Are you fit for kung fu?

My Si-Fu has given me the opportunity to run class Monday night. It will deviate from the normal format of chi-sao, self-defense application and take a more fitness slant: creating a fitness foundation for the students, making them sweat and get those muscles moving on a cardiovascular level.

The goal here is simply to provide the class an intense workout with a WT perspective. In formats like these, you don't neccessarily learn a lot of new techniques or cool moves, but it focuses on the one or two things you can do and turns it up a notch.

I've done similar classes before and it's a blend of WT with workouts i've had to do in previous kung fu and karate classes, as well as some things I've picked up on own fitness journey.

With all the many technical details involved in wing tsun, chi-sao, drills, etc., sometimes it's hard to work up a sweat. Well guess what folks, it's sweatin' time.

Until then.

Step 1

Wing Tsun and other kung fu styles, for that matter, when placed in a free-fight situation looks incredibly “static” or “stiff” in nature. Probably because it is. What do I mean by static? Well, beyond the fancy hand positions and low, one-legged stances, there’s just something so “un-Mohammed Ali”…it’s like they fight in postures..while the typical western boxer does not fight in posture and instead fights freely, naturally…as if they do what they want to do. While, the kung fu fighter, on the other hand seems restricted or bound to the hand positions, the body positions, of their teacher’s word.

“Head up, back straight, punches down the centre-line, weight on the back leg!”.

All inducive of a static fighter, don’t you think?

While for western boxing…

“Chin down, shoulders rolled, put your weight into it!”

They are like polar opposites!

How did we go from that…to that!? We are all human at the end of the day. We are all bound by the biological and physical natures of this world, and yet the fighting schemes are so different. You’d think we’d all converge to a certain way of moving the body…the best way…in order to fight, that capitalizes on the advantages of the human body and minimizes the disadvantages.

This is probably why many go running to the muay thai, boxing, MMA style of fighting. It’s natural, intuitive and mobile. While the wing chun fighter pictured in your mind is this guy trying to hop on one leg and rabbit punch you to death.

But guess what? The styles do converge…eventually. The problem is that most people don’t get that far to see that being the case. Wing tsun should be applied on a mobile sense, adding weight to the punch, become natural and smooth. It doesn’t even look like wing tsun anymore (..whatever it’s supposed to look like).

Many are stuck in the realm of chi-sao. Can’t blame them. There’s lots to explore there and it’s a lot of fun. But that’s just one side of the dice. And when they only see one side, they only play one side. But it makes sense. The realm of chi-sao favours the game of punches down the centre-line, keeping the back straight, and with rather “dead” legs. It’s meant to teach one stage of fighting, expand on certain ideas. But eventually, we have to take what we need to get out of chi-sao and toss it into the fighting context. There, things must adjust to the new variables. The stance has to be mobile, punches better be powerful to KNOCK OUT the opponent (not tap the guy on the chest), the whole body has to be able to move towards the opponent, evade attacks, take advantage of openings – I’m not even talking about “trapping” (egh..i hate that word.).

If you can’t get in, how can you even think of applying your “crazy chi-sao skills”. The chi-sao realm sucks us wing tsun practitioners in and we forget that in order to even THINK about using any of your cool chi-sao moves (if at all), you need to know how to bridge (aka, getting to your opponent).

It’s like an art in itself. Not as fun as chi-sao though. But it’s step 1.

Until then.