The truth on Self-Defense and TaijiQuan / Tai Chi Chuan

[windwalker099]

And there you go, no video I can see but yet, it exists.

sure,,,trained TWC in the 70s... it was called a fist hook...

Being a very distinctive style, what was trained was used....

Some clips of teacher Ron Dongs, class

he with my teacher Mike trained under Gorge Long....

Mantis as practiced in Korea....

 

[windwalker099]

Some of our practice in Beijing.
The way our teacher taught....He in his late 80s at the time..
Zhao, a taiji bother later going on to teach his method

 

[Wing Woo Gar]

sure,,,trained TWC in the 70s... it was called a fist hook...

Being a very distinctive style, what was trained was used....

Some clips of teacher Ron Dongs, class

he with my teacher Mike trained under Gorge Long....

Mantis as practiced in Korea....

Good stuff, and on video too! Still not what I mean when I say “hook”. That’s the danger of definition and labels though.

 

[windwalker099]

Good stuff, and on video too! Still not what I mean when I say “hook”. That’s the danger of definition and labels though.

Some may not know, boxing has a rule set that specifies what aspect of the fist that can be used for striking...
This influences the way, why and how "hooks" can be thrown...

8. Hitting with the open glove, the butt of the hand, the wrist or the elbow, and all backhand blows.

 

[Flying Crane]

Good stuff, and on video too! Still not what I mean when I say “hook”. That’s the danger of definition and labels though.

It does raise the question though: why is the Western Boxing method of a hook the default? Why isn’t some other hook the go-to? Maybe boxing is missing out on something good, by not having the hook as it is found in other systems.

 

[Steve]

Ok there is common ground for us. You and I both believe it IS the exception and NOT the rule. New species are identified every day, most of us will never hear of them nor see them, yet they exist. Hundreds of millions of people believe in a mysterious guy who has missing years in his story who was supposedly able to walk on water. Where is the video? People say he shows up on toast sometimes, and there are videos. Now I haven’t seen him, nor have I seen a gigantopithecus, but without a video I can tell you which one I believe existed. On the other side of that we have some folks that believe in The Water Walker and don’t believe that dinosaurs were real. I can’t make people believe anything, but if I start to, I will be sure to make a video.

I don't think you're making a lot of sense right now. never existed is not the same as doesn't exist. We don't have video of dinosaurs. But, if a T-rex was roaming around the south of France today, you can damn sure bet there'd be video of it now. And that's even if it's a very shy T-rex.

Someone walks on water today, and I guarantee you that within hours, you'd have dozens, if not hundreds of people ALSO walking on water, including tutorials on how the stunt was done. And today, I think it's pretty reasonable to say that, absent video, if someone is claiming to be able to walk on water, you should be VERY skeptical.

 

[Steve]

It does raise the question though: why is the Western Boxing method of a hook the default? What isn’t some other hook the go-to? Maybe boxing is missing out on something good, by not having the hook as it is found in other systems.

It doesn't have to be, but boxing has an advantage over some other systems in that they actually punch people. Since you don't punch people, it's kind of hard to evaluate your system's hook. Except by someone who does punch people... but you would say that person doesn't actually understand your system and so lacks the insight to evaluate. A real conundrum.

 

[windwalker099]

It does raise the question though: why is the Western Boxing method of a hook the default? What isn’t some other hook the go-to? Maybe boxing is missing out on something good, by not having the hook as it is found in other systems

In the early 70s, a lot of the long arm used in TWC was not allowed....
Mike along with some of the other instructor's in our gym started to modify the system

Chin Shifu,,"David Chin" teaching "hop gar" sister style to TWC
also modified his system

Some of his students practicing

 

[Flying Crane]

In the early 70s, a lot of the long arm used in TWC was not allowed....
Mike along with some of the other instructor's in our gym started to modify the system

Chin Shifu,,"David Chin" teaching "hop gar" sister style to TWC
also modified his system

Some of his students practicing

Not allowed, in what context?

 

[windwalker099]

Some one mentioned punching people

 

[windwalker099]

Not allowed, in what context?

In the full contact matches of the day, they tended to use boxing rule sets....Some of the long arm
type punching was not allowed....This was long ago,,could be mistaken...

I do know that long arm worked very well on boxers, or those who said they boxed when I encountered them..
using TWC agreeing not to kick them...

it was funny....we also had what was called burning palm or hand....a fight stopper required a lot of time to train and maintain....

Mike was a good teacher very much ahead of his time ..

"Mike along with Gary, and some of the other students of Gorge Long, where big influences
on me as a young teen in the city.

The style and way of practice was geared only for one thing
and one thing only,,,"fighting"

The training back then was quite severe and brutal also secretive.
Some times we would get visitors from China town

instead of staying in our 20min ma bo, as usual
we would sit until they left....

We had specialty hands like "burning palm" and others that to this day
are not widely known nor talked about much....anyone who's practiced it or come in contact with it
would know what it can do...like in another thread some might question it...its ok and expected

"

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

why is the Western Boxing method of a hook the default? Why isn’t some other hook the go-to? Maybe boxing is missing out on something good, by not having the hook as it is found in other systems.

This is a very good point. CMA hook punch is used to do a lot of things. You can write a book just about many different ways to use hook.

Besides to use hook to hit your opponent's

- head (high hook),
- chest (middle hook),
- kidney area (low hook),

you can also use hook to:

1. Knock down a jab or cross.

2. Use hook to change into downward parry and open your opponent's guard. In boxing, a punch is just a punch. In CMA, a punch is a punch followed by a grab/pull.

3. Use hook to set up another hook with grab/pull, followed by an uppercut.

4. Use hook to set up head lock. The moment that you can knock your opponent's arms away from your entering path, you can move in.

5. Use hook to set up under hook. I don't believe boxing has every considered this.

6. change hook (punch to the head) into a spiral punch (punch to the chest).
7. ...

 

[Xue Sheng]

I think I know what you mean, with the yang hook. The wing chun block i am thinking of is more for a roundhouse type punch. I don’t know of a wing chun block for low body hooks. That said, I am not a Wing Chun guy. On the Yang hook, can you elaborate where this is in the form?

进步 – Step Forward, Parry Block and Punch

around 7:34
This is my Shigong by the way Tung Ying Chieh

 

[Buka]

Here's a nice combo.....

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

In the full contact matches of the day, they tended to use boxing rule sets.

At least in Texas, I still remember that when Karate turned into full contack Karate back in 1974. All the full contact Karate tournament had to followed the boxing rules and used 16 oz boxing gloves. The forum gloves was no longer allowed.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Sure, how would I know it’s Tai Chi? How would anybody?

Well, I guess the first clue is that Chen Ziqiang is a well known Tai Chi instructor from Chen village. I haven't read anything to suggest that he has cross trained in other arts.

Another clue is that the flavor of his movement in this video (and others that I've seen) is a bit different from what I've seen from equivalently skilled wrestlers, judoka, jiujiteiros, or sambists.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Well, I guess the first clue is that Chen Ziqiang is a well known Tai Chi instructor from Chen village. I haven't read anything to suggest that he has cross trained in other arts.

The problem you get when you get to the 20th generation of the Chen family is they are starting to use Sanda/Sanshou in application. So applications of postures done by the 19th generation and prior generations can be different

 

[Tony Dismukes]

What I believe you define as a fight, I believe I may define as spar.

Ideally for the development of a fighting art, you're going to have both. There's not always a 100% clear boundary between the two categories (sparring and fighting). Generally I use "sparring" for a training method where you get to practice your technique under the pressure of someone trying to defeat your technique, but the primary aim is to learn and make sure everyone goes home in one piece and can show up to training the next day. I use "fighting" to describe an activity where you are trying to win and the methods for doing so include hurting the opponent, knocking them out, strangling them into unconsciousness, etc.

If you do just fighting all the time, then almost everyone ends up broken and you don't have anyone to train with.

If you just spar and no one in the school or the larger community of the art takes it to the level of actual fighting, then you run the risk of starting to rely on methods that seem to work in lower intensity sparring but that turn out to be unreliable when someone is going all out trying to really hurt you.

When I was younger I loved challenging other Tai Chi folks to a “fight”, no push hands, no gloves, a “fight”. My secret hope was that one of them would best me handily and prove me wrong. Very few would accept, and as far as someone handling me like my teachers, It never happened. My teachers could do it nearly effortlessly. I am not at that level, and it is possible I never will be, but I know it is possible because I experienced it. If I showed a video of it, would that experience somehow transfer to the viewer? If not, does that mean it doesn’t exist?

I absolutely believe that there are Tai Chi practitioners who can fight well, although they may be vanishingly rare these days. What I doubt is that there are Tai Chi practitioners who can fight well and haven't put the time in actually sparring and fighting.

Ramsey Dewey tells the story of how he (as a 30-something professional fighter) got his *** kicked by a seventy-something Tai Chi master, Yu Dao Shui. But he goes on to say that Yu Dao Shui spent a lot of time sparring and fighting before he even learned Tai Chi, and then continued to do so after he became a Tai Chi practitioner. If your instructors were at the level you describe, I suspect they also had sparring and/or fighting experience.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

The problem you get when you get to the 20th generation of the Chen family is they are starting to use Sanda/Sanshou in application. So applications of postures done by the 19th generation and prior generations can be different

That wouldn't surprise me. Most arts evolve and change over the course of the generations. I'm willing to bet that if you could go back in time and take video of the 12th generation Chen family they would be even more different from the 19th generation than the 19th is from the 20th.

That doesn't mean it isn't Tai Chi though. Unless we're heading into "no true Scotsman" territory where everybody starts to claim that the way they learned Tai Chi is the only real Tai Chi.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

Why Taiji people rarely talk about kick?