# Lessons in Chi Sao



## bcbernam777 (Mar 10, 2005)

What are some of the most important lessons yu have learnt throught the practice of Chi Sao, what are some of the benefits it has brought yu?


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## 7starmantis (Mar 10, 2005)

bcbernam777 said:
			
		

> What are some of the most important lessons yu have learnt throught the practice of Chi Sao, what are some of the benefits it has brought yu?


 I know Chi Sao is mainly a Wing Chun term, but we do ALOT of Shi Sao at my school as well. Are you looking for mainly WC answers?

 7sm


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## ed-swckf (Mar 10, 2005)

bcbernam777 said:
			
		

> What are some of the most important lessons yu have learnt throught the practice of Chi Sao, what are some of the benefits it has brought yu?


 
One thing i really find important in chi sau is realising its play and that you should avoid letting the ego get in there, a good training partner is a vital part of training so i think realising that egos can get knocked if they get in the way is something i learnt to avoid.  Chi sau is training for me and my training partners, an understanding and good working relationship can continue your chi sau in good stead for years, i don't want to start wars with the people i train with, they are on my side after all.


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## DarrenJew (Mar 11, 2005)

In Wing Chung it is not enough to only train with just the forms or practicing technique using a mirror or on a bag. In Wing Chun we have learned than sight alone is insufficient to assess any type of situation once contact is made. Most of the techniques learned in Sil Lum Tao, Chum Kil, and Bil Ji can tested and applied in Chi Sau. Chi Sau helps to improve your footwork, reflexes, positioning, techniques, energy and your automatic reflexes to a situation through sensitivity. Chi Sau trains you to keep the pressure on and to not stop after one punch.​​Light sparing is also good but once contact is made you may find your Chi Sau skill kick into automatic.​​Note: If you do heavy sparing with full gear head gear, gloves, pads sensitivity is out the window and Chi Sau will not help as much. (though it has a purpose, timing, closing the gap)​


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## ed-swckf (Mar 12, 2005)

DarrenJew said:
			
		

> In Wing Chung it is not enough to only train with just the forms or practicing technique using a mirror or on a bag. In Wing Chun we have learned than sight alone is insufficient to assess any type of situation once contact is made. Most of the techniques learned in Sil Lum Tao, Chum Kil, and Bil Ji can tested and applied in Chi Sau. Chi Sau helps to improve your footwork, reflexes, positioning, techniques, energy and your automatic reflexes to a situation through sensitivity. Chi Sau trains you to keep the pressure on and to not stop after one punch.
> 
> ​
> 
> ...


I tend to agree with most of your post except that sensitivity is never out the window, when i spar with the gear on i still use relaxed energy to avoid being manipulated by an tensed shapes, plenty of on/off energy and using elements of chi sau within the sparing match and utilising the sensitivity when i am in contact to give me any split second adavantage i may have or gain.  I realise you said chi sau won't help as much which i also agree with but i don't think sensitivity is out the window.  That aside i couldn't agree more.


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## bcbernam777 (Mar 13, 2005)

7starmantis said:
			
		

> I know Chi Sao is mainly a Wing Chun term, but we do ALOT of Shi Sao at my school as well. Are you looking for mainly WC answers?
> 
> 7sm


I am curious as to what Shi Sao is???


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## bcbernam777 (Mar 13, 2005)

What context do you think the saying "recieve what comes, pursue what flees, on loss of contact strike" plays? Also there has been a lot of criticism re chi sao practicioners in regards to them simply chasing hands, it has been said that they lose the goal of Chi Sao. What do you think is the main goal of chi sau and how fo you think practioners can avoid simply chasing hands?


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## 7starmantis (Mar 13, 2005)

bcbernam777 said:
			
		

> I am curious as to what Shi Sao is???


  Haha, me too!! Stupid keyboard!!

  No, thats just a typing mistaek (that was on purpose btw). I meant Chi Sao

  7sm


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## Feisty Mouse (Mar 13, 2005)

Chi Sao has helped me in my JKD practice.  The idea of finding the hole and flowing into it like water (no pause, no thinking) has been a challenge, but very helpful.


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## ed-swckf (Mar 14, 2005)

bcbernam777 said:
			
		

> What context do you think the saying "recieve what comes, pursue what flees, on loss of contact strike" plays? Also there has been a lot of criticism re chi sao practicioners in regards to them simply chasing hands, it has been said that they lose the goal of Chi Sao. What do you think is the main goal of chi sau and how fo you think practioners can avoid simply chasing hands?


That wing chun maxim is applied to many contexts, in chi sau of course, but as soon as contact is made you are feeling and thus that maxim is used, even out of contact you can begin its application.  Chasing hands is useless as you are chasing what has already gone, accept it and move on, usually instead of chasing you could have maximised the situation using lai lou hui sung, lut sao jik chung, filling the void as it is present, this is a result of a forward feeling energy (not heavy leaning on your opponent, it shouldn't be a telegraphed energy for your partner to manipulate).  The main goal is subjective in accordance with levels in training, chi sau is generally a laboratory in which to work things at a working level, you can make it more akin to doc sau or go the other way and apply it more as gor sau.  For me the main goal is to be getting somethging from it and my partner to be getting something from it, i'm not just trying to knock my partners head off, its done within a teaching environment and hopefully without the ego.


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## ed-swckf (Mar 14, 2005)

Feisty Mouse said:
			
		

> Chi Sao has helped me in my JKD practice. The idea of finding the hole and flowing into it like water (no pause, no thinking) has been a challenge, but very helpful.


Do you have an understanding of sui nim tao and chum kui forms and how they relate to chi sau?  I a lot of the time chi sau in JKD is very bare bones and misses a lot of the concepts and theorys.  Sometimes its good.


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## achilles (Mar 14, 2005)

I'm going to be rude and interject my opinion, though I think it's valid since I train with Feisty Mouse.  We do not practice sil lum tao or chum kiu in class.  I have limited experience in Wing Chun forms, but I don't think that they are necessary for the way we practice chi sao.  We do practice individual postures (e.g. tan, fook, boang), but we tend not to spend as much time practicing these postures in the air as we do within look sao.  Obviously practice in the mirror or simply in the air is done, but the majority of our time is spent in partner interaction.  I can see how the wing chun forms are essential to wing chun practice, however, they are not much of a part of how we practice our art.  From what I have been told by my colleagues and instructors who have trained formally in wing chun, JKD chi sao is different.


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## Danny T (Mar 15, 2005)

Lessons in Chi Sao?


There are many things contributed by the training of Chi Sao. Here are but a few things that will be enhanced by the proper training of Chi Sao.

Control of pressure; Drawing, this is used to diminish the opponents strength to the point where you are stronger. By drawing his arms out from his body he becomes weaker and vulnerable to losing his structure. You control his energy as you let your body fade away from him. This draws his arms and his center of gravity and you can then redirect his movement. Chi Sao practice help train the moving of the entire structure. You learn to feel the pressure and to fade or to turn the structure to redirect the opponents energy. Chi Sao helps train the short lever principles where you use bone, joint and tendon strength opposed to muscle. 

The short lever principles are directed from the ankles, knees, hips, shoulders, elbows, and wrists. This is all performed by the turning of the body as a unit when moving. This will provide you with incredible power and mechanical strength. The training of Chi Sao helps reinforce what is taught in Sil Lum Tao and Chum Kil. The proper use of body structure, mechanical advantages, sensitivity, and applying energies all the while keeping control of your center of gravity and manipulating the opponents under the dynamics of movement created by your opponent. 

A Major factor in Chi Sao training is your structure. Pressure is exerted from the body structure and not through the arms. In this way, the arms can be firm without being tense, relaxed without being flimsy. By not causing muscle contraction in the arms you remove rebound energy. You also learn not to grow tense under the opponents pressure. In addition to proper body structure, you must also know proper tool structure and how to turn on and off certain muscles and joints. All of this (and many other things) is crucial. The training of Chi Sao helps train the practitioner to release tension within the body and arms thereby not allowing the opponent to have a handle to move or control your structure. By this I mean you learn to keep your limbs firm yet soft and supple so that if the opponent were to lop (grab) your arm there would be no stiffness in the arm to hold on to. Your arm would suddenly become as soft and flexible as a piece of twine or string.

Chi Sao teaches how to maintain the facing principle. This helps assure that both arms and hands would be able to be use equally. 

Immovable Elbow Principle. The elbow must be maintained on or close to your centerline, and should never be positioned less than one fist length from your body. If your elbow gives, your structure is destroyed. 

Structure Softening. Soften and concave the chest so that you are all shoulders, back, and forearms. This allows structural strength and firmer grounding while reducing tension in the body. It keeps your mid-body at further reach from your opponent while, at the same time, naturally extending your reach to him. The soft curvature of the body is used for setting up gaps that you may need for exercising powerful mechanical advantages in the use of your tools. Most important, it helps to remove the unnecessary tension in your own body while creating a tension and shock in your opponent.

Locking down of the shoulder. Be aware that to raise it your structure will be weakened. This is not only important while jamming and trapping, but even so in striking. Lock down the shoulders so that your structure will be powerfully unitized, rather than weakly disjointed. Locking down the shoulder does not mean tightening up the muscles. It simply means sealing it snugly into the joint so that the arm and body are connected. By locking down the shoulder you actually reduce muscle tension.

Ball Principle. If you were to roll around on a big ball, you would be rolling on multiple planes of movement. You can go under, over, around on either side and in either direction, or at any one of 360 degrees of direction, or push straight through. Learn to use this to your mechanical advantages. For instance, you might lift or push down the opponents arms or elbows to break down and move his structure, as found in the Sil Lum Tao form.

Hip Action. The hip is  used as a bow, flexing, building, and releasing tension. A fundamental power source provided by the proper structure. Its the kind of thing that you dont see and most dont know about but be assured its there!

Tactile Sensitivity. This is what most say Chi Sao is all about. The only way to learn this correctly is to learn it from a good instructor, hands on. Learn to became one with the opponent. Feel the opponent and learn to blend your center of gravity with theirs. Tactile sensitivity also teaches how to use the full arm as a tool. Often times you will be in a position to trap or jam down your opponent by using your upper forearm while, at the same instant, freeing both of your hands. This is the Third Hand Principle.

Needless to say, this list does not include all of the principles and mechanics reinforced by good Chi Sao training such as rooting, slipping, poling, vectoring, plyometrics, joint selection, jing, simplicity, and so much more. It is really simple if you understand all the complexity of details. Unfortunately most do not. That is why to learn chi sao correctly you must learn it from someone who is very, very good. Even then, keep in mind that not everyone teaches it the same. For the most part, the tools and the rolling are pretty much the same, but the details often differ as well as the strategy. Some practitioners do it very mechanically and outstretched, while others train it close and heavy. Very few have the ability to go from one move into the next without becoming stuck and having to start over. If you find an instructor who can do this, then learn from them. 
Good luck on your training

Danny T


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## ed-swckf (Mar 16, 2005)

achilles said:
			
		

> I'm going to be rude and interject my opinion, though I think it's valid since I train with Feisty Mouse. We do not practice sil lum tao or chum kiu in class. I have limited experience in Wing Chun forms, but I don't think that they are necessary for the way we practice chi sao. We do practice individual postures (e.g. tan, fook, boang), but we tend not to spend as much time practicing these postures in the air as we do within look sao. Obviously practice in the mirror or simply in the air is done, but the majority of our time is spent in partner interaction. I can see how the wing chun forms are essential to wing chun practice, however, they are not much of a part of how we practice our art. From what I have been told by my colleagues and instructors who have trained formally in wing chun, JKD chi sao is different.


Yeah i mean its a tough one to call for me really, i have had exposure to some good chi sau from JKD people as well as some god awful stuff.  Mind you i should at this point clarify i'm not dissing JKD here as i have come across wing chun practicioners with awful chi sau, especially for the time they are training and  i have seen some impressive JKD people.  It is different i agree, i often feel a very abnormal energy from JKD people but as most JKD schools do seem to disregard the forms that filter into chisau to make it what it is (all six forms feed into chi sau) its to be expected.  This makes me wonder though, why call it chi sau?  I mean if you don't train it in a wing chun way and have a different skill set as an end result why doesn't it become its own different entity within JKD?  Or is that because of the philosophy behind JKD?


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## achilles (Mar 17, 2005)

I've seen some poor chi sao, among other skills, with a lot of so-called JKD people.  This is partly due to the abuse of the name concerning who uses it.  In any case, my chi sao I've learned chi sao from instructors whose backgrounds are both strictly JKD as well as those who also have formal wing chun training.  I believe that what we do is fairly authentic, granted this is not my area of experise, with a few stylistic modifications.  One that is frequently brought up is the use of the one foot forward stance (more like bai jong) instead of the more square yi chi kim yang ma stance favored by wing chun players.  I can understand your argument that at a certain point a drill may change so drastically that it warrants a distinct name, but JKD chi sao seems to keep much of the same character as its wing chun predecessor but with a few stylistic modifications.  It's like language.  If someone asked me what language I spoke, I would answer english, eventhough the way I speak is different from the way people speak in London.  Moreover, the way people speak in London is different than the way people speak in Liverpool and so on.  I would guess the same is true among different wing chun groups around the world, sligh modifications here and there, a different emphasis in one place, but all are playing the same game.  One might feel the need to add on the qualifier "Jun Fan" chi sao, but the way that most martial artists reduce terminology into simpler terms, I doubt it would stay that way for long.


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## ed-swckf (Mar 17, 2005)

achilles said:
			
		

> I've seen some poor chi sao, among other skills, with a lot of so-called JKD people. This is partly due to the abuse of the name concerning who uses it. In any case, my chi sao I've learned chi sao from instructors whose backgrounds are both strictly JKD as well as those who also have formal wing chun training. I believe that what we do is fairly authentic, granted this is not my area of experise, with a few stylistic modifications. One that is frequently brought up is the use of the one foot forward stance (more like bai jong) instead of the more square yi chi kim yang ma stance favored by wing chun players. I can understand your argument that at a certain point a drill may change so drastically that it warrants a distinct name, but JKD chi sao seems to keep much of the same character as its wing chun predecessor but with a few stylistic modifications. It's like language. If someone asked me what language I spoke, I would answer english, eventhough the way I speak is different from the way people speak in London. Moreover, the way people speak in London is different than the way people speak in Liverpool and so on. I would guess the same is true among different wing chun groups around the world, sligh modifications here and there, a different emphasis in one place, but all are playing the same game. One might feel the need to add on the qualifier "Jun Fan" chi sao, but the way that most martial artists reduce terminology into simpler terms, I doubt it would stay that way for long.


I get your point but the language  metaphor is flawed, i mean when people take wing chuns chi sau and leave elements of it out its not a accent change, that would more likely be the difference within the same ideas and priciples of wing chun.  Everyone has a unique vocabulary, tone and pronounciation and diction with their arms and different wing chun schools will have differing yet recognisable accents.  

What we are talking about is leaving a lot of the language behind perhaps things such as: theorys of context, nouns and pro nouns or other grammatic rules and even perhaps a fair amount of the the words.  At this point the language strains to be English although crudely recognisable,  recognisable  elements are not uncommon in language, look at older languages and how they feed into newer languages of different names with words you can recognise (of course your chi sau could be superb, perhaps a bit of a weird accent, but there is people training stuff that is crudely recognisable as such).  I mean i'm not saying JKD can't call what they do chi sau if it is chi sau but i am of the opinion that chi sau should be that and when it deviates from it to far it certainly becomes something else, this happens in poor wing chun schools also.


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## Feisty Mouse (Mar 17, 2005)

ed-swckf said:
			
		

> What we are talking about is leaving a lot of the language behind perhaps things such as: theorys of context, nouns and pro nouns or other grammatic rules and even perhaps a fair amount of the the words. At this point the language strains to be English although crudely recognisable, recognisable elements are not uncommon in language, look at older languages and how they feed into newer languages of different names with words you can recognise (of course your chi sau could be superb, perhaps a bit of a weird accent, but there is people training stuff that is crudely recognisable as such). I mean i'm not saying JKD can't call what they do chi sau if it is chi sau but i am of the opinion that chi sau should be that and when it deviates from it to far it certainly becomes something else, this happens in poor wing chun schools also.


OK, then what for you is "real chi sao" and what is a "different language"?  Does it mean a certain kind of practice?  Learning certain principles?  

I'm curious.


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## ed-swckf (Mar 18, 2005)

Feisty Mouse said:
			
		

> OK, then what for you is "real chi sao" and what is a "different language"? Does it mean a certain kind of practice? Learning certain principles?
> 
> I'm curious.


Chi sau that adheres to the fundamental principles of its wing chun nature, i mean when boxers get caught up together close there are similar elements at play but its not chi sau.  And a different language would be something that has been taken and evolved in adherence to different principles, rules or guidelines.


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## Feisty Mouse (Mar 18, 2005)

ed-swckf said:
			
		

> Chi sau that adheres to the fundamental principles of its wing chun nature, i mean when boxers get caught up together close there are similar elements at play but its not chi sau. And a different language would be something that has been taken and evolved in adherence to different principles, rules or guidelines.


Please bear with me, as I train in JKD rather than Wing chun, although I admire the latter art.  I am not certain how different these fundamental principles are - perhaps you would be able to explain what you mean here, what is the "essence" of good or worthwhile chi sao, to you.


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## ed-swckf (Mar 18, 2005)

Feisty Mouse said:
			
		

> Please bear with me, as I train in JKD rather than Wing chun, although I admire the latter art. I am not certain how different these fundamental principles are - perhaps you would be able to explain what you mean here, what is the "essence" of good or worthwhile chi sao, to you.


Chi sau is part of wing chun and everything feeds into it, the 3 boxing forms, the dummy, the knives and the pole.  I'm not dismissing what you train, i'm sure its very worthwhile and very effective and its possible that it is on a base level synonamous with the chi sau of wing chun but as i have said before its common enough for these fundamentals to be thrown aside, not just by poor JKD schools but by poor Wing chun schools also.  One thing that was mentioned earlier was the difference in footwork, it negates some of the centerline theorys as well as some of the energy priciples that tie in with triangulation as well as kau bo (plucking step).  I'm aware you can train to deal with this and be very effective but chi sau has a lot to do with footwork as well as energy that is trained in the forms (gung lik, fa ging and sung lik) i mean it just seems to loose a lot if its not having wing chun fed into it, it shocks me that people do chi sau but can't preform sui nim tao.  I've seen some pretty radical ideas of chi sau so it just makes me wonder why JKD's intrerpretation isn't somehow consolidated down and somewhat uniformed to some base level as a part of the system itself.  As i said earlier i wasn't sure if that going against the principle of JKD, i'm unsure if the JKD practicioner is just interpretting elements of different arts in their own way.  If i was doing JKD i would learn wing chun in the same way bruce lee learnt it (from a teacher of wing chun) and then make the changes so i would understand why i have made the changes and if they are benificial to my personal approach. I'm fairly uneducated about JKD but that is how i have understood the focus of the philosophy.  If i wanted to cross train in another art, lets say boxing, i wouldn't pay a visit to someone who teaches many arts and has done some boxing.  Whilst that person could use it effectively and be very good i would prefer to get knowledge fresh from a boxing coach at a boxing gym for me to trim myself and meld into my base art of wing chun.  Thats my viewpoint and i really hope you haven't taken offence to it as i'm sure your's differs and my intent is not to stir **** up, i respect JKD as i respect all martial arts.


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## Feisty Mouse (Mar 18, 2005)

That helps me to understand a bit what you are saying, I think.  I appreciate it.  I'm still trying to understand the differences. 

There is no single JKD school or mentor - the nature of Sigung Bruce's philosophies, as I understand them, would lead JKD'ers away from one system or making things more ...encrusted with a set way of doing things.  So there probably won't be a single consolidation or interpretation.


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