# What do you make of this?



## geezer (Jul 7, 2011)

A short while back I discovered that this sifu was opening a school about a block away from the park where my group trains. Since my group is so huge (a handful of students!) I welcome any new additions to the WC/WT/VT community. Both Eric and Joy, who frequently post on this forum, also teach in the same metro area. Still, I'm a little confused by what I see here. This sifu states that he is a student of "Great Grandmaster Chris Chan" of the Ip Man lineage. I also practice in the Ip Man lineage, but I do not recognize the forms presented in the clips below. Have any of you guys seen anything similar? What are your thoughts?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2QjbR5QNqY&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAlp3G18ZQg&feature=related


Incidentally, his webpage is titled Wing Chun _Transformations_, so I assume he has been a bit... "creative" in his presentation of these two forms???


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## Flying Crane (Jul 7, 2011)

yup, that looks like Chris Chan's way (or at least as far as I remember seeing it done).

Chris is out here in San Francisco, and he did study under Yip Man.  I studied for a while under one of Chris' students, but we did not do the form that way.  My teacher was shifting over and becoming more of a student of Chris' older brother, Stanley, who teaches a very small group out of his garage.  My teacher feels that Stanley's method is closer to Yip Man's.  I believe my teacher had been a student under Chris for some 30 years or so, and at the time he had been working more with Stanley for something like 10 years.  This was close to eight or ten years ago and I believe the shift was gradual over time.

Chris made modifications to the form.  I do not know why, nor what the supposed benefits are.  He also went, in my opinion, overboard on the power issue. Everything is done with heavy tension and power, to the point where his long-term students all walk with a curve in the upper back and shoulders.

anyway, I've never met Chris personally.  I know that he has a lot of students who love him.  I've also met people who feel he is very difficult to get along with, even an erratic personality.  I've been told on good authority that he generally derides anyone who does it differently from him, or holds a different perspective in practice.  Which is just about anybody who is not his student.


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## Flying Crane (Jul 7, 2011)

My initial comments were directed at the siu nim tao.  I didn't see the chom kiu clip until after.  That was really bizarre.  I've seen Chris' students to chom kiu, and it looked nothing like this.  I don't know what happened there.  Almost like he was at the end of his time slot and he wanted to fit it in so he just rushed it.  Looks like it mostly fell apart.


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## geezer (Jul 7, 2011)

Here are a couple of clips of Chris Chan (referenced in the previous post). He seems very entertaining and less... er, "unique" than his student (shown in the previous clips). Chan Sifu seems a good deal "harder" and more forceful in his movements than my old sifu perhaps, but his WC looks like Ip Man lineage to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFDTxCI-VTo&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXc5yJ5hdn0&feature=related


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## Vajramusti (Jul 7, 2011)

No comment!!!

joy chaudhuri


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## Flying Crane (Jul 7, 2011)

Chris Chan is definitely Yip Man lineage, no doubt about it.  His approach is "harder" and more power-oriented than others, and he modified the forms somewhat, that is all I was saying.


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## Jake104 (Jul 7, 2011)

Did anyone happen to read the first couple comments at the end of the Wing Chun Kick THE A$$?ole vid?


Jake


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## Eric_H (Jul 7, 2011)

Hey,

A couple of my sihing were actually at that presentation and met Sifu Barquera (hope I'm spelling his name right). From what I understand he was with Sifu Chan for a pretty long time. Say what you want about the dynamic tension and it's long term health effects - those guys punch like MFers.

As for the forms, I don't think they don't look very good, but I'm not qualified to say what's right to the way Chris Chan teaches.


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## Eric_H (Jul 7, 2011)

Jake104 said:


> Did anyone happen to read the first couple comments at the end of the Wing Chun Kick THE A$$?ole vid?
> 
> 
> Jake



Uhhhhhhhhhh, just did. Does anyone on here have access to background checks to see if it's BS or true?


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## geezer (Jul 7, 2011)

Whoops. I just read that comment and would not have posted that clip if I had seen that before (I usually ignore all the garbage comments that accompany Youtube clips). In this case, I just went on a national registry for sex offenders (see link below) and put in the sifu's name. *It came up with "0 hits".* Whatever you may think of a guy's forms, nobody has any business smearing his name with those kind of rumors. Sorry folks.

http://www.nsopw.gov/Core/OffenderSearchCriteria.aspx


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## Jake104 (Jul 7, 2011)

Glad that's cleared up. I can't believe someone woould  lie and say something like that. I was afraid to agree to the terms of conditions on the DOJ site. I have heard they track your computer once you agree. 

Jake


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## geezer (Jul 7, 2011)

Well, now I guess they're tracking my wife! --I'm using her computer-- LOL. Seriously though, how and why would they track everybody that checks out their site. I imagine that it's intended as a public service. As a parent, I appreciate being able to check things like this out. If _they_ (the evil government conspiracy) want to track me, they are welcome. As it is, I feel positively ignored by my government!


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## Jake104 (Jul 7, 2011)

Well if you suddenly dissapear, we know why. LoL..I believe it was the cash for clunkers GOV site a few years back, were there was some controversy about this. I like to fly under ther radar.

Jake


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## yak sao (Jul 7, 2011)

geezer said:


> Well, now I guess they're tracking my wife! --I'm using her computer-- LOL. Seriously though, how and why would they track everybody that checks out their site. I imagine that it's intended as a public service. As a parent, I appreciate being able to check things like this out. If _they_ (the evil government conspiracy) want to track me, they are welcome. *As it is, I feel positively ignored by my government*!




Don't pay your taxes. See how well they remember you then.


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## bully (Jul 8, 2011)

I have practiced under one of Chris Chans students and have done this version of SLT too.

In the end (I have previously posted about this) I found it too different to what I knew but that was mainly due to the huge amounts of dynamic tension involved in Chi Sau mainly. 

The SLT has most of what we know in it, so that did not really bother me, we all do things differently and an extra Bui here, a Huen there and some other things in different order doesnt really bother me.

We were taught to do the whole form under massive amounts of dynamic tension, I can see the advantages for getting stronger but don't think it should be done like this ALWAYS....which we were taught to do. My opinion btw.

The Chi sau using tension was where I could not agree with the guy who taught us, for obvious reasons. The thing was that he could control me anyway but I am not very good, I wold have liked to see him touch hands with a good Chi Sau practicioner. Not too see him look stupid etc because I dont think he would, but to see if his version worked with our version if you see what i mean?

In the end I walked and told him it was too different for me. I saw him not long ago and we had a good chat and are still freinds, which I think is important.

He was, I must add, a bloody good WC guy. His shapes were all correct and he could move fast and boy did he have some power. He was only small but I wouldnt fancy taking any shots from him. So whilst this form of WC might be different, the guy I saw made it work for him.

I found it wierd when he taught us SLT that we started turning like in CK. But when in China ALL forms and drills begin with the torque turning, 2 on each side then back to middle and begin form/drill. They seem to place more importance on practicing it earlier than we do.

So not only Chris Chans lineage that do things "out of sequence" as us guys would see it.

Hope this helps and I must say Flying Crane gave me good advice at the time when I was training with Chris's student.


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## MacPedro (Aug 27, 2011)

Eric H -"Say what you want about the dynamic tension and it's long term health effects"

Guys,
      I'm interested in hearing more of this. Are the long term effects detrimental? Not that I have ever 'formed' like in the videos but I believe the term Dynamic Tension would apply to something I found myself cultivating during SLT when I was following Jin Young on youtube. I just kinda happened. I'd never had a sifu or anybody to tell me different so I was just experimenting to see what felt right. It really seemed to work the shoulders and I can honestly say without a word of a lie I was noticably more 'beefed up' by the end of the fortnight. (it must be said though that I am not one for going to the gym and it's easy to notice the knots in even the thinnest piece of string  
I remembered reading "A weak body must start with strength" so I carried on for a while till I began reading more about the power of relaxation. I still think this tension has a place and do it that way every so often but I would like to know if I'll end up all bent outta shape.

Thanks,
          Pedro


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## qwksilver61 (Sep 13, 2011)

First I would like to ask if Ip man did teach more than one style of Wing Chun? The forms I learned look exactly like the ones Ip man performs on You tube with the exception of the added side kick (LT) in the Chum Kiu.I have seen different types of Wing Chun,But I have never seen this odd type of Wing Chun (no offense).,Rotsa Ruck.....


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## hunt1 (Sep 14, 2011)

One wing chun style, many variations. Yip Man overall was not a great teacher. Many reasons for it and many stories . In general it seems he didn't like to argue and was traditional therefore not open to being questioned. Examples to illustrate. Yip Ching change a punch in chum kui. He showed his father. Yip Man asked if he had a good reason for the change,Ip Ching said he did. That was end of it. Now another variation. 2 students asked Yip what was the correct way way to do a tan sau in the SLT form. Both showed their different ways. Yip said both right and walked away. Private students paid a lot of $ for lessons Yip had to give them something more that he gave public students. Another student used to take Ip out  often. One day over dim sum Ip taught him the knife form with chop sticks.

 So you see many reasons for variations. Ip was also big on smart people. if you were smart you would figure things out . if you weren't smart enough to figure things out than you were not really wing chun material anyway. Thus more variations

 Finally there are 2 sides to wing chun, Yang side and Yin side. Ip taught and most others taught and teach the Yang side first. Most don't stick around for the Yin side. Many others that do reject it since initially to learn it feels like going backwards and very wimpy. 
 In my own experience my class mates rejected it. I learned it . For several months I felt like I was going backwards. Started to get my *** kicked in gor sau stuff like that. Eventually though I jumped over my classmates but it took time.


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## zepedawingchun (Sep 15, 2011)

hunt1 said:


> One wing chun style, many variations. Yip Man overall was not a great teacher. Many reasons for it and many stories . In general it seems he didn't like to argue and was traditional therefore not open to being questioned. Examples to illustrate. Yip Ching change a punch in chum kui. He showed his father. Yip Man asked if he had a good reason for the change,Ip Ching said he did. That was end of it. Now another variation. 2 students asked Yip what was the correct way way to do a tan sau in the SLT form. Both showed their different ways. Yip said both right and walked away. Private students paid a lot of $ for lessons Yip had to give them something more that he gave public students. Another student used to take Ip out often. One day over dim sum Ip taught him the knife form with chop sticks.
> 
> So you see many reasons for variations. Ip was also big on smart people. if you were smart you would figure things out . if you weren't smart enough to figure things out than you were not really wing chun material anyway. Thus more variations
> 
> ...



Very good post, Hunt1.  Especially concerning the yin/yang sides of Wing Chun.  I know when I was younger, my chi sau was a bit harder and less yielding.  Today, my chi sau is much softer and more yielding, making it much easier to read or be sensitive to my opponent's responses.

I had heard that of Yip Man, from my first sifu.  My first sifu was a student of Moy Yat Sifu and told us of stories he was told about Yip Man.


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