Strength vs Size

When it comes to fighting and practically everything else in this world - size matters. At least so it seems. The bigger the better. Case in point: Tanks are cool. Huge rock on engagement ring is cool. Big piece of steak for dinner - totally cool. Brock Lesnar - scary big and doing pretty well in the UFC.

But guess what? Just because you're big, doesn't necessarily mean you're strong. This concept is well known in the olympic lifting world. Here, where strength counts, these guys can lift massive amounts of weight but they aren't big guys nor do they look like your typical Mr. Universe. You see, when you lift weights for strength, the rep range for an exercise is tailored so that it maximizes your neural connection to lift strong rather than increase muscle size. When you lift for size, however, the rep range is different and it minimizes that neural connection but allows for increasing the muscle cells in your biceps, chest, etc.

So to us average wing tsun folk - what does this mean? Well it means not all is lost when you face that big muscular foe in front of you. It also means you don't need to rely only on speed, agility and timing..you can add strength to that list as well. In the WT world, however, i think this "strength" is more understood as "rootedness" and "structure". The rootedness and structure also translates to powerful, heavy attacks.

That "structure" or "rootedness" is really an example of how our wing tsun training establishes those neural connections so that we can be "strong" (felt that way by the attacker) from such an upright position. All that chi-sao, lat-sao under heavy pressures and light pressures are stimulating that neural connection..making us..well stronger. And because the training reflects the actions we use to fight, we are strong where it counts - punching, chops to the throat, neck grabs etc..but maybe not when bench pressing.

That said, because we are so "strong"...us WT'ers are susceptible to being "stiff"..it's not the conventional stiffness that most newbies suffer from when learning WT. Instead, we're caught flat footed many a times and this might get us in trouble. That's where footwork comes back into your training scheme...

Things sure come full circle doesn't it? First stiff, then weak, then strong again, then stiff, then mobile, etc etc.

Until then.

Demos

One of the things that wing chun gets a bad rap for is its excessive use of demonstrations. Wing Tsun, in particular, has a plethora of demos you can watch - just youtube it. Some are really good, some are mediocre and some are..well..not so great.

I think it's easy for student to get caught in the confusion that your demonstration is a reflection of skill. The guy you're hitting is co-operating with you, so don't be fooled in thinking that because your opponent flops over that a real-life attacker will do the same.

THAT SAID, I do believe that demonstrations do have its place as a training tool for the wing tsun student. The rush of adrenaline, that tingling feeling in your finger tips...these are all physiological reactions that can somewhat simulate the fight environment. What this allows for is more freedom of expression of YOUR wing tsun under those edgy/nervous conditions, while still being controlled with a relatively co-operative partner. This can also reveal where you fall behind on...perhaps too stiff, perhaps your own attacks bounce off the opponent, you slip on to the floor - anything can happen. But how do you react after? ..especially with an audience, a camera or two?

Also important, demonstrations should show the FUN of learning wing tsun. you don't always have to be a bad ass. The audience knows this is just a demo, not a fight. So i say have some fun with that, keep them entertained. But hey, there's nothing wrong with bad-ass demos either.

One thing though - no slow poke demos. Those are boring and really don't elicit excitement, nor is it believable to the audience that the moves work. i'd rather see a guy blast through his attacker with simple chain punches then some snail-paced complicated elbow and finger striking sequence.

If you've never participated in one, I say try it. If you spar all the time, your body gets used to that environment and the adrenaline/nervousness rush decreases. Through yourself into a demo environment with a huge audience, and it gets that fire going again.

But of course, skill in demonstrations does not necessarily translate to skill on the street.

Until then.