{"id":625,"date":"2025-10-10T07:41:45","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T12:41:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/?p=625"},"modified":"2025-10-10T09:20:04","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T14:20:04","slug":"episode-80-jeff-grant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/?p=625","title":{"rendered":"Episode 80 &#8211; Jeff Grant"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In Episode 80 of My Empty Hands, host Reggie Darden sits down with martial artist <strong>Jeff Grant<\/strong> for an insightful Kenpo Conversation. Jeff takes us through his decades-long journey, starting from watching Bruce Lee movies as a kid in Germany to finding his true martial arts home in the comprehensive system of <strong>Kajukenbo<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Listen as Jeff shares his unique experience cross-training across multiple disciplines\u2014from Texas Blood and Guts Karate to Judo, Jiu-Jitsu, and Kempo\u2014and explains why Kajukenbo became the &#8220;full bloom&#8221; art that satisfied his hunger for realistic, complete combat training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>In This Episode, We Discuss:<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The Martial Arts Journey Begins:<\/strong> Jeff shares his early influences, from his father&#8217;s Taekwondo training in Korea to the impact of Bruce Lee films on base in Germany [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=134\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">02:14<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Blood and Guts Era:<\/strong> His intense training experience at the Texas Karate Institute (TKI) in Dallas, emphasizing sparring and body conditioning [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=267\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">04:27<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>A World of Arts:<\/strong> Jeff&#8217;s path through Taekwondo, an unplanned Air Force stint with Aikido, and his time as a &#8220;throwing dummy&#8221; while learning Judo and Jiu-Jitsu at Vince Tumura\u2019s school [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=606\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">10:06<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Finding His &#8216;Home&#8217;:<\/strong> The moment he was introduced to <strong>Kajukenbo<\/strong> by Bert Vickers and realized it was the complete art he had been searching for, blending striking, throws, and joint locks [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=960\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">16:00<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Kajukenbo Philosophy:<\/strong> Jeff discusses the art&#8217;s five contributing styles (Kempo, Judo, Jujitsu, Kenpo, and Chinese Boxing) and the importance of realistic, hard-contact training to test techniques [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=2011\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">33:31<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Forms, Weapons, and Training:<\/strong> A look into Kajukenbo\u2019s 14 forms, the nature of its weapons work (especially the knife), and the differences between various Kaji Kempo branches [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=2045\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">34:05<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Future of a Complete Art:<\/strong> The delicate balance of growing the Kajukenbo community without &#8220;softening&#8221; the training and losing its original combat intent [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=2953\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">49:13<\/a>].<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Lightning Round:<\/strong> Jeff reveals his favorite rapid-fire technique, his favorite forms, and why the knife is his weapon of choice [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=3489\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">58:09<\/a>].<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Shout-Outs &amp; Resources:<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Guest&#8217;s Art:<\/strong> Kajukenbo<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Instructors Mentioned:<\/strong> Bert Vickers, Chris Kimbro, Tommy Burks, Steve Tapper<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Reggie\u2019s Training:<\/strong> Reggie Darden gives a shout-out to Steve Tapper and Tommy Burks&#8217;s excellent training groups [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DZRz4nhdC8I&amp;t=1418\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">23:38<\/a>].<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_844\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-625-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/podcast\/Jeff_Grant.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/podcast\/Jeff_Grant.mp3\">https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/podcast\/Jeff_Grant.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 1px !important;\">Podcast: <a href=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/podcast\/Jeff_Grant.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/?powerpress_pinw=625-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/podcast\/Jeff_Grant.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"Jeff_Grant.mp3\">Download<\/a><\/p><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_subscribe_links\">Subscribe: <a href=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/?feed=podcast\" class=\"powerpress_link_subscribe powerpress_link_subscribe_rss\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Subscribe via RSS\" rel=\"nofollow\">RSS<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/?page_id=96\" class=\"powerpress_link_subscribe powerpress_link_subscribe_more\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"More\" rel=\"nofollow\">More<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Episode 80 of My Empty Hands, host Reggie Darden sits down with martial artist Jeff Grant for an insightful [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=625"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":627,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625\/revisions\/627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myemptyhands.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}