New to the forum, looking to get back in martial arts.

[MetalBoar]

Hello All!

I’ve been lurking for a bit and decided to join the forum. I like that the atmosphere seems to be friendly and constructive.

I’m looking to get back into martial arts after a long break. I’m 47 now, haven’t studied anything in about 10 years and haven’t done more than dabbled since I was in my early 30’s. Back when I was more diligent in my training I practiced western sport fencing, primarily foil, very seriously for a little over 2 years, spent about 2 years in Aikido, and then when I moved away from my hometown switched to Hapkido for another 4-5 years until that school closed.

I’m in good health for my age and I’ve been lifting weights for years so, apart from having picked up a few pounds during my last job, I don’t feel like I’m slowing down TOO much yet. I have developed some problems with vertigo. They don’t impact my life very often but they do tend to get triggered by rolling, so my Aikido/Hapkido days are probably over.

I'm interested in studying Wing Chun or any of the 3 big Chinese internals at the right school. I’m also sure that there are many Chinese arts that I know nothing about that I’d really enjoy if I got the chance to try them. I don’t want to do modern Wushu. Regardless of the style, ideally I’m looking for a school that’s got a good instructor, a well conceived, coherent approach to combat, and, at least eventually, regular sparring sessions in which the strategies and techniques of the style get applied.

I’m currently living in Seattle, but there’s a good chance I’ll be moving to Phoenix in the not so distant future. I’m going to be down there for a few weeks in July and thought it would be fun and possibly inspiring to check out some of the schools while I’m in town. I know that Arizona has a fantastic reputation for Wing Chun and I’ve heard a lot of great things about Augustine Fong over in Tucson, so I’d love to hear what people think of Tempe Wing Chun. I’ve seen some insightful posts by @geezer on this forum so I’m also interested in Ving Tsun Arizona. I don’t know much about I Liq Chuan, but I’ve seen some videos by Ashe Higgs from Falling Leaves Kung Fu Club that make me want to learn more. Is there anyone else I should really be thinking about? Does anyone have any feedback on the schools I’ve listed?

Thanks!

 

[frank raud]

It's not Wing Chun, but if I was in Phoenix, I'd be checking out Megaton Dias. Megaton BJJ Competition team – The best Brazilian Jiu-jitsu gym in Arizona. And I'm not a BJJ player.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

First off, welcome to Martial Talk! Glad to have you step out of the shadows (you were kinda creepy back there, anyway) and join in the friendly squabbling around here.

I just wanted to toss in that I had a student for almost 3 years who had vertigo issues. She had to limit the amount of continuous rolling she did, and some days couldn't do any rolls, but was able to do fine in classes, so don't give up entirely on being able to do rolls and such. That shouldn't affect your current choice of arts (since nothing you are leaning toward seems to be of that ilk), but might be worth keeping in mind, as you might want to revisit some of that old Aikido material from time to time.

 

[MetalBoar]

It's not Wing Chun, but if I was in Phoenix, I'd be checking out Megaton Dias. Megaton BJJ Competition team – The best Brazilian Jiu-jitsu gym in Arizona. And I'm not a BJJ player.

Thanks!

They do look really good and now that I'm looking around a bit it appears that Phoenix has a lot of well respected BJJ schools. I admit I don't know much about BJJ, but I guess I've sort of given the whole MMA scene a pass because of my experience with boxing gyms - where they aren't interested in you if you aren't going to go pro or they're just offering boxercise. I know boxing is really it's own thing so I should give BJJ a look.

 

[MetalBoar]

First off, welcome to Martial Talk! Glad to have you step out of the shadows (you were kinda creepy back there, anyway) and join in the friendly squabbling around here.

I just wanted to toss in that I had a student for almost 3 years who had vertigo issues. She had to limit the amount of continuous rolling she did, and some days couldn't do any rolls, but was able to do fine in classes, so don't give up entirely on being able to do rolls and such. That shouldn't affect your current choice of arts (since nothing you are leaning toward seems to be of that ilk), but might be worth keeping in mind, as you might want to revisit some of that old Aikido material from time to time.

Thanks for the reply.

It's true, I can do some rolling and it doesn't usually lead to more than a brief moment of disorientation, nor has it ever triggered one of my multi-day vertigo episodes. It's just really frustrating because sometimes a single fast roll can cause the room to spin where it's hard to stand without falling over and I feel like I can't train the way I want and perhaps that I'm getting in the way of others' training. You have a good point though, in the right environment it would be nice to recover some of my old skills.

Luckily, this really only seems to be a problem with a very limited set of movements so it shouldn't effect my experience in most of the arts out there.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Thanks for the reply.

It's true, I can do some rolling and it doesn't usually lead to more than a brief moment of disorientation, nor has it ever triggered one of my multi-day vertigo episodes. It's just really frustrating because sometimes a single fast roll can cause the room to spin where it's hard to stand without falling over and I feel like I can't train the way I want and perhaps that I'm getting in the way of others' training. You have a good point though, in the right environment it would be nice to recover some of my old skills.

Luckily, this really only seems to be a problem with a very limited set of movements so it shouldn't effect my experience in most of the arts out there.

I can see how that would be frustrating. When I've had injuries that caused any kind of limitation, I found myself feeling that same frustration.

With my student, she could tell at the beginning of class what her reaction to rolls would be that day (back rolls were worse, for some reason), so during warm-up (when we usually do 2 front and 2 back rolls) she could tell me if she needed to stay off rolls that day, or if she needed to limit them some, or whatever. She could never comfortably do 3 rolls in a row, so we just didn't do drills that required that, or she'd do something different.

Or, just go do the rolls and pretend afterward you've been binge-drinking.

 

[Deafdude#5]

Hello and welcome!

 

[Tames D]

Welcome.

 

[evan.fedora]

Wing Chun is a great choice that you have made.