What’s lacking in most modern marts?

Power.

People are derisory toward 70’s and 80’s Karate and Kung Fu because of their simplicity and training methods, but the truth is that the good practitioners of those days would smash straight through most of the modern technicians.

They may have been raw but they had the components that worked for real and they tested it every bloody, bone crunching training session and in security work where there was no badges or cameras, only hard earned reputations.

Why were they so much more powerful?

Because they practised hour after hour of rock solid basics working on:

Power
Venom
Fitness
Speed
Agility
Distance
Angles

And they fought, not sparring, but full contact with no pads or gloves, as matches were for real with nothing ‘pulled’.

Tournaments were bloodbaths but still not as heavy as the interclub rivalries and club ‘visits’ and invasions, where there were no referees or rules.

Luckily we’ve moved on from those days, but in some ways I think we’ve thrown the baby out with the bath water as we’ve lost the simple ‘budo spirit’ that develops an internal locus of power and the ability step up when it really counts.