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Jeet Kune Do tranlates to the way of the intercepting fist.  It is the martial art and philosophy created by the late Bruce Lee in 1967.  The art is heavily influenced by Wing Chun and borrows many of its concepts such as economy of motion from it.  Western boxing and fencing also make up a large portion, as well as elements of other arts including Judo.

JKD practitioners rely on minimal motion and maximum speed.  There are elements of classical and non classical martial arts.  We train to respond to energies, pressures and situations rather than a specific punch A is blocked by a specific block B.  Real combat should be spontaneous, and a martial artist cannot predict it, but only react to it, flowing like water into each twist and turn.

Not all JKD schools are created equal.  Some have wildly different ideas about what the founder of the art intended it to be.  There are those that believe it is only a concept that can be applied to any two or more arts, and those that believe that Lee's teachings should be followed exactly, and anything outside of those teachings is not JKD.

What makes this more difficult to understand is that many of Lee's writings seem contradictory, and people on both sides of the fence use quotes of Lee's to back up their claim that they are right.  There are those that see Bruce Lee as the father of modern MMA, and those that see that claim as an insult.  Either way, it is more important to develop your own understanding of it, than to change somebody else's mind.

Bruce Lee used to say that efficiency is anything that scores.  At Hamilton Jeet Kune Do, we follow a curriculum that we believe in.  It is an amalgamation of what Bruce Lee taught at all three of his schools.  What he taught changed and evolved over the years, but the core did remain the same and is very important.  If we teach something outside of that curriculum, we will let you know, but you will be progressing through the Hardcore Jeet Kune Do curriculum.

It is a vast art that will take years to master, but the basics are taught from day one.  When you start, your instructor teaches you to mimic his movements.  Later when you are more advanced and understand why and how you do these movements, you might decide that you would take a different approach to a situation.  That is when your instructor becomes more of a coach, and your art becomes more individualistic.