 American Kempo was probably one of the broadest and fastest spreading of the American martial arts. Founded by Ed Parker and perpetuated by his generations of his students, the system exists today in a variety of different flavors. Now perhaps one of the most prominent of these evolved systems is Jeff Speakman's Kempo 5.0. Taken the powerful stand-up fighting Kempo was known for and merging it with the robust grappling that is popular and prominent today, Kempo 5.0 has positioned itself as a powerful hybrid. Today, Master Jeff Speakman himself joins us as we take a deeper look into the art. So the first thing people tend to ask me is about the name Kempo 5.0. Now as I understand it, there were three previous manuals that Ed Parker had put together or that were during his time and I look back at my own material, we have a manual when we were part of your school that says 4.0 on it. Can you tell us what the 4.0 system was and how you transitioned from that to 5.0? Absolutely and a really good question. It comes from the perspective of when for example when I first began it was 1983 and there were 32 techniques per belt. That would be Kempo 1.0. During all those many years, Mr. Parker was rewriting the entire system and changing the extensions and updating it as he did all of his life. So that by the time that would probably be 1985 that I began to go to his house once a week with three other people, become a private student of his, then that had changed to 24 techniques per system and in the top right hand corner it had the 2.0. So that began that evolution reflected by the 1.0, 2.0. So before he died he had told me that he wanted to go to what he called a 16 and 20 system which is 16 techniques below brown and then 20 through the three levels of brown and then to the one level of black accomplishing the 154 techniques of the entire system and there was only one school he had doing that which was Brian Duffy in Austin, Texas. So after Mr. Parker died and of course some time has to pass when you clear your head and start to figure out how to move on, then I went to the 16 and 20 system because it made so much sense because there are extensions for second degree, black belt, third, fourth, and fifth and then if you move to a 16 and 20 system it really cleans that up because it gives you base techniques till first degree black belt and then logically orange extensions for second and purple and blue and green take you to fifth. Okay so by changing the order of the techniques that's what we called it wasn't the order of the techniques but the number of techniques per belt that was 3.0 that presented a problem because if you just cut the bottom and move them to the top and cut the bottom move pretty soon very soon you have techniques that are taught in the form that you're responsible for that belt level that aren't taught till much later which makes no sense at all so you can either now change the order to fit that problem create a solution for that problem or you can just say to your students okay I'm going to show you this technique don't worry about it now you'll learn about it later you know in the form and that also doesn't make any sense. So we restructured the order of the techniques to fit so that every technique that's taught in that belt level is in that form or earlier so there wouldn't be that conflict and that was version 4.0 and then that takes us to the complete tipping over of the apple cart and you know it's going from scratch to bring in the to address the issues of the 800 pound gorilla in the room which is jujitsu slash MMA and how that ripped Kempo karate from the place it had for decades which was the the ultimate in self-defense for the street that was then yanked out rightfully so by first the Gracie's and then the Machado and then the evolution of what we now call MMA and so then adapting the system to answer that question which essentially is okay how would you guys do your Kempo on your back and so we then address that but to to make that work and make it a Kempo ground system not you know we do Kempo Monday Wednesday Friday and Tuesday Thursday some guy comes in and teaches us jujitsu and you guys figure it out we didn't do that we took many of my students very accomplished in grappling ground fighting wrestling I became a student in a school in LA for four years so then we all came together and created solutions answers to how would you do your Kempo on your back if you fight one of these guys and it takes you down and you don't know what you're doing you can start writing bad checks you know because he's gonna he's not gonna let you up and he's not gonna let you strike him on the ground so the mountain of information of the jujitsu slash MMA world had to be brought in and interwoven into the fabric of Kempo and that's where the enormous workload and difficulty came in because I had to then with a lot of deliberation and communication with my other senior black belts figure out what we were going to take out of the system how we were going to change it what techniques were we're going to add now that there's you know an opening because other techniques were taken out and that's how we arrived at the 5.0 and accepted the responsibility which by the way was the mandate directly from it so if any of you didn't know it Parker didn't own that well you can just read all it everywhere it was all about continuing evolution and using scientific principles and concepts to help evolve the art and the direct quote from him that we lean into is the ignorant refuse to study in the intelligent never stop if you remember that Kempo will always be the art of perpetual change it will never become obsolete so so there it is all his life he was concerned about Kempo becoming obsolete unless it used the methodology of advancement and change and altering the techniques to keep it relevant and that was the mandate from him to all of his black belts one of the other quote we turn to is again from Ed Parker's when I'm gone I hope no one traditionalizes my art and as you fully know almost everyone did very very few people ever tried to adapt and advance the art and of those small group nobody really you know jumped down the 800 pound gorilla and said okay let's figure this out so we took that responsibility on and in the process of doing that it was necessary to eliminate somewhere around 2526 techniques from the system because not only would they be ineffective against that guy what we call the new fighter but in some cases you were actually doing exactly the wrong thing you would lean into what he wanted you to do and then it would be over for you so the those that were much more ineffective were selected for extinction from the system and therefore opening the opportunity for us to bring brand new Kempo techniques that either start standing up and go to the ground or start on the ground and finish on the ground that's one thing I noticed when I went through the FIBO system for a little bit the combat modules you actually grouped a lot of the techniques that were related together so you had like here's step a but if that doesn't work here's your what if here's your what if here's your what if and exactly from a student point of view that made it so much easier to grasp the whole bigger picture against the family group right and um right I like that a lot so yeah so a lot of new techniques adopted that format yes and and even when you know I refer to everybody isn't doing 5.0 to 4.0 you might be 3.0 2.0 1.0 doesn't matter but 5.0 guys that come over and want to look or talk or maybe even join with us whatever the case may be that's one of the things I point out is if you would take forget the 5.0 system forget all that controversial stuff of what we did and took out didn't take out blah blah if you just kept the 4.0 system and reorganize the techniques so that techniques that belong together work taught together you know like one two three four so there'd be three or four or five techniques that needed to be moved around and put together in a model you might call family grouping or some other related term but the idea is to create a learning experience for the students where they approach a physical problem with an ideal phase technique and then immediately default to the technique that answers the question of okay if that goes wrong and he does this what do you do and on and on and on down and down so even if you didn't do the 5.0 if you restructured the order the techniques with a combat model in mind the learning of your students goes through the roof their capability through the roof and their spontaneity as you know that's job number one of the Kempo homies is to be able to spontaneously you know shift from one mode to the next within the flow of the technique very very difficult to do so then when you add this monster of information called grappling then we would have to be able to by doing what we did was we created these combat models so there's a stand-up model like the typical one everybody knows is you know shielding hammer excuse me followed by five swords and then a few others so those are now put together instead of spread out over six months two years what have you and then we have that model and then we have another model like let's say how to fight on the ground how to escape a guard and what you do and how to finish on the ground so now the Kempo 5.0 student is capable within this combat model and then what he can do is jump to another model instead of another technique so you've got like three techniques in this model and three in that and when you intertwine them like that there are many many many choices in here so you should be able to start with your classic typical stand-up Kempo technique that guy realizes it was a mistake to try to stand up and and you know you're striking techniques against you because Kempo is really phenomenal at that so what does he do he would drop down grab your leg and take you to the ground okay how can I move from that state of consciousness to a radically different environment and not miss a beat and that's what we have done in Kempo 5.0 so the combat models basically take the ideal phase the water phase and even the grafting formulation phase and kind of teach all at once yeah that's exactly correct and and if you think about that for a minute see here's what we do as Kempo black belts that I think is a mistake we always look at us doing the art if you would stop for a minute and say okay what are the experiences of a guy coming in at yellow belt and orange belt and all that what do they see how can I help them not just how can I help myself how can I give the information to them so not only is it meaningful and they retain it they can perform it to get their rank but most importantly can you do it can you move from this situation to that radical different situation and have and have you just seamlessly move from one technique to the next and I'm glad you addressed that with the different the restructuring because that's exactly what happened when we did because when I started our school was doing the 16 technique system and when we started getting up into the couple belts in I had that exact same question we were learning techniques in the form and I would ask the director I'm like well what is this he actually his answer was what don't worry about it you learn about that the next belt and that was very confusing yeah so when we got the technique it's like okay now I get it but in the meantime it was just moves I didn't know what we were doing and and and perfect you're exactly the guy I'm thinking of when I did this the next question becomes how do we fix that and this is the uncomfortable conversation I've had with many many people over the years is that just that cognitive paradigm of okay here's a problem let's start creating solutions and move ahead just that seems to be so foreign to so many people because they have this righteous indignation in their head about how they think about this system was set up and their loyalty to Ed Parker and on and on and then so what I did is literally offensive to them even though I'm doing exactly what Ed Parker asked us to do and you're not so you're the perfect example of exactly what we did I thought how would you think no and that's I'm glad that you did it that way so I want to ask you when you started to approach the 50 system was it um did you first look at it like oh we have to make a couple tweaks or did you just sit down and say we need to start from scratch and completely rebuild from ground up it pretty much it was the latter of what you said it was back in 2002 when I you know for lack of a better expression I gave myself permission to open Pandora's box and start the what I hope to be incremental changes that ultimately turned out to be a mountain of information uh so well really what I did was I went into it with a really open mind and I said okay if I open that door and I change that technique to fit this then what are the other effects of that moving down the line in the system and bringing in I mean as you know Kempo Karate is a mountain of information that's absolutely astonishing when you compare it to other types of martial arts it's just in its own universe okay now we're going to bring in another mountain of information that we as Kempo Karate guys are completely ignorant of which is how to fight on the ground and then figure out how to bring that in and make those jujitsu or MMA techniques a part of the Kempo syllabus again it's really important that everybody that listens to this understand this point we are not having separate jujitsu MMA techniques in our system we learned what those were we brought them into our thinking the scientific the physics the principles the concepts that are the foundation of the art of Kempo which is what puts Ed Parker on his own planet he was absolutely a genius for doing that so we didn't create that what we did was we took his brilliance and applied it to another world and we were able to make this interwoven cohesive world it's not that tough to learn but it is challenging for to be sure and when you talked about um it's a question I get a lot about the fight with system people ask me well what is the grounds of is it BJJ is a judo is in the mix so you said you went and trained for a few years and you brought your guys in is it primarily jujitsu elements is it judo is the mix of different grappling arts put together so um it it really is bringing in a lot of what's known as Brazilian jujitsu which can turn more thin to this thing called MMA so there's a huge cross over there anyhow but I think you're right that it was primarily Brazilian jujitsu and bringing that back in and making that a part of the cohesive Kempo system we had no idea that jujitsu with no striking at all whatsoever is every bit as dangerous and brutal and effective as Kempo is standing up and we just I personally was completely ignorant of that until I started you know put on a white belt and a white game I went to the jujitsu school in LA and started learning firsthand just exactly how incredible that system is so freeze frame that for a second so take really well done Kempo and really well done jujitsu and put those two worlds together that harmonize with one another then you've got really the best of both worlds so the the primary goal what I really wanted to accomplish was to create a student body that who is extremely effective at both those ideas stand up or on the ground and really not care that they would be so effective on the ground you wanted to go there okay let's go there you want to stand up we'll go there and I really think that we've accomplished that now for for quite some time it's actually kind of a funny story about that because I encounter so many people who multiple different artists that that they want to deny the impact that ground fighting has had in the modern landscape they you know they've been trained in the martial art for how many decades and they feel that oh I don't need to learn grappling because you know I've got XYZ and I've got a really good friend who's who's changed in Kempo and him and his student years back decided you know what we're going to try to develop the anti-grapping Kempo so they figured they would work on their Kempo to defeat Brazilian jujitsu but the more they trained and the more they realized and worked the material the more they realized we need to just learn Brazilian jujitsu so we understand it so then that way we can implement it into the system there you go exactly exactly I mean you you really have to I mean and this is exactly who Ed Parker was you have to open your mind and investigate these things from a scientific point of view and take the emotion out of it you know if a technique doesn't work against one of those guys in the street then you got to fix it you've got to create a scenario where you go after a solution and if it can't be fixed then it should be extinguished from the system because why are you then teaching techniques to your students that wouldn't work against that particular guy now granted that guy didn't exist back when or or in very very small numbers in the United States back when Mr. Parker was alive so the push or the need to fulfill that gap wasn't there but it is now and ever since the gracious came here in 91 and changed martial arts forever in the world but certainly in the United States and actually we're the beneficiary of that because we didn't back away from it this is this is a really important thing we didn't just put the blinders on and say okay we're gonna be I'm sure you've heard Kempo people say I would never let any of those guys take me down ridiculous completely ridiculous I mean I'm a white belt in jujitsu clear clearly and I'm never not going to be a white belt but for those Kempo guys who haven't studied ground fighting or defend against a shoot attack I will be able to take you down and believe me I'm just an average white belt in jujitsu so if I can take you down imagine what would happen if you went against one of these guys who was really really talented not only would they take you down but they would humiliate you you would be crushed your joints would be twisted out of their sockets and there would be pain for a long time to come because you just don't know so I just wish people would listen to me and say when I say what you don't know is going to get you and your students in a lot of trouble now I'm not inviting you to come to Kempo 5.0 this isn't a sales pitch I'm sure you hear many organizations say come yeah join us be a part of our group you never hear me say that for one reason I'm not sure I want you I want only serious dedicated athletes who are gonna embrace the teachings of Ed Parker see clearly the necessity for being able to defend yourself on the ground even though you might be a magnificent Kempo black belt practitioner a tremendous striker but when someone takes your ability away to strike now what skill set do you say and that I'm going to beat somebody a jujitsu guy on the ground that's just not going to happen but can I survive can I even maybe thrive down there and get out of that situation get back up on my feet which is where I want to be and go back to the point you said that a lot of techniques that you found in a traditional Parker system put into these new scenarios that it was actually creating more danger for yourself and I'd like to kind of bring up um I guess locking horns would be a good example of that the defense against the front headlock that would not work against the guillotine move now no that's exactly right in fact there are three techniques that are the charging ram family grouping and and those are techniques that would really get you in a lot of trouble because they are not made for MMA shoot attack takedowns they're not they're made for sort of a football player guy standing back running at you trying to tackle you that's their effectiveness is within that range but the problem is then if the student then goes back say okay what techniques do we have against the shoot attack or an attempted takedown from a jujitsu guy and the answer is we don't the only techniques you have are those I just mentioned which would be highly ineffective and put you in a lot of jeopardy because you're not hipping out you're not getting your hips away from the attacker you're just moving up the circle which it doesn't create the distance necessary because here's the problem those takedowns don't come from three feet away four feet away five feet away that guy's right on top of you you're in the middle of a fight and he drops down and grabs your leg your ankle and down you go so you can't avoid that so we have three techniques that are set for techniques excuse me and the end of purple belt that are set to defend against that particular type of takedown attempt and then the first three techniques of blue are actually the answer to the question of okay and if those don't work and he takes you down what do I do I'm on my back I got a guy on top of me he knows what he's doing how do I defend against that so actually the last four purple and the first three of blue are actually seven techniques combined in one particular combat model I just split them in terms of the belt levels I have a good friend who's over at Mr. Sotomayor school in California and he's in the 5-0 program and we've been friends for for years but my experience is mixed and I've had Kemple 24 techniques 16 technique I've worked with your system a little bit different hybrids I've had a Tracy system so we like to compare techniques back and forth and what I noticed was interesting was the 5-0 that he's doing now is drastically different than the 5-0 I was doing back in 2006 2007 so what can you tell us about the evolution the 5-0 system has made in the past 15 or so years yeah it's I'm glad that you can see that because it is a pretty dramatic difference no it was 2005 when we came out with the first version of Kemple 5.0 and then about 12 13 years later we had continued to gather information test things go to different people have people like Bobby Sotomayor who his first belt was a black belt in Judo and my student base is such that these are very accomplished ground fighters grapplers jiu-jitsu guys literally from all around the world we have franchise schools in 20 countries now so I'm able to gain a lot of insight and information from not only people outside but within my group because those people that love Kemple but left because they knew there's something big missing then when they heard what we did then they came back to Kemple to come with us and when they came back they brought an enormous amount of knowledge with them which in turn has added so those accumulative experiences picking away at this and what's wrong with that how can we make that better what's the problem with this like the jiu-jitsu school I went to I had that gentleman look at our ground techniques and just say what do you think I want to hear the bad news you know not the good news and he said this is like for example if you would look at one and say this is a good technique except it wouldn't work against me and I thought okay you know I tried to make the system work against a guy like you and you're telling me it wouldn't work can you explain why and he would show me and I would go wow okay so we need to upgrade that we need to change this because we do have a viable robust ground system which has now developed even further from when we did it so technically we're really teaching Kemple 5.0.2 you know we just call it version 2 which means there there could be a version 3 there could be a version 4 I don't think so but during my lifetime and I'm 64 and a half years old now which you count half years once you're past 60 you know so when you're under 10 and over 60 you count half years but for the remainder of my time on earth we still could evolve further probably little tweaks in the extensions where there's really sophisticated advanced motion but everybody benefits from it but I'm still open and I want to learn and I want to grow and I want to change and I've as you can imagine I've spoken to many many people over the years who are many more you're senior than I and and kind of said why don't you do this or something like it or I mean my conversations with my fellow advanced black belts for my senior should be okay in this attack when you're on the ground you do this but we do that this is why we do it why do you do it now we're comparing you know we're learning from each other we're expanding Kemple to create a greater solution for the common good nobody wants to do it they literally have said look I've been doing it this way for 40 some years I don't want to change I said well I don't want to change either you know I don't want to be I'm 55 years old I'm rolling on the ground as a white belt in a jujitsu school getting my ass handed to me every single day I went in you think I want to do that I would rather parade in my black belt out in front of my Kemple group and have that you know emperors not wearing clothes anymore you know not happened to me but but I I said this has to change you know I took very seriously at Parker's quote and his influence on me obviously I knew him very very well you can imagine how close we were during the filming of the perfect weapon and on and on so I understood what he wanted I understood how we thought what his thinking process was when he developed the system so I went back and said okay now we have this huge amount of information we need to use that same cognitive pattern that he used we need to use to expand and adapt the system did Mr. Parker um address the the rising of grappling at all that he foresee the trend of BJJ and grappling coming into the future or do you think that happened afterwards I am told by uh people whom I trust very much who were there because I saw them because I was there and they said that he had files that he was keeping on jujitsu and ground fighting um now I never had that conversation with him but you got to remember I was just a third and fourth degree black belt when I was with him so I was still in that okay I get to learn from that Parker now so shut up and listen you know because the the you know I started under a guy named Larry Tatum in West Los Angeles and then when Mr. Parker asked me to start coming to his house with three other people the Kemple he was doing was so different it was completely different so that meant that if I wanted to be good at it I had to go back to yellow belt and relearn the entire system in every move and how he wanted it done he was very very solid in his stances well that's the education I had in Japanese gojiro so Parker's Kemple was power first and speed is an element of power which is how we teach Kemple so when I became a student of his it was like this is like going home to me you know the the power base and the solid forward bow reverse bow etc etc on and on it goes that's how I was taught karate in the beginning by Lou Angelman the Japanese goju that I studied first so it was a welcome change for me it was a welcome transition and a comfortable one for me so then I carried that forward in the Kemple that I did then so we backed off on the speed and went more for power for because effectiveness is what you care about I'm in the game of doing it right if you want to come and be a part of that great and if you don't that's also great but I'm not going to accommodate what I know is the right thing to do because I want more students so I can get more money so I can buy a better house or car or I don't need the ego trip you know I don't need that stuff many many many other people in all martial arts not just Kemple but they need that acceptance they need that power surge they need that I'm the one in charge and I say it goes like I could care less I mean I get out of my own way you know because I want to be the best I can be before I die and I want to bring this question up I had a viewer recently asked me because they look at the techniques that we do and they asked me they said would you say Kemple is more of a percussion striking art versus a penetrating linear art and I actually stopped to think about that because the first thing I thought it was actually you because going to your seminars yeah I actually you know you were showing us different ways to hit the body so that the power would reverberate and you and then you demonstrated on me which I swear I still feel today but it made me think about it would you say it's fair that Kemple is more of a percussion striking art versus linear power I think it's the best is to say it's it's both but it but it changes over time so when you're in the early belts in Kemple you really are much much more Japanese looking and how we do our basics and we're in a horse stance and we you know they're very very linear very single dot focus which is the phrase from the Japanese training you know it's one move and that's it so we're very much like that at the beginning then when you start getting a little bit higher those combinations start to include much more circular movement by the time you get the brown belt being in the advanced level techniques then you know now you're into much more advanced Kemple and now we're much much more Chinese looking than we are Japanese so it's both as long as you keep it in the framework of a projection over time. Doing deep thighs I'm trying to learn more of the academic side of the system and there is so much material like it's like college level course material to like see what you know category completion and how techniques relate to techniques and all the principles and rules that we have when you did 5.0 did you try to keep as much of that in tactic are all the principles and concepts the same or did you make tweaks to the under the hood as well? Kept all of those kept all of them the same added them adapted them to the ground system and then in addition to that we expanded on many of them more because the greater the scientific application to what you do the greater the understanding of your movement and the impact on the target so when you increase your effectiveness your impact on the target you increase the reaction from your opponent so then their next predicted reaction that you set up is a feed into your next move so that action reaction action reaction that sequence of events that we happen to throw a name on it call it five sorts it's really about the physics and the principles in the application and then we throw it together in a structure and we call it a technique and we put it up in the syllabus if you think of tempo in that way you teach it that way it's very very easy or let's say it's easier to adapt to something completely foreign like how to do your tempo on your back that that is an enormous that's an enormous jump from standing up and being highly effective to laying on the ground to have somebody smothering you there is no target to punch he's taken all those away from you and while he's grinding you into the dirt so you've got to find a way to survive that use the techniques that are effective on the ground and then find your way to do your striking tempo back again on him or her and I'm still looking you know I'm still training I'm still learning I have established great relationships with many other martial artists in the world and learn from all of them and I would love to have that kind of relationship with my Kempo Karate family but I don't and because I've been ostracized from the group largely not completely but largely and you know to be honest with me I think it's for good reason I mean if if I was them I wouldn't like me either so so the fact that for 20 years I haven't been invited to go anywhere almost literally zero that you know in a way that's like okay if you guys don't want to have this conversation if you don't want to look at what we're doing if you don't want to consider changing and evolving then okay we probably shouldn't be together because my message is at Parker's message if you don't change Kempo and live and grow it will become obsolete and and what a perfect example here we are you know 20 plus years in that very heavy MMA world and at least in the United States and a much of the West and the question is what have you done what have you done to adapt what have you done to make it a better experience for your students and for your your group however big it is a handful of people or around the world either way what have you done to fulfill your obligation as the mandate from Ed Parker to continue and evolve and change the art so it won't become obsolete that is my argument that is that is the only thing that I'm saying to everybody we could be putting our big brains together and coming up with something amazing I mean you look at type one though you know it's it's a radically different from Kempo Karate and even more different than Kempo 5.0 but in in 2008 I was invited by the world Taekwondo Association to go to Ankara Turkey to be a guest at their competition there their world competition now keeping my distance for teenage competitors only so I went there and I walk out in this auditorium beautifully laid out stadium seating packed with everybody and I'm just floored by what they have accomplished and I look around I just think my gosh if they are this now keep in mind there were seven thousand competitors teenagers only now if we ever got out of our own way and became united around the system instead of a person then imagine what we could accomplish but we can't because people are hunkered down in their little corners defending their they did Kempo this way they did Kempo and all of them say the same thing and they're all correct Ed Parker taught me this way this is the way Ed Parker wanted it that that happens to be true but that doesn't mean that is applicable over here and over there and over there it's a mess out there it's just the way that he ran his organization it's his business I don't run mine that way we're fully transparent everybody knows everything we've created a thing we call the five oh university where all my students all around the world have 24 seven access on any device anytime they want it with complete video slow moving complete explanation by me and then a written version which they can download and print if they want which at the moment is in English and in Spanish we're going to be moving into French and Dutch and Flemish because that's where I have schools in Europe so each student every time they graduate to get access to the next belt and the next belt and the next belt so that they have complete access to the entire system all the time the best analogy I've heard about the people saying oh this is not how Ed Parker showed me my instructor told me he goes it's like saying I have the real version of windows but it's like well that could be windows 3.0 and windows 95 98 they're all the real version of windows but if you want to be effective in today's business world you need the most up-to-date version for it to work properly exactly and and that's the perfect analogy now now take it one step further our position is to embrace change to create the future otherwise the future will create you now if I can get that message out across the world through what I which I've been able to do through my 5.0 family the rate of change of everything in our lives as human beings on earth is radically different now the rate of change in the last five years is greater in the last hundred years and the next two to five years is going to be far greater than that it's just increasing exponentially your thinking has got to be adaptive to the idea of change even if you don't like it and see this is what I think a lot is what's happening in our country right now with this unbelievably ridiculous divide politically between everybody and and and theologically and ideologically every everything is a everybody separated in their two corners well if you would just come out with say okay you know maybe I don't like the way this is going but it is going so let's wrap our heads around it let's talk to other people let's try to create a situation where we can get along and and at the end maybe we have a better world to live in so by creating a thinking pattern that is solution-based which we've done in the 5.0 system in a way you're preparing people to adapt and change to everything else all right you know the web telescope is up there right now at about a month it's going to start sending us information that's going to completely rewrite our understanding of the universe and how it all began and where we came from if you don't open yourself to that information if you close yourself to that because of some demagogue dogmatic thinking then you're going to miss an enormous amount of wealth of information and and this is what I see in the in the Kemple world and this would be the message that I would send to everybody there is so much amazing information in this art with whether it's 4.0 or 5.0 I don't care but there's so much amazing stuff in the advanced material that you're missing out on and and I think for any of the Kemple black belts are listening to that I encourage you whether it's in openly or privately learn that information because it is wonderful and you're missing out on a lot of Kemple at least know what the contrary argument is so you can say okay here's what we think but here's what they think and I choose this for these reasons okay that's a rational logical intelligent conversation that we should all be having instead of backing in your corner and saying that you're right everybody else is wrong and I don't even want to hear about and this is the this is the travesty I think is that this man Ed Parker was truly an amazing human being he was really a genius for him to take ancient Chinese fighting techniques and then Americanize them by bringing physics and principles and concepts brilliant beyond compare no one has done it before since and to not appreciate that to not see him for who he really was and to be driven and motivated by such a brilliant man to say okay we got it guys we got to keep going here you know in walks the gray season there we got it we got to figure this out we've got to and we can because he gave us the tools in the system of Kemple that he created all we have to do is apply them over here well that means you got to learn that skillset that means you got to go put on a white belt and go someplace and say excuse me would you teach me about this world and then bring that back and Kemple I said if you will and then and then create Kemple solutions to that problem and and that's what we've done in the 50 and I wish everybody else would do that and you got to believe me on this I am not pursuing students I'm not if you want to do this then you got to come to us you got to come to me and you got to go okay I get it and I want to look more at it and I want to be a part of that so okay then maybe we'll get along but but nobody comes into the 50 family kind of folds their arm goes okay what's in this for me that nobody does it you got to come in and say okay get it I like it and how can I participate in creating even more of this wonderful positive energy moving forward you you cannot walk in our organization and get a black belt deployment even for what you're the rank you're wearing now you have to retest for your first and second and third and fourth degree black belt after you have proven it you've learned the system because I did I went up I'm a ninth right now and I tested for every belt and in my big camp in July in Las Vegas and on the board are the very well known names in Kemple and the very well known names not in Kemple I put it out there in front of everybody and I get in line and I test with all my students and if things work out this July 7th I will test for my 7th degree or my 10th degree black belt sorry and for the first time ever as you know when martial arts came from China to Japan it went to Okinawa first and they've kept meticulous records from the last 900 years one of those 10 degree black belts from Okinawa and Gojuru is going to be coming to sit on my testing board in Las Vegas in July 7th so that's the first so I'm completely transparent completely open and okay I get that I'm offensive to a lot of people but no you know I had this conversation with a very dear friend who I will not name but a very dear friend and and he said look you know the you come across so abrasive it makes us not want to work with you so why are you doing that and I said okay you know I understand that and in a way I agree and in another way I don't because here's the deal we did this in 2005 15 years later you've done nothing now you want to now blame me because of my attitude for the reason why you didn't do anything well you didn't do anything for 15 years what makes me think you're going to do something if I continue to be Mr. Nice Guy in Kautau and all of that I'm done with that when I came out of my cancer in 2013 and I got my mojo back I lost 80 pounds you know I hit stage four throw cancer stage five you're dead so it's just a flip over coin if I was going to leave or not I came out of that and I started getting my mojo back and I went I just said to myself okay I'm not doing this anymore we're going to come out and we're going to come out swing and say we got to do something guys we got to address this because we have lost our standing in the martial art community as this highly effective street art we need to get that back and you are going to be a part of the solution or you're going to be a part of the problem either one I'm great with but just don't drag me down anymore because I'm just not going to do it I think you nailed something on the head when you said that a lot of people put on that white belt there's a lot of people who almost feel offended to put on that white belt to start over again and in the time I've been doing this channel I've noticed the same trend across a lot of different martial arts that a lot of people will intertwine their ideology their political beliefs their training they intertwine it with their identity so to challenge the material that they've learned seems to be an they take it as a person who they are but if they would only put on that white belt and try again they could improve who they are so I think a lot of people have trouble separating that this is me versus this is what I'm learning yeah it's so well said it really is and and just for the record with us for example let's say you're a third degree black belt you want to come in you wear your third degree black belt you do only on one side of your belt you put three stripes on the other side you put a color of where you are with us so if you're a yellow belt with us you have a yellow stripe and three red stripes on the other side because you're wearing like crest so I don't want people to look at you as a third degree black belt and then they go ask you questions you don't know what the heck you're talking about it makes me look bad but on the other hand I want to respect the fact that you've made a third degree black belt now it doesn't even have to be in Kemal we have several Japanese guys have left their system and come up with us now so if there are third degree black belt in Gojiru you wear your third degree black belt as long as you can prove you have a diploma for it of course and then you study until you can test for your first and then test for your second and then test for your third so that's why we have this big event in Las Vegas over here it's our 27th year coming up we have 130 to 150 brown and black belts from 15 to 20 countries all testing for their brown belt or higher or black belt or higher but here's the kicker if you're with us you have to be in that test every year whether you're testing or not so if it's three years from your second degree black belt to your third degree black belt you got to be in the test every year because you have to state up on your material and the only way that you prove to me that you are is that every year you get up there and you perform a test level of all of the information that you're responsible to know and everybody knows that and everybody loves that that's with us and everybody who doesn't love that they're not with us because they don't want to do it and I'm great with that I'm I pass no judgment on people who are doing that my only statement is you're missing out on so much of what Kemplow has to offer I like the concept of making your students test or show up at the test because you want to keep them like up to date keep the pressure on them and that's another aspect of Kemplow 5.0 I really liked was a step up of that pressure testing a lot of schools I don't feel push enough to kind of make the material work enough sparring enough pressure testing but the Kemplow 5.0 at least the school I went to and then the people I know they they spar and push a lot more so what can you tell us about the the 505 or program great as a byproduct of what we've done we created our own system of competition which you just mentioned called 5.0 fighter so what we wanted to do was create I guess an alternative to MMA because the the typical point fighting karate you know what we call point break where there's a referee you make one move and they stop and start again that's that's been obsolete for for 20 years so we wanted to get out of that but we didn't want to go all the way into MMA because it's just too hard you can't have a me or you or people who are out here you know you almost have to be dedicate yourself to just being a fighter to be able to get anywhere in the MMA circuit so we created a system of competition that really had the best of all worlds so to two minute round one minute rest one minute round the growing us a full contact target like it always has been for Kemplow and the tap out is not the end of the fight it's the only thing you can win three points for so you're on the ground somebody's in a arm bar they tap or the referee tap so they don't get hurt you stand them back up they're still a minute on the clock great award three points that guy ready fight and they keep going so the tap out is not the end of the fight it's amazing and we have a european championship a south american and australia for australia new zealand four regional tournaments throughout the u.s. throughout the year and then the world championship which is my event in july here in las vegas you wouldn't believe it's kemp you see people fighting half the time on the ground passing the guard defending against the past you know sweeping somebody regaining control of the situation making them tap stand up okay now we start fighting again now they're back up to this instead of the grappling on there it's a perfect mix and it's safe enough that everybody can participate in it but it's challenging enough that you've got to have your game on if you want to get anywhere in it so we're really really proud of what we've created so far now what's your opinion on the um and a lot of schools don't teach us anymore but the old kenpo freestyle techniques do you think that they have some to them do they have any place of 5.0 an hour in the future they have an enormous amount of validity to them they always have we don't do them because for one simple reason our fighting techniques are already in our system so that augment was designed because the kind of techniques that you would use in a free fight situation were almost not entirely but almost vacant in the system so you had to have your quote self defense art and then you had to have your fighting drills that you're referring to b1a b2a all of those things because that skill set wasn't in the original lineup but for kenpo 5.0 it is so we already have all of those moves that are in the techniques that are in what you learn moving up so there is no need for an alternate set of okay if you're in if you're in a fight situation don't do this anymore do that we've already got that it's already built into the system so the answer to your question yes it's very very valuable but it's only valuable when you don't have that skill set in the initial system anyhow now you mentioned the kenpo university and that's another question people ask me because you know we did the coverage of 5.0 before and a lot of people asked you know where they could find a school and a lot of people are not in areas where your schools are located so of course the national question was is there an online program can you tell us a little bit about the online program a little bit and where people can go to really important i've i've gone over that we have a thing called the 5.0 university so all students have complete access 24 seven anywhere in the world on any device and that's great and groundbreaking and is a huge move for us as an organization but as of just a few months ago we now have an online academy where you go there and learn the same material and of course have access to the 5.0 university like everyone and you can access that if you just go to jeff speakman.com you'll see a way to click to get on to the 5.0 or to the online academy and then you will have access to all the information and the lessons that are taught by jenny kiper who owns that project are also recorded so whatever time zone you are literally anywhere in the world you can now study 5.0 online you can test through purple belt online from blue belt and above you must physically be present in one of our schools around the world so when you have reached that level where you're ready for your blue belt and okay now you need to make a trip to las vegas and test here in front of me in my school or any school anywhere in the world but you have to physically be present to show that you can interact with other people and fight and spar and still maintain the integrity of the system that we've created no and to be honest too a lot of other art traditional arts they're testing i mean it's very uncommon to see a style actually hold tests for eighth ninth tenth degrees usually it's ceremonial or honorary so the fact that that's the path that you're taking i like that because i do think that that pressure test needs to be there that you need to keep showing that you're up to date that it's not just oh i just got a certificate signed i'm moving up because people love me or because it's been long enough like a lot of people say oh it's been long enough well okay well time is one thing but you have to have the understanding that goes with that exactly time time is a very important aspect to it but it pales in comparison to the information and this is where we're completely disjointed in the world of Kempo although it was crystal clear what Ed Parker made put together the extensions the sets the form all of that was absolutely clear but people don't want to do it but they still want to wear the rank okay that's perfectly right do you still call the Kempo you still say use Ed Parker's name you still do well well then if you do then do what he asked you to do and if you don't know it because maybe it wasn't taught back ask try care and ask somebody to share if somebody which they have that you may know the name Tom Kelly he's no longer with us but he was a tremendous force you know he was a giant he was like six three four ten he was a huge man and unbelievably powerful and great at what he did and we were very very close well one day he called me and said would you come out to where he lived then in Oklahoma and asked me to come out and teach him form seven I went absolutely and how great of you to ask and and that's all you have to do now I get why you don't like me and I get why you wouldn't ask me okay go ask somebody else it's out there it's all over the place the only thing that has to happen is you have to care you have to care that you're doing the art the way Ed Parker laid it out for us and if you do then just reach out and and again don't reach out to me I'm not looking for students I'm not looking for glory I'm not looking for anything I got everything I need what I want is more like-minded people to come and be a part of this positive energy that we've created in this thing we'll call the 5-0 family where it's the love and friendship that we have for one another is a far greater thing than the karate that we do and we morphed into that over time and I think we were always like that to a certain degree but when I almost died for cancer when I came out of that and I saw my black belts for the first time and and it was became the conclusion that I was going to make it I was going to live that the the feeling that we all have for each other the love and the affection it was just enormous and it became the center the the cohesiveness that brings us together so the last two years we haven't been able to have the camp in Las Vegas and it just kills everybody because it's the chance we get together from all over the world and that the most important thing is the human aspect the the things that are great about being human that's what we have put as rule number one for us you've given us so much information on 5-0 you've answered a lot of my questions and I think this paints a really really really broad picture and there's a lot of meat here to chew on um if a viewer were to watch this episode and just walk away with just one no negative idea one notion one idea what would you prefer that to be I wanted to be whether it's in this art or not or in martial arts or not embrace change to create the future because if you don't the future will create you there are so many changes in technology and medicine and imagine a few months ago we were remotely operating a helicopter on the surface of Mars can you believe that isn't that amazing and then you look back at what we're doing to each other politically here in this country and then look what's happening in Ukraine and you know the barbarity and the murder and uh for what for greed for an ideology because your truth isn't a truth to you in your opinion it's a truth for everybody and either you're gonna live in my truth or i'm gonna kill you know what what consciousness is that what humanity is that you know we should be thinking and rational logical scientific and then sprinkle in the emotion you know like mr park he used to say wait for the dust to settle before he cleaned the table have your basis of your thought be about science and cause and effect relationships and making the world a better place before you die well mr speakman i'd like to thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us spend your time with us say to actually give us a deep dive in the five oh i'm personally a fan of it like so i had to taste it for a few years and anything i could do to get the message out there because there's a lot of people who are interested in it and they just don't understand it enough so i think this goes a long way to help educate those who want to know so i just want to thank you so much for taking your time to talk to us about it today and i and i want to thank you you know this is a great opportunity for me to do hopefully what you just said which is to bring some clarity of what this is and our thinking and why we did what we did we're very open i mean you know i'm not tough to find i mean you know the convention city of the world las vegas to show up just walk in we can sit and talk we and i have many with many many people and and everybody is welcome we need to be open and respectful to one another but we need to hold that standard we need desperately to hold that standard and i once again want to thank you because your everything that you've ever said about five oh is spot on it was really really well done and i so much appreciate this opportunity to be here and visit with you and if if there's value and having me back again i i wait for your phone call i'll be glad to be here anytime that would be an absolute honor thank you so much all right have a good day you too i had the fortune of training at a just speak in school for a few years and i've got to spend some time with this material it was a valuable experience and i'm excited to see how the system has grown since then and how it continues to evolve i'd like to thank master speakman for taking us on a tour behind the curtain into the system of campo 5.0 now for those of you who don't know mr. speakman is not only a pioneer in campo but he has an impressive standing in the art of japanese goji ryu as well so be sure to join us in the next episode when he returns to talk with us about how he got his start in goji ryu and how it compares to his campo training so be sure to set your reminders and click that bell notification thank you so much for watching