Differances between cao sau and bong sau?

[Nabakatsu]

Going to have to ask my sifu about this next class, but for the moment, does anyone have any thoughts on the difference between cao sau and bong sau? seems to be fairly similar, perhaps the elbow position is high on a.. a higher bong sau, I spose the cao sau could be of that nature too tho.. if isn't obvious by now, I pretty much know 1 application to this move that I learned a week ago and desire to know a little bit more.. thanks!

 

[mook jong man]

You will have to describe the hand and arm positions a bit more to me mate.
I'm not aware of that term Cao Sau , we probably call it something else in our lineage.

 

[Nabakatsu]

cao song is like a fook sau arm in the bong sau position from what I can tell, I was taught it as a move that my front arm feels pressure and I shift to one side the front arm going into this cao sau position, the other arm low elbowed striking on top of roughly there elbow area towards their throat.

 

[Tensei85]

Actually we were taught that the kau sau is in the sequence right before the 1st faat sau in the 2nd section of SNT (SLT). So we used it as closer to a lan sau except of an abducting nature as opposed to the character for lan (brace). That's interesting though.

 

[mook jong man]

cao song is like a fook sau arm in the bong sau position from what I can tell, I was taught it as a move that my front arm feels pressure and I shift to one side the front arm going into this cao sau position, the other arm low elbowed striking on top of roughly there elbow area towards their throat.

I can't quite visualise it mate I'm afraid , maybe its a WT thing.
Geezer's a WT man , he'll know what your talking about.

 

[geezer]

Actually we were taught that the kau sau is in the sequence right before the 1st faat sau in the 2nd section of SNT (SLT). So we used it as closer to a lan sau except of an abducting nature as opposed to the character for lan (brace). That's interesting though.

The movement you are describing may look a bit like a bong-sau because of the upward rotation of the elbow, but its function and energy is quite different. In the WT system we use the Cantonese term "kau", or "plucking" to refer to a circling movement that hooks and "plucks" aside. So in a "kau sau" the hand circles and hooks your opponenet's bridge and circles inside, downward and outward as the elbow lifts (looking like a bong sau) and "plucks" your opponent's wrist to the outside. As you complete the circling movement (also called huen-sau) your arm moves to the inside gate giving you a direct line for a strike. You will find this movement used a great deal in chi-sau and numerous times in the dummy set.

In short, a typical bong-sau deflects an incoming strike "to the inside" or across your body and there is no wrist circling. Kau sau catches and deflects the strike to the outside.

As a footnote, the in WT the term "kau" or "pluck" is often used in exchange for the term "huen" or "circle". So for example the circling steps in Biu Tze are referred to as both "huen-bo" and "kau-bo". I hope this helps.

 

[yak sao]

I've heard Leung Ting refer to the end result of a kau sao as an inside bong sao. He said kau sao is actually the circling movement not the end structure.