I took up martial arts at around fifteen. After realising I would not become the next Pelé, and after watching the classic Karate Kid, I began – how else – with karate. One day, when I discovered that a man named Bruce Lee had existed, my hero and my future path were decided. After reading his books I understood that you must constantly develop and seek new paths and challenges that move you forward. I devoured all his films. His reincarnation in the film Karate Tiger spoke to me enormously – there I first saw the strange wooden dummy his student had to train with. And so, at eighteen, I built my first wooden dummy – a real one.
I made it from a crooked piece of trunk from a felled tree at our cottage and a few laths, and set it on leftover scaffolding tubes that I assembled into a sort of frame. To this day I don’t understand how I managed it with one small drill. Just like in the film, it rotated on a pole around its axis. Unfortunately, I didn’t know how to stop that rotation. After I moved out of my parents’ home, I had nothing to train on – the frame was too big for my flat. But thanks to the idea of a friend I trained with at the gym, to hang the dummy on a wall bar, I made that happen in my one-bedroom flat too. Three arms and a leg hanging right by my head next to the bed always raised questions from every visitor. The rotating dummy became a fixed one, secured to the wall bar. The dummy was my long-time flatmate.
After starting a family and moving to a larger space, I could develop further again. One more idea from my long-time friend and then-coach still resonated in my head – the ability to move the arms up and down and lock them in various positions. All along I had the problem that my wooden dummy forgives everything; I could hit it like crazy, but there was no response. It brought me back to the idea of rotation, where working with it was quite different. Add to that mounting on the wall bar and arm movement, and an inner desire gradually grew to devise something more. These three impulses built the idea of creating something that would fulfil all my ideas about training: maximum adjustability, minimal space, and a design that looks good even after training.
It is no longer a wooden dummy, but a wooden buddy.
And that’s how it all began. At the start of 2020 I activated all my until-then undiscovered creative ideas. With longer and shorter breaks it took a year and a half of pure development, manufacturing and testing – and a great deal of nerve. I set the highest demands on the final product. I knew I wanted maximum adjustability and that the dummy had to be absolutely durable in every situation and its design unique. Over time I realised I was drifting ever further from the classic I had grown up with. It is no longer a wooden dummy, but a wooden buddy. A real training partner that moves you forward and that you can always have at hand at home. Thirty years after my first dummy, I present something that back then would have been a dream I didn’t even dare to dream. What I would have wished for most of all at eighteen. And now I would like to grant it to you too.
I wish you much success on the journey of discovery.
Michal
