The biggest problem in Wing Chun (and most other TCMA).

[Oily Dragon]

I think he means to say "low level" but it appears that English is not his first language. His conclusion is ironic since many would hold the opposite point of view.

I think he's trying to say that punching is a low level skill. The part about open hands was kind of true. There are a lot in the WC crowd that seem obsessed with closed fist punches (usually while defeating boxing in a video).

Punching is such a small part of Wing Chun. Crane style? That's the advanced stuff, and a lot of it is evasion/defense.

 

[Xue Sheng]

So you are saying that WC strikes need to be delivered with an open hand to be powerful?

This seems counterintuitive to me. If you can generate good power, shouldn't you be able to use it with a fist, open-hand, or whatever tool/configuration you chose to strike with?

Also, you say "...direct hits are only for school level 1 training". Whether you use a fist or palm aren't you still striking "directly" ...as opposed to "indirectly" perhaps? I have no idea what you mean by that! Maybe you can clarify a bit.

Aren't paak sau, jik jeung, wan jeung, huen sau and dai jeung all basically palm strikes

 

[SifuBoza]

So you are saying that WC strikes need to be delivered with an open hand to be powerful?

This seems counterintuitive to me. If you can generate good power, shouldn't you be able to use it with a fist, open-hand, or whatever tool/configuration you chose to strike with?

Also, you say "...direct hits are only for school level 1 training". Whether you use a fist or palm aren't you still striking "directly" ...as opposed to "indirectly" perhaps? I have no idea what you mean by that! Maybe you can clarify a bit.

I mean direct chain fist punching.

 

[SifuBoza]

You mention "level 1" three times. What is level 1?

Level is direct fist punch and direct leg kick

 

[SifuBoza]

I think he means to say "low level" but it appears that English is not his first language. His conclusion is ironic since many would hold the opposite point of view.

Yeah my english not that good sry..

 

[geezer]

Yeah my english not that good sry..

No worries. ...by the way, what is your native tongue?

 

[geezer]

Aren't paak sau, jik jeung, wan jeung, huen sau and dai jeung all basically palm strikes

Not huen sau. That's "circling hand" and is most often used as a way to snake around your opponent's arms, or occasionally to slip out of a wrist grab., etc.

Pak sau is a slapping check directed at "bridge arms" rather than a damaging palm-strike to the head or body. Yeah it can sting like hell when done well, but it's function is not to hurt but to check, deflect an incoming arm, or to remove it from centerline to "free the way" for your strike.

 

[geezer]

I think he's trying to say that punching is a low level skill. The part about open hands was kind of true. There are a lot in the WC crowd that seem obsessed with closed fist punches (usually while defeating boxing in a video).

Punching is such a small part of Wing Chun. Crane style? That's the advanced stuff, and a lot of it is evasion/defense.

Many would disagree with you.

Some feel that it is a higher level skill, and definitely more practical, to learn how to accomplish the kind of control developed with open hand work while maintaining a closed fist construction. Alan Orr is one who espouses this POV. It's an interesting idea that challenges the traditional perspective.

This is really just a more extreme version of the more widely held view among WC practitioners is that less is more. According to this perspective, WC is made stronger and more effective by eliminating the "fancier" moves found in ancestral forms ...including Shaolin and crane movements in favor of specializing in more high percentage movements suited to Wing Chun's preferred close fighting strategy.

 

[Oily Dragon]

Many would disagree with you.

Some feel that it is a higher level skill, and definitely more practical, to learn how to accomplish the kind of control developed with open hand work while maintaining a closed fist construction. Alan Orr is one who espouses this POV. It's an interesting idea that challenges the traditional perspective.

This is really just a more extreme version of the more widely held view among WC practitioners is that less is more. According to this perspective, WC is made stronger and more effective by eliminating the "fancier" moves found in ancestral forms ...including Shaolin and crane movements in favor of specializing in more high percentage movements suited to Wing Chun's preferred close fighting strategy.

I agree. Most of them are errant.

Imagine defending a takedown as "fancy"? Talk about extreme.

 

[drop bear]

Many would disagree with you.

Some feel that it is a higher level skill, and definitely more practical, to learn how to accomplish the kind of control developed with open hand work while maintaining a closed fist construction. Alan Orr is one who espouses this POV. It's an interesting idea that challenges the traditional perspective.

This is really just a more extreme version of the more widely held view among WC practitioners is that less is more. According to this perspective, WC is made stronger and more effective by eliminating the "fancier" moves found in ancestral forms ...including Shaolin and crane movements in favor of specializing in more high percentage movements suited to Wing Chun's preferred close fighting strategy.

I have never seen good timing trained in to chain punching. Not to the same depth as a boxing jab. For example.

So I can understand why people would be trying to do every other thing to land strikes.

 

[Oily Dragon]

I have never seen good timing trained in to chain punching. Not to the same depth as a boxing jab. For example.

So I can understand why people would be trying to do every other thing to land strikes.

The closest boxing analogy to chain punching is the speed bag technique.

Which is great for developing speed but not for knockout blows for sure.

The only effective fist fighting like that I've ever seen was in Looney Tunes, Tom and Jerry, and maybe the Three Stooges.

 

[geezer]

I agree. Most of them are errant.

Imagine defending a takedown as "fancy"? Talk about extreme.

I can't imagine that.

For takedown defense, I imagine a sprawl, cross-face, take the back... Not fancy, just rudimentary wrestling ...and not what you think of when you think of Shaolin either. To me the term Shaolin conjures up images of elaborate movements and endless long forms done in silk pajamas ...the inspiration for modern performance wu-shu.

Now I know there's much more to Shaolin than that. But it is elaborate and complex. I prefer simple and direct.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I have never seen good timing trained in to chain punching. Not to the same depth as a boxing jab. For example.

What do you think about chain hook punches? Will that be more powerful than jab-cross chain punches?

Right hook, left hook, righ hook, left hook, ...

 

[geezer]

The closest boxing analogy to chain punching is the speed bag technique.

That sounds about right.

Sometimes it works well in short 2-3 punch flurries. Somewhere I read something from a WC branch other than my own where their sifu talked about the real chain punching, at the higher level, not being about an endless flurry of straight punches, but rather practice in linking varied strikes in rapid succession.

Basically, continuous, linked combinations that might come in straight, angled, hooking, high, low, and so on.

Ya know, that's not a bad way of approaching it.

 

[geezer]

The only effective fist fighting like that I've ever seen was in Looney Tunes, Tom and Jerry, and maybe the Three Stooges.

Three Stooges?

Well, that all depends on which lineage you come from. It's pretty well established that the Moe lineage was the most fighting oriented.

 

[geezer]

I have never seen good timing trained in to chain punching. Not to the same depth as a boxing jab. For example.

Apples and oranges.

A jab is shot out from a distance. Chain punching starts at close range, often after bridge contact is made. That's why WC works so much on chi-sau. At close range that helps teach how cross the bridge and "free the way" to attack. Chain punching is the follow up.

At least that's how it's supposed to work.

 

[Oily Dragon]

I can't imagine that.

For takedown defense, I imagine a sprawl, cross-face, take the back... Not fancy, just rudimentary wrestling ...and not what you think of when you think of Shaolin either. To me the term Shaolin conjures up images of elaborate movements and endless long forms done in silk pajamas ...the inspiration for modern performance wu-shu.

Now I know there's much more to Shaolin than that. But it is elaborate and complex. I prefer simple and direct.

Basically, except for the silk part. The wealth of Shaolin is immaterial.

 

[isshinryuronin]

To me the term Shaolin conjures up images of elaborate movements and endless long forms

WC is made stronger and more effective by eliminating the "fancier" moves found in ancestral forms ...including Shaolin and crane movements

Not having learned at the Shaolin Temple (although I was once on the set for the original TV show Kung Fu) my study of TMA indicates that the old ("ancestral") Shaolin style was more direct and "hard" than what we commonly see today. The "elaborate/fancier" moves you refer to were, I think, developed post-ancestral a few centuries later.

A number of Chinese styles heavily embraced organized Taoist philosophy (1600's?) leading to a much softer version of Kung Fu to fit the concepts of yielding, void and harmony. Also, the adoption of animal styles led to interjecting their movements into the martial art. They may have been over-enthusiastic in this practice, placing too much emphasis on the particular animal's fighting movements at the expense of human fighting effectiveness. This is conjecture but seems logical to me. We all tend to take on additional trappings over time and become unnecessarily complex.

Due to the above factors some "eliminating" was probably a good idea. In an effort to fit some conceptual mold, various degrees of practicality were lost. Shorter more direct moves eventually came back in various CMA (in some styles, they likely never left) and this trend continued when brought to Okinawa, becoming Karate.

The above is only theory based on my limited scholarship on the subject.

 

[drop bear]

Apples and oranges.

A jab is shot out from a distance. Chain punching starts at close range, often after bridge contact is made. That's why WC works so much on chi-sau. At close range that helps teach how cross the bridge and "free the way" to attack. Chain punching is the follow up.

At least that's how it's supposed to work.

Chain punching is similar in application to a lead cross or a short cross. Comes through the middle.


If it is treated as an afterthought. It is doing the technique a disservice.

You can literally only benefit by having good entries and exits attached to your chain punching.

 

[SifuBoza]

No worries. ...by the way, what is your native tongue?

I am from Serbia. And you ?