"Common" Moves Not Found in Forms

[Gerry Seymour]

What is a "set"? Never heard that before.

Is is something like what I called one step or two steps sparring where you do combination of kicks and punches like you described here?

This, is USEFUL. I agree 100%. This is what I spend the most time.

This is all I've been talking about, doing this instead of forms. I am a simple person, I don't get into the "imply" use of the movement. I take it as face value, you squat low and punch, I take it as you want me to punch with low stance. At least if you want me to do take down with low stance, move you hands in like taking people down so at least I would stop and question. Don't give me the bull that squat down and punch has a double meaning of taking down.

Not all exercises are meant to be literal, though some are. Sometimes we combine one thing with another to add utility. I can't think of a time when I'd ever punch from a low horse stance. I do practice static punches from a low horse stance, though, because I can use that practice time to also develop my legs.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Ha ha, too many to even try to remember. Are you making it up as you go?!! )

One thing stood out is #20. I can swear I saw leg crossing in some form before. I always wonder you really want to do that!!!

BTW, I saw you post about WC stance, I learn some WC before, they seem to impose a lot of restrictions upon themselves. Like all hands come out on center line, it is as if they can do all the moves with a hoop around both elbows. Why? Why restrict themselves? WC stance truly cannot move fast, when they move, it's like step-drag-step-drag with the two knees close together. They are going to have a hell of a time chasing a boxer. And then the sticky hands. They really think they can trap the person's hands!!!? I do like their front step kick to the knee and the way they nudge the punch to produce more power.

A couple of thoughts on this:

Firstly, every system has a LOT of principles, though they are rarely enumerated like KFW does here. Some are simple ideas (get your weight lower than your opponent) and others are more complex (the use of "tensegrity" in aiki body methods).

And most of those principles are not absolute, even when they seem to be. Even those that are treated as such within a given system will usually not be treated as such in other systems, even those that are related. In my primary art (Nihon Goshin Aikido) we almost never (perhaps never, for some practitioners) cross our legs in stepping, as it violates the basic structure we work from. Yanagi-ryu is arguably a 2nd cousin art, of sorts, yet they readily make use of that crossing step.

 

[Gyakuto]

Won't it be more efficient to cut out the kata and just practice the moves you intend to practice? For me, I practice a lot on punch/kick combinations. I keep practicing both in air and on heavy bags. Hopefully it comes natural when the time comes.

Yes that’s a good point. But I’m a great believer in making things awkward for yourself to develop real skill and the confines of a kata provide that awkwardness.

 

[Olde Phart]

Most of you are sort of dancing around the issue in order to explain why you think your way is best, or at least has more wisdom. Forms are forms. They are not battle. No one in their right mind would be able to go through a whole sequence during an alley fight. Street fighters don't know TKD or Muay Thai. How would they know they were supposed to raise their right arm "just so" in order for me to do the appropriate block/parry?

Forms indicate focus, self-control, intent to duplicate and perfect a style handed down thru the years. Self-Mastery. If you're determined to be the Bad-***-on-the-Block, then learn what you want off of the Internet and "be all you can be."

Many times, I have had to illustrate to a lower-belt-student just what their movement in their form is accomplishing. It had to be done in order for them to imagine just what that movement was doing in real life. Swinging your arm around like a propeller (!) is really immobilizing someone's arm and allowing your next movement (chop, palm strike, elbow, etc.) to disable or at least injure your opponent. "Ohhhh" is the usual response. Once the "pretend" move is practiced enough to become muscle memory, THEN it can be considered to be a part of the toolbox y'all are talking about. At first, pool noodles are used to help them see what's going on, but later on, it's real arms and real legs coming at them.

 

[Gyakuto]

Most of you are sort of dancing around the issue in order to explain why you think your way is best, or at least has more wisdom. Forms are forms. They are not battle. No one in their right mind would be able to go through a whole sequence during an alley fight. Street fighters don't know TKD or Muay Thai. How would they know they were supposed to raise their right arm "just so" in order for me to do the appropriate block/parry?

Forms indicate focus, self-control, intent to duplicate and perfect a style handed down thru the years. Self-Mastery. If you're determined to be the Bad-***-on-the-Block, then learn what you want off of the Internet and "be all you can be."

Many times, I have had to illustrate to a lower-belt-student just what their movement in their form is accomplishing. It had to be done in order for them to imagine just what that movement was doing in real life. Swinging your arm around like a propeller (!) is really immobilizing someone's arm and allowing your next movement (chop, palm strike, elbow, etc.) to disable or at least injure your opponent. "Ohhhh" is the usual response. Once the "pretend" move is practiced enough to become muscle memory, THEN it can be considered to be a part of the toolbox y'all are talking about. At first, pool noodles are used to help them see what's going on, but later on, it's real arms and real legs coming at them.

Very good point…they’re not ‘fighting scenarios’ even small fragments of kata. This idea needs to be scrubbed from people’s minds! I go further and say kata bear no resemblance, at all, to combat. They do teach balance, body and foot movements in idealised, optimal situations on a nice smooth surface and look beautiful etc . But other than that

 

[skribs]

Well, you are right here... you will never see a fight where a form is done, exactly as taught, to win the fight. They must be useless....

They teach stances, to teach you principles. One would be how to root. They teach you to move in a unified manner and how to connect the movement of your body to your attack. Yes, there are lots of ways to teach this... hence, lots of different forms / kata and styles of teaching that have neither kata or forms. There are a lot of things in kata / forms to learn besides the techniques. There are a lot of things to practice in the kata / forms that can make your practice very efficient. Yes, you can ignore the forms and practice punching. Then you can practice throwing. Then you can practice joint locks. In Kata / forms you can practice all three (and more) at the same time.

This is my point. I haven't made it in this thread, but I have in other threads we've been on together. The forms are not directly applicable, but that doesn't mean they're useless.

It's not like a grammar book. It's more like vocabulary. And the vocabulary is using very specific examples that you're not likely to use in every day speech.

If I think of grammar in the martial arts, I would be thinking of things like where techniques go and how you apply them. Grammar is that you capitalize the first word or proper nouns. You put a period/full stop between sentences. You put quotation marks around quotes.

Or maybe it is a grammar book, but in the sense that it's MLA formatting of how you will format your documents in an academic setting, a format that goes out the window when you're writing technical documents for people to follow at work.

Interestingly, General Choi was a student of Funakoshi, got his black belt in Shotokan from Funakoshi and opened his own Shotokan school in Japan under Funakoshi. So he would have been taught by Funakoshi, that these high blocks have grappling applications.

One thing from my reading on the history of forms, is that the Japanese teachers quite often did not teach these applications to their Korean students, due to a combination of language barrier and racism. Koreans learned Karate while they were busy being occupied.

You are making a logical assumption and writing it as fact. You are also speaking for a style of training that is at least thrice removed from current Kukkiwon training, including being twice removed since General Choi was exiled and South Korea wanted to get as far away from his teachings as possible, including making sure that Taekwondo is of Korean origin, and not Japanese.

 

[wab25]

It's not like a grammar book. It's more like vocabulary. And the vocabulary is using very specific examples that you're not likely to use in every day speech.

If I think of grammar in the martial arts, I would be thinking of things like where techniques go and how you apply them. Grammar is that you capitalize the first word or proper nouns. You put a period/full stop between sentences. You put quotation marks around quotes.

Its more than vocabulary words. Why would a vocabulary list have the same word multiple times?

The first kata in Shotokan shows the front stance. It would make sense to teach beginners the basic stance of your art, in the first kata. Stance and foot work have a lot to do with martial arts. You then learn basic movement in that stance. This is about controlling your body, and learning to move explosively while in control and on balance. You learn to generate power from the ground, through explosive movement of your body, and connect it to your attacking strike.

It starts with a very basic strategy... block and counter attack. In the same kata, this strategy can be evolved over time for the more advanced student, to shorten the gap between block and strike, to look at how the first movement aids and supports the second movement. Note that the beginner and the advanced student can be doing the same moves, at the same time, focusing on these two ideas independently. Later, that block can become a movement to clear the opponents guard and create an opening for the following strike. Then the block can become a strike, followed by a strike.

This kata also gets into showing a circular move followed by a linear move. Circle defeats linear and linear defeats circular. Then it sets the pattern, only to then break the pattern.

We also get to explore breathing in this first kata. When to breath and how to breath. How to connect our breathing with our movement and with our attacks. What happens to most people the first time they spar? They forget to breath and gas themselves. The beginning lessons are here, on how and when to breath, while moving, attacking and defending.

This kata also starts to introduce general strategies. Entering in. When the attack comes, you enter in and take the center line. That block you make before the lunge punch, should not only block, but should off balance and destroy the structure of your opponent, allowing you to enter and own the center line.

These are all ideas that can be explored here, with these basic moves. But these ideas, tactics and strategies can be applied with any number of techniques... as your vocabulary grows. I am sorry that you don't see these same type of things in TKD. When I look at the beginner level forms from TKD, I see many of these same things... though some are expressed in slightly different words. And as you point out, they are coming from a slightly different point of view, through another culture. But I don't believe that watered anything down, or took anything away. If anything, it may have added to the depth or at least had a slightly different perspective.

One thing from my reading on the history of forms, is that the Japanese teachers quite often did not teach these applications to their Korean students, due to a combination of language barrier and racism. Koreans learned Karate while they were busy being occupied.

Japanese teachers quite often did not sponsor Koreans to open schools in Japan, teaching their own style to other Japanese. Something was different about General Choi and his relationship with Funakoshi, for him to be allowed to do this. While many Koreans did learn Karate while being occupied, General Choi went to Japan, and learned there... and then taught Shotokan Karate to other Japanese. I don't believe that Choi and the other TKD founders were as clueless about the Karate they learned as you seem to believe they were. I believe that they had quite a good understanding of what they had learned... which explains why Funakoshi supported Choi in opening a Shotokan dojo, in Japan, to teach other Japanese Shotokan. It also explains why they could iterate on Karate and the other arts they learned, both Chinese and native Korean, to produce such a successful art as TKD. These guys truly understood what they had learned and what they had been taught.

 

[Alan0354]

What works isn't a binary matter, though. I can build strength faster in my legs many ways, but that doesn't mean having moves in a form that target leg strength isn't useful.

Here's a different example of the same concept. I included some movesn in my forms that specifically challenge mobility and balance. I could develop students' balance more effectively with wobble boards and other specifically balance-oriented exercises. I could develop students' mobility better with ladders or other mobility-oriented exercises. And I can develop both of those a bit - while also developing some movement patterns that are useful within our techniques - in the forms.

For me, personally, I like to have all of those things going on. I sometimes do exercises specifically targeting each of those. And I also like the fact that all of them are possible to work on within the forms.

Funny I have wobble boards and use them to train also!!! It's like using the best thing available to get the max benefit with the shortest amount of time.

I should really bowl out on this. I am all about improving from existing technologies. Not that I don't honor the great minds of the pass. The world is different, we concentrate in learn the past and then concentrate on improving from it. We honor the great minds of the pass, but we move on from that.

Even now at my age, everyday I spend 1/2hr after waking up and just lie in bed, thinking of different things and how I can find a better way to achieve the goal. Of cause not all are MA related, it's just everything, from electronics design, everyday problem solving, exercise for injury recovery.......Just whatever comes to mind, just constantly trying to improve whatever I have and learned. I solved most of the issues and create new idea in my career like that and I own 3 US patents and published papers in the American Institute of Physics. Just keep on challenge the existing stuffs.

I honor Issac Newton, but most of his stuffs were overturned. I honor Beatles for creating a completely new trend. But to be honest, their technique and skill are so so so behind. I honor them for being the creator, but people need to move on. This is the new world. We always joke that when your product comes out, it's obsolete already. I force myself to learn new things even though I can justify why not. I am 69, but I am still decent with computers, using a smart phone. I even forced myself learning C++ programming to compete with my grandson!!! It's all about learning new things and keep up.

Older masters were the creators, we honor them. BUT it's for us to improve. Like strength, balance and injury recovery, science comes a long long way in the last 50 years. Learn from them. Look at the athletes now, they are competing at the old age that people 30 years ago cannot even imagine. It's the new way of training to keep them stronger, recover faster and last longer.

Like I know the deep horse stance is for strengthening the legs and balance, I walk with low stance like those katas with front thigh almost horizontal and back leg straight for 7 1/2 minutes non stop, no break to strength the legs, use wobble boards for balance. Use other method of strength. It is a lot more efficient.

But anyway, I should stop talking since it's very apparent nobody agree with me. To me, this is the way of life.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I’m a great believer in making things awkward for yourself to develop real skill and the confines of a kata provide that awkwardness.

Agree with you 100% there.

Try to do the following move, you will find out it will get more difficult when you get older. If you can still do this when you are 70. your body flexibility is very good.

For thsoe who doesn't train form, his body flexibility has never been fully developed.

Just repeat this drill 20 times and see how you may feel afterward.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

hidden in one of the forms,

Someone said the foot sweep is hidden in the Yang Taiji 108 moves long form.

My questions are:

- How do you know that the form creator even recorded foot sweep in his form? No other leg skill exist the Taiji form.
- Why did the form creator want to hide a technique in his form? He didn't want anybody to learn?
- Why should I look into Yang 108 moves long form to find the hidden foot sweep if I can find it from other MA system.

A: I have created a 24 moves short form. There are over 100 techniques hidden in my form.
B: You can hide your form in your grave. Nobody will care about your form.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I am all about improving from existing technologies.

I strongly suggest you to drill this move 20 times daily. It may not help your fighting skill. But it will prevent your body from aging and keep your body young forever.

 

[Flying Crane]

Someone said the foot sweep is hidden in the Yang Taiji 108 moves long form.

My questions are:

- How do you know that the form creator even recorded foot sweep in his form? No other leg skill exist the Taiji form.

A: good question.
B: this is obviously not true. There are all kind of stepping patterns and kicks in taiji.

- Why did the form creator want to hide a technique in his form? He didn't want anybody to learn?

A good question and I don’t have an answer for you, since I do not and have never myself trained Yang taiji. So for me, it is an irrelevant issue. I will suggest that unless you train the method, the issue is irrelevant to you as well. We are all shaped by our experiences, so you are asking the question based on your prior experience in methods other than Yang taiji. On some level there is nothing wrong with that, but that is the question of someone who can’t get past the beginning. You ought to understand this by now.

- Why should I look into Yang 108 moves long form to find the hidden foot sweep if I can find it from other MA system.

You should not. You don’t train Yang taiji so the issue is irrelevant to you. See the previous comment.

 

[wab25]

Someone said the foot sweep is hidden in the Yang Taiji 108 moves long form.

My questions are:

- How do you know that the form creator even recorded foot sweep in his form? No other leg skill exist the Taiji form.
- Why did the form creator want to hide a technique in his form? He didn't want anybody to learn?
- Why should I look into Yang 108 moves long form to find the hidden foot sweep if I can find it from other MA system.

A: I have created a 24 moves short form. There are over 100 techniques hidden in my form.
B: You can hide your form in your grave. Nobody will care about your form.

I don't know specifics about your example...

But, many times, in other examples, it was not the founder that hid the techniques. Funakoshi very openly, and explicitly taught certain moves as throws and grapples and joint destructions. He even wrote a few books about the subject, very clearly explaining what he meant them to be. It was the people after him that hid the techniques...

In other cases, the founder may have found a movement and or transition, that can be applied to 10 different fighting techniques. If he includes that movement in his kata, then when you are doing that movement, you are practicing and improving all 10 techniques, at the same time... even if you only know of 8 of them at the time.

There are many reasons for techniques to be "hidden." This is why learning the history of what you are studying is important. If one technique was hidden for a particular reason, its likely that others were as well. What if all the movements in a kata were designed to practice the core of multiple techniques, simultaneously?

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

You don’t train Yang taiji so the issue is irrelevant to you. ... There are all kind of stepping patterns and kicks in taiji.

Yang Taiji was the 1st MA system that I trained when I was 7.

When I talk about "leg skill", I don't mean kicks. I mean the leg skill that you use to take your opponent down such as the foot sweep.

As far as the leg skill, besides the foot sweep, there are bite, scoop, sticky lift, break, block, cut, hook, spring, twist, lift, ...

 

[Flying Crane]

Yang Taiji was the 1st MA system that I trained when I was 7.

And you did it for a very short time, the instruction you received was not top-notch, and you haven’t trained it in years. When I was about nine or ten I had a few classes in Tae Kwon Do. I do not claim any connection to that system because that was nearly 45 years ago and I never made any accomplishment in it.

You aren’t a taiji guy. Why do you care if methodologies in taiji don’t mirror the methods that you do train? It is irrelevant.

I think you need a little dose of honesty here because you aren’t simply someone who is curious. You are someone who systematically keeps beating on this (and Wing Chun) over and over and over. Face it: you don’t like taiji nor wing Chun, you don’t have to like them, you don’t train them. What they do shouldn’t matter to you. Get over it.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

You aren’t a taiji guy. ... And you did it for a very short time, the instruction you received was not top-notch, and you haven’t trained it in years.

Just for the record. I taught Taiji in Austin community college, Austin YWCA, Austin computer research center, Chinese Professional Association. I may have more Taiji studnets than I have long fist and Chinese wrestling students.

That was my 1st Taiji teacher. I had 2 more Taiji teachers after that. My serious Taiji training was from my Chinese wrestling teacher.

My Chinese wrestling teacher's Taiji.

My and my student's Taiji.

4 of my old Taiji student's Taiji. This video was mde in 1987 in UT Austin TV steduo.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

you don’t like taiji nor wing Chun, you don’t have to like them, you don’t train them. What they do shouldn’t matter to you. Get over it.

Why do you think that I care to discuss about something that I don't train?

You have just forced to to prove that I do train WC.

Here is the proof. Video was taken in UT Austin kung fu informal class back in 1974.

 

[Olde Phart]

Had never heard of Taiji . . . which is no big deal, right? But after watching "My Taiji", it confirmed what I have thought all along: the Forms we learn are basically a dance of what we are learning; and, conversely, the slower forms are simply a combination of what we are learning, but slowed down and made more graceful. Very pretty style. Adds emphasis to the ART of Martial Arts.

I also noticed that there were a couple that wanted to hurry up and get to the next move and not really doing it with the group. Same thing with full-speed forms!

 

[Alan0354]

Why do you think that I care to discuss about something that I don't train?

You have just forced to to prove that I do train WC.

Here is the proof. Video was taken in UT Austin kung fu informal class back in 1974.

I did not know you trained in WC. Excuse me for criticizing WC. Stuffs you've been showing is so far away from WC it never even dawn on me you practice WC. I only got through the first form "The Little Idea" or whatever.

Any more of your old videos?

 

[isshinryuronin]

I don't know specifics about your example...

But, many times, in other examples, it was not the founder that hid the techniques. Funakoshi very openly, and explicitly taught certain moves as throws and grapples and joint destructions. He even wrote a few books about the subject, very clearly explaining what he meant them to be. It was the people after him that hid the techniques...

In other cases, the founder may have found a movement and or transition, that can be applied to 10 different fighting techniques. If he includes that movement in his kata, then when you are doing that movement, you are practicing and improving all 10 techniques, at the same time... even if you only know of 8 of them at the time.

There are many reasons for techniques to be "hidden." This is why learning the history of what you are studying is important. If one technique was hidden for a particular reason, its likely that others were as well. What if all the movements in a kata were designed to practice the core of multiple techniques, simultaneously?

Hidden techniques.

1. Pre-1920 karate was generally taught in secret, keeping a number of techniques only within the particular school, or even particular students. Think of it as proprietary intellectual property. By purposely hiding some techniques within the form, the student could practice the movements (which still had basic combat applications), unaware of the true, or at least, potential applications until, if and when, the master chose to reveal them, or until the student was advanced enough to experiment and discover them on this own.

2. After the early 1920's, karate was getting taught to kids in the public schools, and to adults in for profit dojos, so a number of the more dangerous applications were not taught (or were modified) but remained in the kata as recognizable basics. The masters would also reserve a number of hidden techniques for his chosen advanced private students. So the forms provided a two-level teaching platform built into a single form.

3. After WWll, many military guys studied karate and, due to them being foreigners, or not having spent enough time in Japan/Okinawa, never got to learn these hidden applications, yet started schools of their own here at home. So, for the next several decades and generations later, millions of students learned only the basic version of the forms. Luckily, the movements enshrined in the forms still contained the potential for these hidden moves to be rediscovered. This was aided in the West by the gradual translation of the earlier masters' (or their students') written works which described the original principles of the art and its forms.

4. Many times, the forms were modified over the years due to poor teaching or an irresponsible teacher who messed with stuff he didn't have full knowledge of, changing the basic moves that, in turn, rendered the hidden advanced applications ineffective. Sport competition has led to this result as well.

So, as wab25 correctly points out, there are reasons for hidden movements and the serious student should look at the history or find an instructor who is well trained in these deeper concepts.