You are correct. Lots of conditioning for the forearms/elbows/hands/fingers; and a deep understanding of how and when to exert power.
I believe this approach to be valid, but it is not equally emphasized in all WC branches. My old Chinese sifu felt that the conditioning drills like iron palm and
saam sing arm conditioning (that I had learned with a previous instructor) were unnecessary, and even counterproductive in his "WT" branch. He felt that our regular two man drills, our chi-sau, wall bag hitting, and later-on, the dummy training, was more than sufficient. He felt that too much hard training trying to make the arms hard like weapons reduces your elasticity or "springiness" and sensitivity as required in his soft concept of "WT".
Now as to the rising elbow in the forms, we do not have it
literally expressed in the forms as I learned them, but the energy is definitely there. Especially if you look at the wide range of applications that emerge from each movement. For example, the pivoting double lan-sau in Chum Kiu can hit both coming and going. Pivoting forward, you can strike with the outside edge of the hand, the forearm, the front of the elbow, or the point of the elbow. Equally, pivoting back, you can hit with the upper arm, the back or the point of the elbow, the forearm and the edge of the hand. It is all the same, just depending on your position and distance relative to your opponent. Similarly, you can fold your hand into a palm-down fist, and the forward pivoting lan-sau becomes a hook-punch, much like the more whipping hook-like movement learned later in Biu Tze.
Well, if the energy learned in the pivoting lan-sau can be all of the above, then i can certainly see the rising elbow strike as a natural extension of the energy expressed in the "lifting punch" in our version of Chum Kiu (coming from "WT"). Just as lan-sau and bong-sau can fold into kup, gwai, and pai or ding jarn, so can the lifting punch continue upwards and fold into a rising ding-jarn. You can see this movement as I learned it in the clip below at 1:02 -1:05, and in close-up at 1:15-1:18.
BTW here is the
whipping "hook-punch" sequence from the old 1980s "WT" version of the Biu Tze form. I've seen the energies expressed in this sequence: hook - downward vertical elbow - reverse biu tze strike applied a wide range of applications. The "hook" can be a punch, a cutting elbow, a "clothes-line" sort of strike with the inside of the forearm or bicep muscle, and even a throw. The downward elbow can also be a downward backfist, rebounding upward into a short lifting punch, or a more extended reverse biu-tze or throat spear, and so on. As this downward elbow "rebounds" up
...it can fold back into the rising elbow just as easily as extending into a strike. See blow, fro, about 1:40-1:48.
Now, some might say that I am reading too much into these sequences. To that I would respond, not at all. One of the reasons that a style as complex as WC only has three comparatively short empty-handed forms is that the forms are very dense. They do not teach mere application, but as others have said, they are the alphabet that underlies our
martial language. They teach concepts and principles, structures, movement, and energy dynamics. It is
up to us to expand this core into nearly infinite variations as needed in application.
