WING CHUN SYDNEY.

 

The real reason there are so few Masters in the world is less to with the difficulty in becoming a Master and far more to do with the difficulty of keeping up the training.

The drop off rate in the Martial Arts is something all Instructors are aware of, from my perspective there are three significant reasons, there are many more than these for sure but these I think are paramount.

Early on people do not consider the length of the journey, expect too much too quickly or are not willing to put in the work to get measurable results, this group leave within the first 3 to 12 months.

At the other end of the scale are the people that really did give it a go, trained diligently for years and then for some reasons, especially with Wing Chun, they decide that it doesn’t work, it doesn’t do what it says on the box and they change styles.

But for me the most unfortunate of all are the students that cared, worked hard at the training, loved it, made good progress then life got in the way, it can seem like mission impossible to prioritise training over working to pay the mortgage and raising a family, especially if there is travel involved to get to training.

The real reason there are so few Masters in the world is less to with the difficulty in becoming a Master and far more to do with the difficulty of keeping up the training.

It is this middle group that I try to reach out to by asking their friends that still train to get them to this Blog, by sending Emails and even by offering some catch up private lessons at a greatly reduced price, because I know that deep down they still want to be training.

Often when I am in contact with a member of this group of people they will say something along the lines of  “I have not completely abandoned Wing Chun I still do the Form most days” the implication being that somehow this is all it takes.

On the few occasions that I do tempt them to come back it very quickly becomes obvious that what they thought they were maintaining by doing the Form has long since packed its bags and headed for the coast, frequently this is the final nail in the lid of a well forgotten coffin.

So long it’s been good to know you.

Can there even be such a thing as “Maintenance Training?

All Martial Arts are complex systems that require involvement in a variety of different areas to stay current, if we focus too strongly on any single aspect then some other aspect is being ignored and decomposing, this is my main concern about Schools that base their training on doing Forms or “Internal” aspects.

All training even non Martial Art training is task specific, we can only learn what we are doing, we will only ever be able to do what we have learned. 

In fairness to the “Internal Camp” if we spend all of our time just hitting stuff we would experience a similar drop off in all around skill.

There must be balance, but most importantly there must be forward movement, just like a shark if we stop swimming we start sinking, if our training is always doing the same thing every time we train we are not moving forward.

One of the great weakness in Wing Chun training is that far too often there is no connection to context.

What is this thing I am doing really teaching me?

If we are only ever training one or even all of the Forms are we learning Wing Chun or are we simply learning Forms? And of course this applies if we are only training to hit things.

Each of us individually and as a School collectively need to establish the context that our training relates to, if we do not know where we are coming from how can we know where we are, if we do not know where we are how can we tell if we are headed in the right direction.

If you where to ask your Instructor “what is the context that you teach from” how do you think they would answer?

Would their answer be that they are trying to provide the conservative same old, same old or a progressive step forward, would they be passing on someone else’s ideas or their own updated understanding, would they be facilitating maintenance or progress?

Whichever way we look at it can only doing the Form provide either?

If this sounds like you get back to supervised training before it is too late.

If this sounds like someone you know send them a link to this post.

 

 

Even though this is part of Chum Kiu Logic it is not until we are introduced to Biu Gee core winding that it all clicks into place

OUT GOES IN, IN GOES OUT AND NOTHING GOES FORWARDS, is a very simple maxim but it takes a lot of study and understanding before it clearly shows itself, it is the defensive aspect of Fist Logic, it is Chum Kiu.

At its core Wing Chun is a defensive martial arts system, even though we adopt simultaneous defence and attack and one of our maxims from the Kuen Kuit is “ they attack first we hit first” counter attacking in any fashion means that we begin in second place on the grid.  Our first thought is to deal with the incoming strike, through training we learn how to do this is in such a way that it allows us to attack as soon as possible, ideally at the same time, later through exploration we discover strategic structural obstructions {basically putting shit in the way} that lead us into direct attack, this is how the dummy explains Fist Logic.

Out goes in, in goes out and nothing goes forwards is an aspect that often gets totally misunderstood, practically reversed by most students playing Chi Sau , most of the moves played out in Chi Sau would be the next move after a failed simultaneous defence and attack, in reality my strike would have made our attacker loose contact with us, our opponent would have freed our hand this is why it is so important not to push our partner in Chi Sau we only accept their force, this is why most Lap Sau, Gwoh Sau and trapping only exist as a reality instead of a concept within Chi Sau.

We should question the value of spending so much time on what are representing second phase moves, follow ups to our initial strike, that could and would only happen if our own counter attack had been countered. Not only are we training for failure but we are now faced by the quite silly idea of countering the counter to our own counter which is nothing but Hong Kong Movie stuff,  remotely possible but highly unlikely considering simultaneous attack and defence.

Simultaneous attack and defence can only be achieved if my defending side circles away from my opponent as my attacking side circles into them, this is why Bong Sau can never be a defensive option.

In training we often refer to our arm shapes as circles, to strike unhindered one of the antagonists needs to be on the inside of the circle so the main purpose of Chi Sau is to understand the concept of how to control and change orientation,  if we find our partner inside our circle then we need to roll him to the outside, essentially this is Tarn Sau → Chit Sau,  this is IN GOES OUT, our partner is on the inside where he can easily attack so we roll him to the outside, in reality this would be done before contact by aligning our interception in relation to our opponents line of force.

If we have intercepted an incoming straight strike our opponent is still inside our circle and in a position to strike then we need to roll into the inner gate putting him beneath and outside of our circle, the inner gate, essentially something like Biu Sau → Huen Sau, or Biu Sau → Chum Sau this is OUT GOES IN we are on the outside so we roll into the inside.

These ideas get confused in Chi Sau because we roll so large, all of these actions will take place at the point of contact and use minimal movement, just enough for my strike to enter, if done with a slight rotation of the body, Chum Kiu, then their is little need for my hand to move from its general location, these actions will play out at around shoulder height. Smaller moves allows me to create a timing advantage, more movement requires more time.

In Wing Chun we always try to avoid force on force, in many ways this is mission impossible because any type of contact creates its own opposing force, but we keep it to a minimum by not only resisting the urge to go forwards into the incoming strike {as Bong Sau always does because no matter what direction we may think we are going the elbow advances it forwards}, but also turning our body in the same direction as the incoming force, interceptions should be at 90 degrees or more to the angle of the incoming force, if possible sharing the same vector and changing its direction which is in many ways moving back towards ourselves, this is NOTHING GOES FORWARDS.

 

 

Even though this is part of Chum Kiu Logic it is not until we are introduced to Biu Gee core winding that it all clicks into place, through Biu Gee we understand that the reversing right side powers the advancing left side and vice versa.