Rushing through Hyung during class or one's own pace?

[JT_the_Ninja]

JT,
There is no argument as to the importance of deep stance training for both conditioning as well as establishing a solid foundation for specific defensive and offensive techniques. However, due to a lack of understanding of function, practitioners develop improper technique as a result of the additional “telegraphing” movements that become a part of their movement in order to transition from one step to the next. These movements include upper body forward and backward movement that becomes necessary to get the weight off of the rear foot and draw it forward. The ITF Chungul Jaseh is, from what I have seen here in Michigan, too wide. When your front legs femur is pointing to the side, as opposed to pointing forward at the target, your power will follow the direction that the femur/knee is pointing. This wider stance also causes a side to side swaying movement that causes you to have more telegraphing than, making it easier for your opponent to read your intent.
Many confuse deeper body position with the length and width of the foot placement, or how far apart your feet are. You can still have a strong, deep stance with your feet closer together. A primary concern should always be ease of mobility. If you are stuck in a position that calls for you to include additional body movements to transition from one stance to another, you need to make adjustments.

As I have stated in the past, the best way to discuss these issues and share this information so that it is best understood, we should find a time to meet and train in person. I will be in Pittsburgh in September. I would love to have you participate in that seminar…

I think you misunderstand the ITF chungul jase, then, because you've misdescribed it. Our chungul jase has both feet pointed forward, as you said, because (a) it's easier to pick up your knee from this position and (b) you have greater stability with your back foot able to lock into place to keep you from being knocked backward. I guess that's a bad reflection on the Michigan students, if they all do that kind of front stance. As someone who trains in Pittsburgh and who tests at Master Kim's dojang, I can tell you firsthand that one of the most common corrections made to front stances I hear from my SBN is "Knees pointed forward!"

As to their stances being too wide (which is why, I guess, their front femurs were pointing to the side), the feet should still be shoulder-width apart. Some people try to go too wide to get lower; that's not what I meant by training in low stances. If you have to break the stance to get lower, you're not doing it right.

You see the same thing when people try to do a keema jase too wide -- they almost do a split, often with their knees necessarily straight to keep them from collapsing. One of my seniors always called this the "house-riding stance," because you look like you're trying to straddle a triangular roof. Trying to kick, or even move, from this is far more difficult than from a good low keema jase, where your feet are just outside of shoulder-width apart, your knees bent forward, your shins more or less straight vertical, and your weight over your center-line, as opposed to leaning forward (again, to get "lower").

 

[Muwubu16858]

tell you one thing, my teacher does application to technique in forms too, and honestly, because most of his techniques, he uses body power and waist twist power that Oh Sae Joon used in his Y.M.C.A. style after 1958, their is no place for low stances in the applications. I'm sure low stances are great exercise, but as a warm up or training item. Hyung training should be focused on the application of the movements in sequence, i.e., why do I do this move, and how would it benefit me in a real circumstance? That's all I can add on that.

 

[shesulsa]

You folks have done a wonderful job exploring the elements of hyungs, could you please comment on how speeding through affects these, according to the OP's question?

Thanks.

 

[exile]

You folks have done a wonderful job exploring the elements of hyungs, could you please comment on how speeding through affects these, according to the OP's question?

Thanks.

Well, there are three sides to this, as far as I can see. One is how you pace yourself in practicing the performance of the form, one is in demonstrating the forms, as in class, and the third is how you pace yourself when you practice the forms as inventories of combat-applicable techniques—when you practice the bunkai applications `in sequence' according to the hyung's directions.

• At home, when you're practicing, your goal is to actually master the moves and develop a smooth transition through the movements that make up the form—not because smoothness is itself necessarily a virtue, but because a smooth performance is a kind of guarantee that you really have internalized the whole hyung and are no longer having to stop and consciously `dig around' in memory for the next move. For this purpose, I think a slow smooth execution is just as effective as a fast smooth execution—if you don're really have the hyung `nailed', you're probably not going to be able to perform it smoothly. So here, smoothness rather than speed is primary.

• In demoing the hyungs in class, I want everyone to stay together, at the same speed. My primary reason for this is that if someone hasn't really nailed the form, s/he may well resort to `shadowing' other people in the class in front of them or next to her/him—peripheral vision is a wonderful thing!—and using the others in the class as a crutch. There's a good deal more pressure in performing a hyung, kata or hsing in class than there is doing at home, and I want to be sure that each student knows the form well enough to execute it flawlessly even under that pressure. So I want everyone to be in the same place at the same time in the execution. We usually do each hyung once at a slow pace and once at a kind of normal speed, but everyone has to be together.

• If you're demoing the form from the point of view of its combat information, its bunkai, then what Master Penfil and others have suggested earlier is the operative constraint: the speed should vary depending on the tech, and here a good deal of individual variation will follow, because people execute techs differently, according to their own individual skeletal structure, height, and so on. Group performance isn't called for here, and therefore `keeping together' isn't an issue. When I work on this aspect of hyungs at home, or at my gym on my own, I'm visualizing an attacker moving in various ways, with each hyung movement that I carry out corresponding to a particular move, which will to some extent take the attacker's prior move into account, and to some extent let me experiment with expanding or compressing the duration of various elements of my defense: execute a movement slowly in order to rehearse an increase the duration and force I apply to a pin that that part of the hyung seems to me to be encoding.​

So the respective roles of speed when you're learning the hyung, demo-ing the hyung in group performance, and analyzing and experimenting with the bunkai that may be encrypted in the hyung are all somewhat different, depending on the task...

 

[Master Jay S. Penfil]

You folks have done a wonderful job exploring the elements of hyungs, could you please comment on how speeding through affects these, according to the OP's question?

Thanks.

Although many of the participants, including me took the conversation much deeper then simply answering Lynn’s question, we ALL answered her original question and covered it from several vantage points.

 

[tsdmgk1336]

Hey there master Penfil haven't heard from you in awhile give me a call when you get a chance..

 

[Lynne]

Hyung training is among the most important parts of our training and should be taught in stages…

Stage #1:
Learn the techniques, one section at a time.

Stage #2:
Establish an understanding of application from both sides of the fight. In Okinawan and Japanese karate the terms are “Bunkai and Oyo”. Bunkai means; explanation of what the technique is doing. Oyo means; what is the attacker doing to force your response.

Without understanding the Bunkai and the Oyo you are just performing physical exercise, not practicing martial art of self defense.

In order for your practice to translate into martial training, or purposeful defensive training you mind must at all times be engaged in engaging the attacker. Every repetition that you execute should be performed with full mental involvement and attention to detail with the attacker in your mind. Understanding distance and timing;

How far is he/she from you when they initiate their attack?

What angle are they coming from?

How long is their weapon?

What will be the correct angle for your body to be on to successfully deflect or block the incoming weapon and than counter in an effective manor?

In transitioning from one stance to another, how should you pivot on your feet to allow the smoothest transition possible, without telegraphing your intent to your opponent?

Once these questions are answered and you have a correct picture in your mind for how the techniques should look you are ready to learn about the natural rhythm of the hyung. Keep in mind that the kind of technique that you are executing will determine its speed. Striking and blocking techniques will be fast and powerful. Joint locking techniques will be slow and deliberate. Your breathing will also help you to set the correct pace of the hyung.

Stage #3:

PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE!!!

Remember; practice makes perfect is not correct.

Grandmaster Hwang Kee said; you can practice a reverse punch for 1,000 repetitions. If you execute them incorrectly, at the end of your 1,000 repetitions you will perform them well, incorrectly.

Perfect practice makes perfect…

If you are going to take the time to practice, practice at a pace that will allow you to see and feel how you are performing. Use a mirror when ever you can and study yourself closely. Don’t just focus on the number of repetitions. Sometimes “Less is More”. 100 well executed repetitions will serve you better than 1,000 poorly executed repetitions.


When training hyung in a group setting such as in class. If everyone is doing the same hyung together, they should always be moving at the same pace. It is the senior in the group that should set the pace, and that senior should at all times be mindful of who is in the group and make sure that he/she doesn’t leave anyone behind.

By keeping everyone on pace with one another you are learning about the hyungs rhythm. If you are making mistakes because you simply can’t keep up, there should be an adjustment of the pace by the senior. If you are making mistakes because you simply don’t know the hyung, you should be assigned an assistant to help you learn it.

Instructors that see students making mistakes due to lack of knowledge that don’t make corrections are either being lazy or they just aren’t well experienced teachers. We have far too many drill sergeant style teachers out there. Anyone can stand in front of the class and bark out commands. This doesn’t make you a good teacher; in fact it makes you a bad teacher.

If your instructor isn’t making corrections, you won’t be improving any time soon. Performing the same mistakes over and over again only reinforces poor muscle memory. If you aren’t getting corrections, become the squeaky wheel that gets the grease. Ask for help. You will than find it…

Thank you, Master Penfil.

To be honest, we do not learn our Hyung in sections. Well, I'm only on Gi Chi Hyung Sam Bu. Perhaps higher/more complicated forms are broken down; I really don't know. Actually, for Sam Bu, I was told, "Start out with yup makee, do a chun dan kon kyuk - do weng jing (sp) kon kyuks up the middle." I had learned yup makee and weng jing kon kyuks from the school DVD I bought. I was glad I'd viewed the DVD before my first class as a yellow belt! Of course, I would have asked for instruction if I had not viewed the DVD. That is how I learned the form, from the DVD. And my daughter gave me some corrections. The first two forms I learned in one session (the second was easy because I already knew what a high punch and a Sangdon Makee was).

To be fair, we have a large school and around 10 instructors. Not everyone would have known that I'd just gotten my yellow belt. Then again, I have this feeling they are expecting a lot out of me because my daughter is taking classes and several levels above me. I may be wrong.

Regarding Number 2, I would love to know the practical applications of each move. Generally, we are reminded that Hyung simulates a battle and teaches one how to move, and teaches control and balance. I'm often reminded to twist from the core, to punch hard, etc. But we haven't had an instruction section explaining how the yup makee is a powerful block for example.

I am practicing at home, every day. (What I am noticing is that I'm usually the only yellow belt with white belts; when other yellow belts are in class, they aren't going into low side stances, in fact, they are just shifting their feet, and they aren't aiming either, so they fly through the form. It takes a little bit of time to aim and to get down lower and stay there. I've watched the video and know they are doing the form incorrectly. I am now doing it faster and smoother...and more importantly, correctly.

I can't say why the yellow belts haven't been corrected yet. I see a lot of sloppiness and it bugs me. The punches are to the side of the body instead of the middle of the solar plexus. The punches are at above sternum height, even shoulder height, instead of at solar plexus level. I don't understand. It could be that the instructors are correcting people and it's not sinking in? I was constantly corrected as a white belt, "keep your shoulders square, punch toward the middle, lower your fist to the middle of your solar plexux, snap that fist, block hard, look before you block," etc. I must have been very lucky!

 

[Lynne]

Thank you, everyone, for taking time to answer my questions and your patience with a newbie. I appreciate the input. It's been very helpful.

 

[MBuzzy]

Lynne,

At most schools, you will see that behavior all the way up the ranks. Two people who are ranked the same may look completely different. Some will be sloppy and some will be almost perfect.

As for breaking down the forms, once you get into some of the higher forms, they get very very difficult to learn without breaking them down. I know a handful of people whose memories are good enough to see a form once or learn it once and they know it.....but most of us need to have it broken down and taught over the course of a few classes.

Whether you are performing your hyung fast or slow (based on style and technique as you mentioned), just be sure that you are keeping a constant tempo. Every form has a rhythm and a tempo that you must be sure to keep with. This may differ from school to school and style to style, so be careful!

 

[Master Jay S. Penfil]

This is why we are all here Lynne,

When we, as seniors take the time to work with juniors it strengthens our own understanding and keeps us sharp.

I have learned far more by teaching than I could have ever learned from my instructors. This is not a slam against my instructors...

As I teach my students; when you have to work with a junior, and you are expected to be the best model that you can be in order to give them the best training possible, that is when you really learn and understand what you are doing. I always tell my students that; as a senior master instructor, I can't teach you anything. I can guide you along the correct path, but you must learn to visualize and emulate all that you see (correctly).

Keep up the great work, and please continue to keep us updated as too how you are progressing.

 

[Lynne]

Lynne,

At most schools, you will see that behavior all the way up the ranks. Two people who are ranked the same may look completely different. Some will be sloppy and some will be almost perfect.

As for breaking down the forms, once you get into some of the higher forms, they get very very difficult to learn without breaking them down. I know a handful of people whose memories are good enough to see a form once or learn it once and they know it.....but most of us need to have it broken down and taught over the course of a few classes.

Whether you are performing your hyung fast or slow (based on style and technique as you mentioned), just be sure that you are keeping a constant tempo. Every form has a rhythm and a tempo that you must be sure to keep with. This may differ from school to school and style to style, so be careful!

I know we can't be perfect, but I wonder why some people are in class. Well, I did hear someone say they were mainly there for the physical exercise. All I could think of was "if they dropped lower in side punches, they'd get a real nice burn and that great workout they're looking for."

I can see what you are saying about the higher forms (I've watched the higher belts and some of those forms are long ones, too). I'm not one of those people who "pick up" that sort of thing quickly. Next month, Black Belt Club starts up and I hope my brain doesn't blow up learning Chil Sung forms.

Thank you for the tip on tempo. Tempo is definitely important in our school. During our testing, we "hiss" to stay together by the way. Sometimes, there are 30 - 40 people testing at the same time. Everyone has to stay together during the first three basic forms.