Is it possible to be good at wing chun...

[Jake104]

IMO, This is a silly conversation. Who really cares? I don't. In our group we can train and make it work with or without gear. Maybe even on one leg and with one arm tied behind our back. It doesn't matter and really doesn't change anything. Effective is effective regardless of protection. Using protection is more about preventing injury.

 

[The Great Gigsy]

There are many ways to go about sparring and each type comes with its own benefits. Most of our sparring is done with gloves but my sifu like too mix it up from time, so sometimes we use mma gloves or bare hands it hust depends on what yhe goal is that day. I would like to think that if you can successfully get past your partner's guard with gloves landing effect strikes against an opponent without gloves should be easier.

 

[Jake104]

I think it is an interesting question for those who advocate changing the wing chun training methodology to consider. We don't need to go as far back as Leung Jan though. Yip man and those he taught didn't sprar with gloves. Were they effective at fighting? Or are we better now?

Nobody's advocating changing WC. Back then nobody wore motorcycle helmets and now almost everybody does. Does the wind in your hair change the way you ride? If anything, I ride like more of a champ with a helmet on, cause I know my brain will remain intact if I dump it.

 

[JowGaWolf]

Let's hope so...there's nothing cooler than a big ol' shiner.

I broke the end of my pinky finger today as well if that counts. I have a hollow bone in that finger so it breaks easily. I forgot that and put it in harms way. Now my left hand gets to have 3 months of doing nothing until it heals. So much for me sparring this Saturday.

 

[LFJ]

Ironically I got hit in the eye today at practice (from a bare fist). I have swelling under my eye right on the bone that's under my eye (zygomatic bone). My sparring partner pulled the punch so it didn't land with full force. It still hurts. There's no way in the world someone is going to go full force without gloves during training. We were training without gloves and I got hit with a fist because my partner did the drill wrong. Now I get to wait and see if it's going to turn into a black eye tomorrow.

Hell, a few years ago I was horsing around very lightly and got caught with a little flicking backhand that came around like a hook and it broke my freaking nose! Yet, guy b. claims to be taking full contact bareknuckle punches straight to the face and it only results in minor cuts?

Just a couple days ago a friend got into with someone who rushed on him all angry faced, nostrils flared, and fists up. He extend his left arm to gauge distance and tell him not to enter his space. When the guy's chest touched his left hand he threw one well placed Ving Tsun punch and dropped the guy. That single punch broke the guy's jaw and sent him to the hospital for surgery. And now he has a court date next month and may be looking at jail time for a felony offense.

And yet we have guy b. here saying he takes full contact bareknuckle punches in the face every two weeks just as part of normal training, and he calls everyone else delusional and in denial for training with gloves. Okay.

 

[guy b.]

It is interesting how many people call me a liar outright when I bring up this topic. This just tells me they don't ever train bare handed. Which is a shame because it is extremely beneficial.

Gloves do not reduce the frequency of broken bones in my experience, unless you are talking about untrained hand bones. Learning to protect your hands is a good reason to fight without gloves. It is just as easy to break an orbital bone or a nose with mma gloves on.

Gloves also damage the ability to acquire target, timing, distancing, power generation without gloves, and various other things. They are extremely bad for wing chun, which already has a training methodology that doesn't use gloves.

The reason that broken faces occur a lot in street encounters or messing around is that the participants are not prepared in terms of bracing and guard for being hit. It is very easy to cause massive damage to an unprepared adversary with a sucker punch or an accidental blow. In boxing kos, damage and death occur from the punches that don't get seen. Sparring bare handed is an enlightening experience in terms of understanding the damage that you are likely to be able to do in different kinds of situation.

 

[LFJ]

It is interesting how many people call me a liar outright when I bring up this topic. This just tells me they don't ever train bare handed. Which is a shame because it is extremely beneficial.

Nope. I train barehanded too and agree it's essential. But what you're talking about is taking full contact bareknuckle punches straight to the face. And you think bracing yourself for it is going to save your face from getting broken? It sounds like you've never been punched or punched anyone else before.

You're either training with kindergarteners, or you're completely confused as to what full contact is and what you're doing is actually far from it.

 

[guy b.]

And you think bracing yourself for it is going to save your face from getting broken? It sounds like you've never been punched or punched anyone else before.

On the contrary, I do it regularly and my face is fine. Your ignorance on this betrays your real lack of experience. It is telling that all of the proponents of gloves claim to do bare hand as well, but then don't seem to know what it is like. See videos of full contact bare knuckle for examples. Many are available.

It actually doesn't break your face more than any other kind of full contact sparring. It breaks hands pretty well if they aren't trained for it. And it causes cuts. I don't look any different doing full contact without gloves every few weeks than I used to look doing MT sparring. Some bruises and scrapes. Slightly more cuts. I wear a gumshield to minimise tooth damage as I would for any other sparring.

In the days of bareknuckle boxing, fights used to go on for tens of rounds and were generally wars of attrition. This is because hands are softer than heads. Any prepared person with a modicum of skill is very difficult to hurt with punches they see. This is why grappling is so successful in ring sports like mma.

 

[LFJ]

You told me you were taking full contact bareknuckle punches straight to the face and only sustaining minor cuts at worst because apparently you see every shot thrown at you and brace yourself...

Your nose must be smelling your ear by now, or you're indeed fighting kindergarteners, or your training partners just have fists of tofu.

Controlled bareknuckle sparring is fine, but full contact bareknuckle sparring as regular training is idiotic, no one but you claims to do it, and you're unwilling to post your own clips of it.

 

[guy b.]

You are just as likely to be hurt training full contact with mma gloves as you are bare handed. In fact the risk of brain trauma and facial bone breaks is lower with bare hands as the history of bare knuckle boxing shows. The risk of cuts and hand bone breaks is undoubtedly higher doing it with bare hands. I know which I prefer.

There are many examples of bare knuckle fights in ireland and the UK on youtube. There are also many examples of Burmese bando available (which is much worse because they wrap the hands). Facial breakages are low in both. Severe knockouts of the kind seen in professional boxing are also low. You can see hands getting hurt all of the time, and you will see cuts.

The way you hit with bare hands is also different. Without doing it regularly you will not know this and you will not be prepared to do it.

Typical gym sparring shown as examples of contact training with gloves is very far from full contact. Simply removing the gloves will increase the intensity.

If you are getting hit hard straight in the face all of the time during sparring then I can only say that you are doing something very wrong. To be honest it doesn't sound like you spar much at all, even with gloves.

In a sparring session you are much more ready, aware and braced to receive contact than in a surprise attack or a sucker punch situation. This is blatantly obvious. Sparring with friends also entails stopping when one of you gets caught with a hard shot, not proceeding to follow up as they fall over, and not stamping on their head as they lie on the ground. Again obvious.

 

[JowGaWolf]

In fact the risk of brain trauma and facial bone breaks is lower with bare hands as the history of bare knuckle boxing shows.

I want to see a video of you going full force bare knuckle sparring

 

[JowGaWolf]

There are many examples of bare knuckle fights in ireland and the UK on youtube. There are also many examples of Burmese bando available (which is much worse because they wrap the hands). Facial breakages are low in both. Severe knockouts of the kind seen in professional boxing are also low. You can see hands getting hurt all of the time, and you will see cuts.

You tube also has street fights with people without gloves knocking each other out

 

[LFJ]

He won't do it. He just wants to act tougher than everyone else without having to substantiate it. He'll post fights (not of him and not VT), but ignore how intelligent people train for fights. I'm pretty sure he just posts to hear himself talking tough so he feels superior somehow.

He also wasn't just talking bareknuckle vs gloved, but headgear and other protective gear. Full contact sparring can be done with headgear to avoid serious cuts and broken noses, and I think it's an exaggeration to say it screws up distance to any substantial degree. After all, you should be sparring without headgear enough to know your distance so that headgear is just protection for when the intensity is turned up.

The only thing I agree with is that large boxing gloves are a detriment to the tight lines used in VT tactics, but if guy b.'s VT doesn't even work with light gloves on, then I guess winter would be the season to rob him.

 

[Danny T]

#1 - Training is not sparring. Training is learning and developing. Practice is repetitively working the material to ingrain it. Sparring is bringing the training (your learning) and practice (the repetitions) into a testing mode. Proving it out under fight like conditions. It is not actually fighting.
#2 - Going full force in sparring is foolish.
#3 - My group 'trains' everything we do except Muay Thai bare handed. We practice the same. We practice hitting focus pads and wall bags (we don't practice by hitting someones face). We spar hard but controlled and with safety in mind.
#4 - As to being a wing chun purist, please tell us just what does that mean. After all wing chun itself isn't pure having had several modifications or additions to it over the years.
#5 - As to other arts like Muay Thai, Muay Baron, and others from that area of the world's bare knuckle fighting systems; They do very little sparring. A lot of training, practicing, and fighting but very little sparring. Why, because the fighters get Hurt and can't train for their next fight.

 

[Mephisto]

On the contrary, I do it regularly and my face is fine. Your ignorance on this betrays your real lack of experience. It is telling that all of the proponents of gloves claim to do bare hand as well, but then don't seem to know what it is like. See videos of full contact bare knuckle for examples. Many are available.

It actually doesn't break your face more than any other kind of full contact sparring. It breaks hands pretty well if they aren't trained for it. And it causes cuts. I don't look any different doing full contact without gloves every few weeks than I used to look doing MT sparring. Some bruises and scrapes. Slightly more cuts. I wear a gumshield to minimise tooth damage as I would for any other sparring.

In the days of bareknuckle boxing, fights used to go on for tens of rounds and were generally wars of attrition. This is because hands are softer than heads. Any prepared person with a modicum of skill is very difficult to hurt with punches they see. This is why grappling is so successful in ring sports like mma.

Can you share some of your sparring video?

 

[geezer]

Can you share some of your sparring video?

Guy says he doesn't do video. I don't either. But I should start...not so I can post it but to watch and critique myself. Watching yourself on video can be really useful in spotting and correcting problems. That's why it's so widely used by coaches and trainers.

So Guy, would you even consider doing some video of your next sparring session? It would, hopefully, elevate this discussion some.

In the meantime I guess we can just assume that LFJ is just a wimpy-wimp with little girly nose-bones that break when a butterfly flutters by. And, you sir Guy, are a big strong manly-man with robust nose-bones, strong like the prow of a Russian icebreaker crashing through the floes in January.

http://englishrussia.com/images/022013/biggesticebreaker/biggesticebreaker001-10.jpg

Hey, did somebody put something in my coffee??? Tastes funny...

 

[JowGaWolf]

Guy says he doesn't do video. I don't either. But I should start...not so I can post it but to watch and critique myself. Watching yourself on video can be really useful in spotting and correcting problems. That's why it's so widely used by coaches and trainers.

So Guy, would you even consider doing some video of your next sparring session? It would, hopefully, elevate this discussion some.

In the meantime I guess we can just assume that LFJ is just a wimpy-wimp with little girly nose-bones that break when a butterfly flutters by. And you sir are a big strong manly-man with robust nose-bones, strong like the prow of a Russian icebreaker crashing through the floes in January.

http://englishrussia.com/images/022013/biggesticebreaker/biggesticebreaker001-10.jpg

Hey, did somebody put something in my coffee??? Tastes funny...

Everyone should video themselves sparring because it will help make you better at what you do.

 

[JPinAZ]

I really don't get this 'guy's' hang up with gloves here..

Wing chun is a different training methodology. Many people train wing chun with chi sau only, or chi sau and gor sau, doing very little or no full contact at all. I think this is a better option than gloved sparring if you wish to avoid hard contact but don't want to add anything to the wing chun training methodology from outside. Fighting with body punches and palms to face is another option with bare hands that is lower contact.

So you're saying that training (ie. drilling) using low-to-no contact without gloved sparring will produce better fighting skills than those that also add gloved pressure testing to their training/drilling?!? Lol, do you realize how utterly stupid that logic sounds? Only someone with very little actual fight training experience would say something like that.

Why are you so afraid of people using gloves anyway? I think you're making a huge deal out of something that is really no big deal in most functional MA's.

I'm curious, how much actual gloved sparring have you done in your WC training pror to going only-knuckle -on-skin? I'm not talking about 12-16oz boxing gloves, I'm talking about open finger/palm 8oz gloves, or even the 4oz MMA gloves?

I guess I am a wing chun purist. I prefer the wing chun approach and don't like to tamper with it. I think it is a training method with a certain amount of genius involved in its creation.

I agree that WC is quit genius in it's approach to fighting, but what exactly is 'the wing chun approach' and who said it disallows the usage of protective equipment during skill testing/sparring? Aren't you making a bigger deal out of this that it really is? I mean, we're only talking about suing some protection while sparring.. WTF!
And didn't say you use a mouth guard when you do all of your bare knuckle full-force-to-the-face sparring? I bet they didn't have those 200 years ago either, so looks like you're changing WC training methods also, Mr. Purist!!

I think it is an interesting question for those who advocate changing the wing chun training methodology to consider.

Who said anything about anyone advocating changing training methodologies? I'm curious how long exactly you actually trained under your sifu(s) to know all there is to know all there is to 'wing chun training methodologies' to come here and play expert and question what everyone else is doing?

If I recall, the last time you claimed to train under someone, they didn't even remember you. So could it be possible you just might not really understand things as well as you think?

We don't need to go as far back as Leung Jan though. Yip man and those he taught didn't sprar with gloves. Were they effective at fighting? Or are we better now?

Effectiveness then vs. now is impossible to determine, so no use going down that road. But being effective at fighting is really an individual thing. And not everyone that trained with Ip Man was necessarily a good fighter.
While we surely know that at least some of Ip Man's students were out fighting with other styles, can we really verify that they were sparring while in class at all (gloves or not)? And say they were sparring, how do you know they didn't use gloves? Bruce was a student of that era, and he was a big proponent of using gloves in his training...

 

[JPinAZ]

Guy says he doesn't do video. I don't either. But I should start...not so I can post it but to watch and critique myself. Watching yourself on video can be really useful in spotting and correcting problems. That's why it's so widely used by coaches and trainers.

Agreed, videos are a great tool to helping improve and for self critique! Maybe Guy can't video because hey, they didn't have video cameras 200 years ago, so filming himself training now would ruin all his purity lol

I think there's a difference between you and 'guy'. You aren't coming here claiming to be taking full on punches to the face every 2 weeks with little-to-no effect. Nor are you taking a higher-than-though attitude telling people they are delusional and modifying/changing the Wc system by wearing gloves during sparring. So I understand why people would ask him to put up or shut up.. I'd much prefer the latter

 

[geezer]

...I think there's a difference between you and 'guy'. You aren't coming here claiming to be taking full on punches to the face every 2 weeks with little-to-no effect. Nor are you taking a higher-than-though attitude ...

Thanks, JP you've always been considerate to this old man (yours truly).

Now, @ Guy B., I have to agree. Real, authentic men don't need no stinkin' protection. Of course they didn't use that stuff back in Yip Man's time in Hong Kong ....the 1950s. Heck, real hockey goalies right here in North America didn't even use facemasks back then either. Take Terry Sawchuck for example. Never mind that he died at the ripe old age of 40 from complications (damaged liver) resulting from a little bare-knuckle bout with a friend.

https://timedotcom.files.wordpress....sawchuk-1966.jpg?quality=65&strip=color&w=727

...Total respect for Terry Sawchuck, R.I.P., but being one of the world's hardest "hard men" does come at a price.