details or ‘name-drop’. However, the people involved with the background of this material are very notable. It is hopeful that practitioners of Kenpo from the 1960s and 1970s will experience nostalgia, and the new practitioners of our art will get inspired from how we trained in the developmental days of Kenpo in America.

Part 5 – The Golden Age of the Martial Arts – 1974 to 1980

Eric is a very detailed and organized individual. Eric was studying Sports Medicine at the University of Louisville. He had taken many notes and studies from the numerous experiments that we conducted on our students. Applying his sports medicine research techniques to the old Tracy’s classroom drills, we had found what drills produced the best results and what order that they should be executed to produce the greatest synergistic effect. We noticed great gains in our students and we jealously guarded the training ‘secrets’. Whenever a visitor would come in from out-of-state, we would revert back to a standard format. Our students were quick to figure out that our new student was a visitor.

Eric had begun to organize all of the Tracy’s system into its Family Groupings as we had done for the Parker System. What he found was a complete system of how the Kenpo system is organized. We had just released our “Kenpo Master’s Series – The Family Grouping of American Kenpo”. This series teaches how to study the Parker Kenpo System according to its Family Groupings, and Master Key Moves. The manual is available as a free download and the videotapes are still available. The students of American Kenpo loved this series. Those who had learned only a partial listing of the Family Groups were finally able to get the complete system.

In 1998, I had my first son. Eric and I had been developing a ‘family system’ that we would pass on to our children. Our intention was to only pass on the materials and information that we had gained through our classroom experiments to our children. Around February 2000, Eric had finalized the outline of how all of the Family Groupings can be incorporated in to the Filipino Martial Arts, ground fighting, judo, jiu-jitsu, firearms and multiple attacker situations. We had discovered that many Kenpo techniques in both systems did not answer all that a Kenpo technique is supposed to answer. There are the Four Technique Criteria that must be met in order for a Kenpo technique to be considered a complete technique. Most of the ‘well-noted’ techniques such as; Thundering Hammers, Sleeper, Snapping Twig, etc. meet those criteria, others only partially meet them. I had found our new system to be too good to keep to ourselves. We began to test the beginnings of our new system with one of our other most-trusted students, Hannah Sorota. Together, the three of us would develop, and fine-tune a new system of martial arts.

As we fine-tuned and finalized the entire curriculum for our new system, we came upon the main stumbling block that prevents kenpoists for understanding some of the more advanced concepts such as; the Master Key movements and Family Groupings. The main stumbling block is belt curriculum. Unless you know how to look for the Family Groupings and Master Key movements, you will not be able to systemize all of them into their complete categories. We decided to arrange our new system according to the Root Techniques and Family Groupings. We created a system in which there are 24 Family Roots techniques and 108 Family Groupings. This is the minimum number of techniques that can be reduced before eliminating important categories. [The martial artist historian will find it very interesting to compare our 24 Root Techniques and 108 Family Groupings to the original 24 movements of the Yang style Tai Chi Chuan, the 180 movements of the Tai Chi Chuan Long Form, and the 108 movements of Wing Chun Chuan.] To remedy the problem of where to put the techniques logically in a belt, we decided to have a ‘no-belt’ system. Instead, the system was broken into six levels, which progressively teaches all of the information in a logical curriculum.

We found the ‘no-belt’ system to be more honest in the appraisal of the abilities of the student. If you understand the ‘Bell Curve Theory’ then you will understand the concepts of average, median, mean, and deviation from the mean. Applying the Bell Curve Theory to the belt factory dojos, you will conclude that the mean, or average ability level, of the martial artist is shifted to the left. In other words, the average black belt in those schools is required less ability level than those of the standard from 30-40 years ago. This is why you see a number of black belts running around without any fighting ability. One of the concepts of American Kenpo has also affected the Bell Shape of the Black Belt ability requirements. This concept is called ‘tailoring’. Because so many American Kenpo schools have misapplied this concept, the concept of Black Belt has become ‘tailored’ to the ability level of whatever the student feels right about. This as produced a generation of Kenpo Black Belts that can articulate many of the concepts of Kenpo, but not deliver its effectiveness. The Bell Shape for a majority of American Kenpo Schools is a flat plateau. In these schools, everyone is accepted for who they are, not what they can do – the death-grip of political correctness.

Our new system has roots in Kenpo, Jeet Kune Do, the Filipino Martial Arts, Judo, Jiu-Jitsu, and fencing. It’s not a ‘do’ or ‘ryu’, nor is it affiliated with any specific nationality other than American. Therefore, we could not call it a type of Kenpo, Karate, or Kung Fu, because it is much more than that. Because we had strived to create a system that develops the martial artists to his fullest potential, we decided to shift the Bell Curve to the right. We want our average to be better than the best that others have to offer. We want our best to be among the elite levels of the fighters of the past. As a result, we developed a testing procedure to place only the elite at the top. In addition, we fine-tuned the training exercises that will enable anyone who trains accordingly, to be place among elite status. Therefore, instead of honoring ourselves by naming our system ‘The Lamkin System”, we decided to honor the elite practitioners who go the distance and complete the journey to become the elite. We titled our system, therefore, The Elite-Fighters System of Martial Arts.

There have been many to begin the Elite-Fighters System. Some have already become ranked in the system. We have found these individuals to be the ‘hard-core’, self directed, conscientious practitioners. Early in 2004, a group of our American Kenpo students who had been training in the Elite-Fighters System requested that the material become the advanced belt material for the American-Kenpo-Legacy-Association. They had found that the logical layout of the curriculum enabled them to finally make sense of the American Kenpo System. Therefore, the Elite-Fighters System of Martial Arts curriculum has now become the 4th through 9th degree Black Belt requirements. Other Martial Arts Systems (Kajukenbo, Jeet Kune Do, and other eclectic martial arts systems) are also looking at incorporating the curriculum into their systems.

Our journey is an on-going process. We thank all of the great instructors of our past who have guided, trained and inspired us to give back to the martial arts. It is our desire to help guide individuals who wish to fulfill their potential, to become the elite – the legends of the martial arts of tomorrow.

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