Episode 1057 - U.S. National Karate Team?
In this episode Jeremy and Andrew sit down and discuss the many US Karate Teams and why they may not really be US Karate Teams.
U.S. National Karate Team? - Episode 1057
SUMMARY
In this episode of Whistlekick Martial Arts Radio, Jeremy Lesniak and Andrew Adams discuss the issue of martial artists claiming to represent 'Team USA' without proper authority. They explore the implications of such claims, the importance of honesty in representation, and the need for clarity regarding the structure and authority of martial arts teams. The conversation emphasizes the value of integrity within the martial arts community and the potential negative impact of misrepresentation.
TAKEAWAYS
The misuse of 'Team USA' claims can mislead the public.
Honesty in team representation is crucial for integrity.
Martial artists should clarify their authority and scope.
Misrepresentation can harm the reputation of martial arts.
The desire for recognition can lead to inflated claims.
It's important to acknowledge the hard work of martial artists.
Teams should include their organizational name in titles.
Open tryouts across states lend credibility to teams.
The martial arts community should strive for transparency.
Misleading claims can create division within the martial arts community.
CHAPTERS
00:00 Introduction to the Discussion
02:24 The Misrepresentation of Martial Arts Teams
04:39 The Importance of Accurate Representation
09:02 The Desire for Recognition in Martial Arts
13:01 Conclusion and Call for Honesty
After listening to the episode, it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it. Don’t forget to drop them in the comment section down below!
SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Jeremy Lesniak (00:01.174)
Hey martial artists, what's going on? Jeremy here from Whistlekick joined by Andrew from Whistlekick and this is Whistlekick martial arts radio, the world's number one traditional martial arts podcast. And on this episode, we are going to talk about something that kind of bugs me. And it's people claiming that they represent various groups of martial artists when they don't. And if you're not sure what that means, you're probably annoyed too.
And if you're not, I'll tell you why you should be annoyed.
Well, maybe it's not that big of a deal, but I think it is right now and it's good material for discussion episode. Andrew and I are going to talk about it and you're going to stick around and you're going to see what we think. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for spending some time. If you're new to the show, whistlekickmarshallarchradio.com is the place to go for every single episode. While you're there, hit the subscribe button. That subscribe button is going to get you a place to plug in your email address. And when you plug in your email address, we're not going to bombard you. We're going to send you emails that say, hey, fool.
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Andrew Adams (01:28.484)
Yep, we just don't want you we just don't want you to miss out. That's all
Jeremy Lesniak (01:34.126)
And we also don't want you to miss that out on the other cool stuff that we do here at Whistlekick. Our job, our mission is to connect, educate and entertain the traditional martial artists of the world. And we do a lot more than just this show. So please check out Whistlekick.com for our full product line, our services where we will help you grow your school, our events and all kinds of other cool stuff that we work on. And we work hard. It's a big team and we're working hard to help all of you out.
Check those things out and shout out and thank you, the team. All right, Andrew. I know that we don't have a title for this episode yet. We decided we'd wait until the end and see how it went as to how we're gonna title it. But here's the gist. Let me set this up. I see people saying, hey, I've qualified to be on Team USA. Do you know how many Team USAs I've seen in the martial arts world in the last 20 years?
most of which are regional at best, most of which carry absolutely no national authority to designate themselves as a team representing the United States.
Now, the reason it bothers me...
is because the people doing this are claiming authority. They're using that name because they want their team or their organization or whatever to sound bigger than it is. And I find that disingenuous and disengenuity, that a word? That thing to me is just one small step away from outright lying. And I don't like liars.
Andrew Adams (03:19.619)
Yeah, it's difficult. I mean, it's impossible to have a US team of anything unless it encompasses the entire United States. And it also kind of implies that there is an overarching organization that is in charge of all martial artists. And we all know there isn't.
Jeremy Lesniak (03:44.75)
Right now. Let me start with swatting away the most obvious defense that people are going to make. Well, yeah, we're just claiming that it, you know, we're not actually claiming it's that OK. When we think of an actual legitimate nationwide. Sports organization that represents this entire country, most people think of something related to what Andrew?
Andrew Adams (04:13.858)
Olympics.
Jeremy Lesniak (04:14.744)
the Olympics. And how is any of the sports teams? Are any of the sports teams related to the Olympics named?
The US Olympic bobsled team, US Olympic basketball team. It's not the US basketball team. Even the Olympics, which I think we can all agree is.
Andrew Adams (04:29.54)
Olympic. Yep, exactly.
Andrew Adams (04:36.4)
Correct. Absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak (04:44.118)
the most deserving, if there is a grouping, the one that is most deserving of claiming any kind of federally supported, because there are tax dollars that go into it, title, even they are specific in how this works.
Even the karate team that competed in Japan was the US Olympic karate team, not the US karate team.
Andrew Adams (05:20.452)
Mm-hmm. Yep. Or the U.S. National Karate Team.
Yeah, yeah. And again, it would be different if we did have an overarching overarching arching organization. okay, good organization that overlooked everything, but we don't. So yeah, it is a bit strange.
Jeremy Lesniak (05:39.714)
I think pronunciation is interchangeable there.
think someone will correct me.
Jeremy Lesniak (05:48.884)
Even even if even if we did it would be the US organization name here martial arts team or karate team or taekwondo team or whatever because that work it's. The geographic region. The organization. And then what they do it could be the US Olympic. Hangnail removal society.
Andrew Adams (05:54.82)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak (06:18.668)
Right? That's still like that checks all the boxes.
And I went back and forth. I know I emailed you about this a couple of weeks ago that I wanted to talk about this.
There's a part of me that hesitated because I have friends who have done this people that I think the world
Jeremy Lesniak (06:48.726)
And all I would ask of them. Is you add the organizational name into the title when you talk about it's that simple.
And go ahead.
Andrew Adams (07:01.934)
Yeah, and I think for a lot of them, as you mentioned, they're regional. They are style specific. But even though that may or may not be the case, you, if you are on that, if I am on that team, whatever that team is, insert team name here, I am only an authority on what I teach to my students. I am not an authority on.
anything else. I have no right to tell people this is the way you have to do it or you should do it because of XYZ because your school is totally different than my school. And so I have no authority to tell anybody anything except my students.
Jeremy Lesniak (07:48.574)
If we're going to create these groupings, these geographic groupings, I think we need to be honest about them. So Andrew and I are from the Northeast of the United States. I grew up in Maine. I live in Vermont. I sort of live in both right now. Andrew, you're from New Hampshire. You spent time living even more north in Vermont than I have. And we know that Canada's right there. And sometimes,
people jump the border to compete. If I have a tournament in Vermont and one, two, three people come over the border to compete, is it really an international tournament?
Andrew Adams (08:29.594)
I mean, you can say it. You can say it is.
Jeremy Lesniak (08:29.868)
Sort of. I can say it is. Am I going to claim that my tournament in a high school gymnasium is an international grand championship world title event?
Even the tournament, because I don't want people to think that we're not holding ourselves to the same rules. We have a tournament coming up and I don't know when this one's coming out, but it'll probably be just a couple of weeks out from when we first dropped this episode. It's September 27th, 2025. It's the Whistlekick Championship. We're not calling it the World Championship or the New England Championship or the US Championship or any kind of other things like that. It's a championship, but it's a championship.
that we are the organization presenting. Now we could call it the US Whistlekick Championship or the World Whistlekick Championship because that at least lets the world know who's deciding this, who's arranging this.
And I get it. We want to as martial artists. We are often left out in a lot of these conversations. We know that the average martial artist by the time they reach black belt has far more time in training than a lot of people who are going to be recognized with, let's say, a varsity letter in a high school team or even that get to. No, I don't think I want to go as far as collegiate championships because.
Most of those are pretty competitive. But if you grew up like I did, you kind of felt left out. I'm like, I'm over here and I'm going to competitions and I'm doing pretty well. And I have less social standing from that than the lowest bench player on the football team. Which by the way, I think our high school team won six games in four years. And that sucks. So I get it. I get the desire to say, you know what?
Andrew Adams (10:24.784)
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak (10:30.806)
I'm now on a team and I'm representing my whatever my state, my region, my country, the world. And it feels good.
Jeremy Lesniak (10:45.336)
But what did I do to earn that place? Did I really best everyone who was interested and qualified to reach that level? Heck no, not even close.
Andrew Adams (11:03.292)
And I think it's important if you're listening or watching, hopefully you're watching, because we like people to see what we're doing on YouTube. Go check it out there. We have nothing, and Jeremy, think I can speak for you, that we have nothing against these US teams. I think it's, you know, and if you are listening or watching and you're on one of those teams, we're not saying you're a bad person for being a part of it. I think what we're saying is be
open and honest about what it really is. don't over overstep is not the right word, but like, keep in mind that you're not you don't have the authority over other people to tell them how that how to do things. Yeah. Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak (11:48.494)
Misrepresenting it's misrepresenting if and and here's the proof I have seen it is it is now August of 2025 and I have seen at least three different US karate teams show up on my Social media from different parts of the country with different people most of whom don't know each other They didn't
Andrew Adams (12:07.78)
Yep,
Jeremy Lesniak (12:16.514)
compete with each other or against each other. One is not, you know, the main team and then there's some alternates. No, they're representing different organizations that are going to different competitions. And that's perfectly fine. We'll be honest about that. Because this is one of those things that when people outside of martial arts, the moment they get any understanding of what really is happening,
It paints the martial arts in a bad light. And I will always come back to defending this industry. And I don't love that word, but it's the one I've been using lately that I love that has given me so much that has, you know, basically saved my life. And I'm going to protect it with everything that I have. And I'm going to protect it from people who maybe mean well, but collectively hold us back through
It's just another form of infighting. No, I represent Team USA. No, I represent Team USA. Well, we're not on the same team. So one of us is lying. Well, guess what? You both lie.
Andrew Adams (13:27.748)
Yeah, that's a really good point.
Jeremy Lesniak (13:30.006)
If you can show me where everyone in the country was invited and there was a reasonable attempt to invite. Everyone who was qualified. Nationally via at least national media.
Jeremy Lesniak (13:49.14)
and you're willing to include your organization in the name of the team, even if it's in small letters, then I can get behind that.
Even if you're an organization, if you're a national organization and 99 % of your membership is in, you know, the upper Northwest or the Midwest or the Southeast, I mean, let's face it, we consider ourselves a global organization at Whistlekick because we do have contacts and we've had guests on this show from all over the globe. But most of the people involved and most of our events are in the Northeast. We're working on growing that.
Andrew Adams (14:25.839)
Mm hmm. Sure. Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak (14:27.874)
But I don't pretend otherwise. I don't pretend that the tournament that we're going to have in a few weeks is going to be equally attended by people all over the country.
That's just not the truth.
And I'm not going to say otherwise. I'm not going to call it a national championship. Maybe in a few years, maybe if we have tournaments in a few areas. But even then it would still be the Whistlekick national championship.
And that's probably not the title I'm gonna use if we're putting it in Northern New England.
Andrew Adams (15:08.889)
Yep. Yep. No, I couldn't agree more.
Jeremy Lesniak (15:13.089)
So...
Little bit of a shorter episode for us, so let's let's wrap here with two very, very important points. One. We are not met at you. As an individual for the hard work that you put in to train and compete and to be part of a team.
Andrew Adams (15:35.535)
Yep, couldn't stress that enough. I think it is great. And I've got two or three friends on Facebook that are on these teams. And they work incredibly hard. And I don't want this episode to take away from any of that.
Jeremy Lesniak (15:56.162)
The only thing we are asking you to do for honesty, for clarity...
is to stop referring to yourselves with an air of authority that has not been granted nor objectively, even attempted objectivity taken.
If you hold open tryouts in 20 states.
Jeremy Lesniak (16:31.682)
we could have another conversation about this.
But if you have tryouts in one time zone...
or you take the winners from a single competition.
That's not national, that's not Team USA. Just put the damn name of the organization in the title and everything's okay.
Andrew Adams (16:59.3)
dig it.
Jeremy Lesniak (17:01.25)
Thank you for watching. you for listening. Andrew, thank you for letting me vent and get this out to those of you out there. If you have a different perspective on this, other than I don't like your face or I disagree with what you're saying, if you actually have intelligent things to say, I want to hear them. I am always open to having my mind changed, but you're going to have to come correct with it. Jeremy at whistlekick.com or social media is at whistlekick.
Jeremy Lesniak (17:26.67)
The best thing you can do to stay informed on this and other episodes and the topics and the things that we're doing with martial arts radio Let's go to whistle kick martial arts radio comm hit the subscribe button get on the email list We're gonna let you know about every single episode the day it comes out and that way you'll never miss a great guest interview or Andrew and I rambling or any of the other Wonderful things that we do in the martial arts world with this show whistle kick comm for all the rest of the stuff Until next time Train hard, smile, and have a great day.
Andrew Adams (17:58.394)
Smile and have a great day.