We take care to provide our students with the best, most affordable martial arts equipment in the Carbondale Park District karate program, from uniforms and sparring equipment to punching bags and weapons. Students need to purchase some of it—primarily their own uniforms—while the rest our program makes available to them at no extra charge.
Here are some thoughts about the equipment we use, with the caveat that they don’t necessarily constitute endorsements and a warning about the inherent dangers that martial arts practice and equipment pose.
Students should consult their instructors to make informed decisions about what equipment to purchase and not buy developmentally inappropriate items—for example, students should not train with weapons until they can demonstrate proficiency with unarmed martial arts techniques. In the Carbondale Park District karate program, that means students must earn their green belts before they start weapons training.
Most Convenient Martial Arts Wholesalers
Wholesalers cannot sell to everyone—they need to restrict their sales to legitimate retailers, businesses, and not-for-profit or government entities. Some martial arts wholesalers, however, have erected unreasonable barriers to doing business with them.
These wholesalers made the application process easy:
Each provides rapid shipping, competitive prices, and excellent customer service.
Fighters Inc. tends to sell much higher-end equipment, while Sword n Armory focuses on weapons.
Since the pandemic, we’ve found supply-chain issues have hit martial arts dealers hard. Backorders have reached the point where once-plentiful items have disappeared and might never return. These days, for example, Zengu and Macho primarily sell sparring equipment and uniforms. Their weapons inventories have shrunk considerably.
Best Rank Belts
Macho’s rank belts cost a hair more than ProForce’s, but the latter’s gaudy labels and inconsistent colors (purchase 10 ProForce yellow belts, and each may come in noticeably different shades of yellow) make Macho’s a better buy.
Best Uniforms
Jujitsu, aikido, and judo students may want heavier uniforms (or gi in Japanese) that will hold up to grappling. The lightest possible uniforms, however, will best serve karate students in hard, physical workouts. They’re less to carry around and trap less heat against your body.
Unfortunately, most martial arts uniforms contain large quantities of cotton, which repels sweat until it reaches a saturation point—at which cotton soaks up sweat, refuses to let go of it, and sticks to your skin. While nearly every other sport in the world has moved toward moisture-wicking materials, for some reason martial arts have stuck to cotton, and sweaty cotton sticks to us.
Unfortunately, a company that made excellent wicking gi tops, Millennium Martial Arts, went out of business some years ago.
Adidas makes a gi with vented mesh in the armpits, back, and between the legs, but it’s still 35 percent cotton, and thus not truly moisture-wicking.
ProForce makes a lightweight, moisture-wicking uniform, but the company sewed an ugly logo into the right chest of the gi, making it impossible to remove and inappropriate for our classes. This gi doesn’t use standard sizes, either—if you wear a size four standard gi, get a size two of this gi. Finally, the drawstrings that close the gi around you are a little high up and too short to double-knot, so they come undone in hard workouts.
Thus, we tend to use ProForce’s five-ounce gi. It won’t wick moisture, but it’s inexpensive, light, and provides excellent freedom of movement.
While you may not find affordable, appropriate sweat-wicking gi jackets with ease, you can find pants that will do the job extremely well, though they’re not sold as martial arts uniforms.
Sweat pants are generally too soft to create the pop that martial artists like to hear when they kick. Many surgical scrubs, however, create that effect, and they come with pockets, which many sweats and gi pants do not. You can find several brands that wick moisture away from your body with a Google search. Unfortunately, a company that we would have loved to endorse for its high-quality, custom-made products, Performance Scrubs, appears to have gone out of business.
Born Tough asked us to try two of their products—a workout T-shirt and jogging pants. Both are excellent attire for general fitness activities but not traditional martial arts classes.
The pants make good running or general exercise attire. They’re heavy enough to keep cold out while wicking sweat away in the winter. The tapered cuffs that grip the ankles like thermal underwear will keep your calves and ankles warm in cold weather, but they won’t provide the snap that martial artists like to hear when they kick. The zippered pockets, moreover, create dojo safety problems—they can cut or scrape skin when sparring or grappling. They’re no substitute for gi pants.
Most traditional martial arts instructors will prohibit the Born Tough moisture-wicking T-shirt as outerwear in their dojos, but might allow it under a gi top. Martial artists used to the loose fit of a gi may find it a little tight and will want a larger size. Athletes who prefer form-fitting attire will probably like it for general exercise.
The pants make good running or general exercise attire. They’re heavy enough to keep cold out while wicking sweat away in the winter. The tapered cuffs that grip the ankles like thermal underwear will keep your calves and ankles warm in cold weather, but they won’t provide the snap that martial artists like to hear when they kick. The zippered pockets, moreover, create dojo safety problems—they can cut or scrape skin when sparring or grappling. They’re no substitute for gi pants.
Most traditional martial artists instructors will prohibit the moisture-wicking T-shirt as outerwear in their dojos. Martial artists used to the loose fit of a gi may find it a little tight and will want a larger size. Athletes who prefer form-fitting attire will probably like it for general exercise.
Those who want a heavyweight gi for grappling might want to invest in the moisture-wicking merino wool uniforms made by Gimono. They’re lighter and far more breathable than you might think, and should hold up to rigorous judo or jujitsu workouts—but drier beware. In addition, as with the ProForce wicking gi mentioned above, the Gimono does not use standard sizes. If you normally wear a four, order a two from Gimono.
Best Weapons (and the Materials They Use)
Due to low costs and buyer ignorance, most big commercial martial arts weapons manufacturers make their wooden products out of red or white oak or a generic hardwood. They may work for no-contact exercises like kata, but will quickly splinter if they hit anything.
In North America, hickory provides the best readily available natural material for martial arts weapons due to its low price, excellent impact resistance, and light weight. Hickory, however, rarely grows long enough to serve as a bo, which generally reaches 66 to 72 inches.
Ash, then, is the preferred wood for a bo. While less resilient than hickory, an ash bo can withstand impact well. Like hickory, it’s light. The spread of the emerald ash borer has increased its price and reduced its availability, however.
For unknown reasons, we’ve always used tapered bos, making martial arts suppliers the best place to purchase them.
The jo is a shorter weapon than a bo—about 48 inches to 52 inches—and ideal for hickory.
We have always used straight jos—indistinguishable from the lowly dowel rod but far more expensive and frequently made of inappropriate hard woods that will not stand up to impact.
Thus, students who want a jo can purchase a hickory dowel rod from a lumber yard for a fraction of the cost of a martial arts supplier’s jo, sand it down, and oil or varnish it. Instead of an expensive red oak jo, which will quickly crack upon impact, a hickory dowel rod from a lumber yard will save you money and serve you for a lifetime.
Hickory is also the best wooden material for bokken, or practice swords—but those bokken cost hundreds of dollars, so we haven’t tested them. For a low-cost (and decidedly nontraditional) alternative, look at polypropylene, or #5 plastic. ProForce and Cold Steel polypropylene bokken will withstand years of hard, blunt-force impact without damage. While far lighter than a steel sword, these polypropylene bokken weigh about as much as wooden bokken but are far more resilient—they will shatter most wooden swords, though metal blades will slice right through them. We wish someone would add a rebar core to them so they would attain the weight of an actual katana or daito.
For other wooden or partially wooden martial arts weapons—particularly tonfa and kama—look for hickory or ash construction, if you can find it. With kama, you can buy low-cost weapons, cut the blades out, and replace the brittle wood wooden handles with hickory dowel rods yourself.
Though excellent for bokken (as well as the shorter wakizashi and tanto bokken), polypropylene makes flimsy sais and kama. The polypropylene tonfa we’ve found provide a poor substitute for wooden tonfa, as they lack the heft and dimensions needed to properly control them. The handles, in particular, are too small for adult hands to grip. They’re less like Okinawan tonfa and more like western police batons.
Aluminum makes slightly better sais than polypropylene—it’s more rigid, like steel, but not as heavy. Beginners might opt for aluminum while they build the strength and endurance for long sai training sessions, but will find it no substitute for quality steel sais in terms of substance or balance. Octagon sais are slightly lighter than round ones, making them somewhat easier on the wrists. They also reflect light in more dazzling ways, resulting in a flashier appearance.
With longer metal weapons like swords, avoid stainless steel, which can crack from the force of drawing them—they will not withstand contact with anything. The Sword Buyer’s Guide provides an excellent place to learn about the most appropriate metals for swords and other information you will need to find a functional weapon, like full-tang construction and proper mekugi attachment to the tsuba. It also operates its own store, which offers excellent post-purchase advice and support.
Best Sparring Equipment
Traditional point-karate tournaments require fighters to wear vinyl-coated foam boots, gloves, and headgear. Tae kwon do tournaments require their combatants to pad their chests, shins, and forearms and wear helmets.
We have found that price does not predict quality or longevity with this equipment. This makes different brands and models of sparring equipment interchangeable. Shop around for less-expensive equipment. It will probably serve you just fine.
We have found that single-mouthpieces and double-mouthpieces have protected our teeth and jaws in light-contact sparring. Those with braces will want to consult their dentists about specially designed mouthguards. Fighters should also consult their dentists about molding custom mouthpieces for boxing or other full-contact sparring.
Best Punching Bag
The Century BOB XL, while expensive, offers many advantages over traditional hanging punching bags.
Regular punching bags need rafters, beams, or other secure places to hang them, or they require the additional expense and space for a stand (which in turn needs weights to prevent tipping).
With the Century BOB (which stands for Body Opponent Bag), you fill the base with sand or water, then sit it on the floor and start your workout. (The base may need a few hundreds pounds of water or sand before you find your preferred balance between stability and mobility, so place the BOB on a floor that can handle the weight.)
Chains or ropes do not suspend the human body from above—gravity anchors people to the ground. Thus, the human body doesn’t swivel from the top the way a hanging bag does when you hit it—it bends from the neck or waist or it pivots from the ankles.
With its stationary base and mobile head, the Century BOB does a better job than a punching bag of mimicking the human body’s physical reactions to impact. Century also designed the BOB to imitate the feel of human targets, with harder temples and ribs but a softer abdomen.
The BOB XL is a longer model, extending to the hips, which allows students to practice Thai leg kicks.
Take care not to hit the base or back, especially with bare hands or feet. Wear gloves for longer workouts, as the rubber mannequin can take just as much of a toll on the knuckles as a traditional canvas or vinyl-dipped bag.
Future Product Reviews?
Contact us if you’re curious about any martial arts equipment that we did not review here. If we find it relevant to our classes, we might test it out and provide our opinions in future editions of this post.
Carbondale Park District Karate 