Wing Chun - an overview of its training methods and effectiveness.

[Red Rum]

Yet more contradictions from the pro Wing Chun folks.

Not at all. Wing chun is known as a street fighting art (nicknamed the street fighting art of Hong Kong)
Yet, you wouldn't say that an art like say BJJ is only for sport use would you?
BJJ has realistic (street worthy) applications, just as wing chun has less realistic applications (ie meditation, non-combat techniques).
But every wing chun school is different.
Personally, I prefer to train in a realistic manner (ie forms and chi sao are useful, but you aren't going to wish you'd done more chi sao when you are facing an ugly brute in some dark alley)

[Thai Bri]

You miss my point. In the blue corner we have the Wing Chun were the forms are absolutely esssential tools in order to learn this devastating art..... Now? In the red corner? Well my oh my..... they're there for mediation, and not self defence. All these different schools..... and all these different, contradictory, interpretations.

It's a bit like the abstract art world. A few squiggles here and there have all kinds of underlying meanings.... Every so often someone sneaky bastage submits a picture created by a 6 year old, and all the experts tell us how inciteful the work is.

That Wing Chun Empereror is as naked as he ever was.

[bodhisattva]

I train in turning style and have been a student for more than five years nows. Every school of Wing Chun is different. My belief, is maybe you didn't have such a great Sifu. We don't do forms in my school, primarily for the reasons stated - but then Sil Lim Tao is more like moving meditation that is practiced for a number of reasons, self defense not being one of them. It's not Karate. If you really don't have a good school, drop out and try something else. Personally, I'd love to find a good teacher of Bak Mei where I live, but for now, I've got a good teacher of Wing Chun so I'm not killing myself looking....

Good luck.

If a martial art is not for "self defense" then how is it martial?

[bodhisattva]

You miss my point. In the blue corner we have the Wing Chun were the forms are absolutely esssential tools in order to learn this devastating art..... Now? In the red corner? Well my oh my..... they're there for mediation, and not self defence. All these different schools..... and all these different, contradictory, interpretations.

It's a bit like the abstract art world. A few squiggles here and there have all kinds of underlying meanings.... Every so often someone sneaky bastage submits a picture created by a 6 year old, and all the experts tell us how inciteful the work is.

That Wing Chun Empereror is as naked as he ever was.

Can we make it the Wing Chun Empress?

I like that image more.

If she's nekkid.

[Thai Bri]

Deal!

It's Ng Mui in the Nude. Those Nun's man.... they're hot!

[Red Rum]

[QUOTE=Thai Bri;289177]You miss my point. In the blue corner we have the Wing Chun were the forms are absolutely esssential tools in order to learn this devastating art..... Now? In the red corner? Well my oh my..... they're there for mediation, and not self defence. All these different schools..... and all these different, contradictory, interpretations.

It's a bit like the abstract art world. A few squiggles here and there have all kinds of underlying meanings.... Every so often someone sneaky bastage submits a picture created by a 6 year old, and all the experts tell us how inciteful the work is.
QUOTE]

Yeah I see what your saying. My belief is that a martial art is wing chun if it sticks to the four main principles (centre line, economy of motion, etc).
These principles are nothing new and not strictly limited to just wing chun, but most arts don't use them all at once

I think the trouble in wing chun is that so many people are concerned with lineage that they forget about what works and doesn't work

Kevin Chan learnt under Sam Kwok, but then went to Ip Chun to learn. So people always list him as a Sam Kwok student even though he learnt it direct from some very good people. Yet I have learnt more from him in a few years then I have under any other martial arts instructor

Why? Because he doesn't try to make his students believe that every move in wing chun works
He explains what works and doesn't work. Forms are explained as a tool to use for training, but not the main lifeblood of wing chun. You could still do wing chun without the forms, although formwork makes the training more interesting

And as for Bodi, who I am starting to doubt has done any martial art...
- A martial art does not have to be for combat. A lot of martial arts nowadays teach you about your own body rather than how to destroy someone elses. It doesn't make it rubbish, just different.
I am okay with that, provided that the school doesn't then palm it off as a fighting art

[jubaji]

Wing chun is known as a street fighting art

...by WC folks...

[Red Rum]

...by WC folks...

Fair comment. To be honest, I have only heard that wing chun is a street fighting art from chunners

It works for me in street confrontations and many others I know who train in kamon

I know that wing chun has the nickname 'The Street Fighting Art of Hong Kong' and Yip man had a reputation as a fighter, but I don't know where this has come from originally (ie it might be all from chunners)

Or maybe it was a statement to say that we don't deal in sport/competitions etc and only for self defence.
Oh well

[peppi]

I put my heart and soul into it and rarely missed a day. Even when there was no lesson I spent my time refining what I had been taught.

Great.

I have also now experienced many other fighting styles, including Karate, Japanese Jiu Jits, Grappling, Thai Boxing and Combatives.
As a police officer I have fought for real many times.

Again great.

here are now many versons of it but, for the most part, I believe that to be people merely trying to remarket the same core system in an attempt to
gain money.

You are partly right and partly not.

There are three main forms (or Katas for our Japanese stylists) in WC. I trained the first one only.

Actually the forms are six. To a large extend they illustrate principles.

Put it this way, Mike Tyson never needed Forms, and he got pretty effective.

Absolutely agree with you.

The basic punch held the fist vertical and relied on a lot of speed in delivery for power.

It relies on the support form the ground to deliver power.

They have Bil Jee (or "thrusting fingers") and it's use could be nullified by the grappler.

Especially in Bui Jee there are several counter-grappling concepts.

Stances are poor, with weight often on the back leg.

Old style western boxing adopts similar stance.

With the weight so far back, a good shove in the chest and over you'd go.

With a push form a slight angle the front stance can not hold it as well.

So moving around was almost like hopping.

Should be more like sliding.

Blocking and parrying was OK.

These are not exactly blocks but reactions to pressure.

WC Dummy - its rigid striking surface is useless for power generation.

The main concept of the dummy is different, though it helps to develop specific kind of power.

About chi sao and anti-grappling - there are programs for what you are addressing but not for beginners.

Kicks were rarely practiced, and never against a striking aid.

Kicks are trained on the wooden and tripoid dummy.

I won't even mention "sticky legs". It is too ridiculous.

It looks like you have not seen it done correctly.

Most of the training is done against thin air.

Indeed it should be with partners.

It was made worse by the "we are the best" attitude of many of the instructors.

Totally agree that this is not good. Sometimes they do it for the purpose of advertising.

Issues like awareness, avoidance, posturing, threat assessment etc etc etc. were not addressed one iota.

On some seminars I have attended exactly these issues were stressed.

bil jee (other ways to throw the fingers)

The concept of the biu jee is not at all to strike with finger jabs.


I understand very well your points.

While wing chun is ok it is a bit specific, and may be not suited for your body and mentality.


Greetings

[Wilks123]

I've only just started wing chun and so far it has been very helpful, it seems to make alot of sense and seems a very capable way of defending yourself. I have only been doing it for 2 months but in a year i feel i'd be a reasonably capable fighter, nothing special but capable.

It seems to me that you just attended a not very capable class, as alot of the issuses you raised about the training we actually do at my class like pad training and such. I have come across similar issues with other arts but i assume it's just the school teaching then the art itself.

[Red Rum]

Wilks, what school do you train at?

Its an amazing the different ways one martial art can be trained. Such a fascinating world full of different ideas and points of view

There is room for traditionalist who like the art of the style as oposed to the fighting side. There are the sport enthusiasts who enjoy competition whether as a point scoring spar or in full knockdown. There are the fitness fanatics who like to keep fit or learn how to move better. And finally there are the fighters who enjoy the hard self defence, realistic version of the art.

These lines often blur and it is nice to see that there are wing chun schools that cater for ALL the above.

It is very hard to satisfy everyone and the more you try to satisfy one student, the more you alienate the other

The best thing is to decide what you want to teach, be honest about what you teach and go for it.

There is no point teaching traditional stuff and then claiming it to be the ultimate fighting style. First of all you attract the wrong type of person. And then you embarass yourself when one of your students gets beaten up in a fight!

[Durete]

Meh a load of pages long...
I've read a few of em,

Any fighting art is very effective in real fights,
Karate(especially Okinawan/Gojo Ryu), Wing chun(the myth goes it's created to beat strength with weakness, hard with soft, shaolin Kung Fu with the fighting arts designed by an women for herself, named after her student, wing chun, aswell as several other kung fu style's. than not to speak about boxing, muay thai etc.

each art is just as deadly.
An old classmate of me was an boxer, he won vs 8 people when they tried to rape his sister in some club. (afterwards his leg was broken by one of the bouncers aswell as he got waited up on after the club+stabbed 6 times with a knife.)

I've never seen an wing chun guy fight in real, I saw boxers , kickboxers and karate dudes kick asses of multiple dudes vs them alone.
This doesn't mean that it's not usable ofcourse.
It does exactly what it's created for: beating an hard low stance fighting style where load of power was delivered in.

About the training I think everything should be trained just as equal,
forms are important, improving technique's in the air is important, practising them on easy targets on hard targets, and on an sparring partner.
both with full speed, full strength and somewhere in between of them two so you can find your perfect balance for what and when you want to do it.
also balance drills and awareness/reaction speed should be trained.

with that in mind any fighting arts can be an very effective art for street fights etc.

Btw: saw some dudes making fun of meditation.

I believe meditation makes you stronger,
but hey go ahaid laugh,

the fool will allways laugh at the wise man's words.

To understand it all there is only one way: go back with your mind to the enviroment and society as back than.
Kung fu isn't just an fighting art, it's an way of living.
An way to have an balanced life.
as several old teachers said:

"without budhism there is no Kung Fu" this simply meant that kung fu was a part of their normal living, aswell as part of everything, and therefor everything has an part in Kung Fu, both physically as mentally, and you train the mental side by meditation."


Wing Chun was a bit different though: it was created(following the chinese story's) to revenge the death of friends in the shaolin temple by killing the ones that defected and betrayed them.
It was an woman who was this and shaolin Kung Fu was mostly strong movements, full power in almost every movement of it.
an woman can simply never win from an strong, well trained man if they have the same fighting style, strength vs strength, the stronger person will obviously win.
therefor she created an own style, developped by her student who was called Wing Chun. an soft style to defeat the hard style.
Water that defeat rocks.

so will wing chun also defeat the strong styles of now, aka boxing/kick boxing etc, since it's sole root-purpose is to defeat the harder styles.

[Red Rum]

At the end of the day simple stuff works. If you can strike hard and strike fast you will do well generally.

The thing is that some martial arts are more geared to a certain thing. Boxing is a sport, yet if a boxer hits a guy in a street fight he will knock them out (or hurt them)
BJJ is a sport, but most of the grappling (clinchwork) can be used very effectively in a streetfight

Wing chun is more geared to being a street art, because the strikes are designed to hurt, not point score. It can be used as a sport (chi sao tournaments etc), but generally it is an art that suffers if rules hinder it.
When I fought in mixed martial art tournaments it was a struggle because I had to adapt my elbows into forearm barges. My fak saos were illegal. My stamp kicks were illegal. I couldn't use bil sao attacks even to bridge because they were deemed as an attempted finger strike
Because of the gloves, it limited close quarter striking power (because you couldn't release the energy.

So I had to use wing chun in a different way in those tournaments (ie using the energy, clichwork and sensitivity to complement my kickboxing/BJJ)

[Bjjexpertise@be]

"Hit fast, hit hard, hit often."
-Geoff Thompson in regards to street fighting.

Good quote.

[fetuso]

I'm a newbye, so I'll not comment about the superiority of an art over another, even if I have my ideas on that.

BUT, that somebody can seriously believe that a 14 yo boy can beat an adult boxer champion... If that was not intended as a jest, I'm totally aghast... Of course, the adult champ tried to hurt the boy right? Cuz you try to hurt your partner in a friendly sparring right? Especially if u are a adult, a champ and your partner is a boy (with all the legal and career consequences that the champ would have had if he, even by mistake, had hurt the boy). So, OF COURSE, the adult champ didn't try to control and restrain himself, right? Then, I can believe the boy was very quick and the champ was surprised by that. But, in a real thing, I have almost no doubts that everything would have been over in seconds. I see 'almost' because it even may be that Elvis has really been kidnapped by the Aliens.

I'm sorry to say that, but many times I've found myself discussing with TMA fans, I noticed a refusal to be in touch with reality which is almost incredible, like if they want to live in the world of Mortal Kombat or Jet Li and no amount or reasoning and evidence can budge them. Well, it's not my business to change their beliefs, but one can't always leave outrageous statements unaswered.