Nothing New

[Lews]

1.) I would like to say hello and Happy New Year to all

2.) Are there any speed drills that any of you think would increase my overall speed.
-I do my chain punches
-I know everything takes time (before some body replies with that)

3.)Also can I ask on the average when some of you noticied improvement with yourself (1st year, 6 mos., etc)

4.) Have any of you gotten to the point where your chis sao skills leveled off and you were not improving and if so what did you do.


Good Day Brothers

[TjD]

what do you need speed for? sticking to the wing chun principles will give you more speed than speed drills will.

if your chi sau skills level off, you've just reached a plateau. you'll find something one day that will open up all new doors for you and thatll be the end of that :D

as to improvement, i almost always notice some improvement after every training session

[Lews]

Ok this is how I view the speed thing I see people all the time (Ed from windycitywingchun.com) and the guy is quick and I know that being relaxed time and repitition will help but, I also know that there are other things that I could do to speed up for example the chain punch

[kj]

There are means of increasing speed other than what can be accomplished through movements that are over-committal.

By over-committal, I am referring to those things that, when we are so anxious or insistent to achieve them, make it increasingly difficult to make changes at any miniscule point in time. When we are greedy or insistent to do this or that particular thing, it generally interferes with our ability to sense and "listen" to everything that is happening for optimal response.

Speed, in my way of practice, is borne from working toward achieving and maintaining proper positioning, and improving sensitivity and responsiveness (differentiated from reactivity). These, combined with appropriate settling of mind and body, are the factors I see as most important for developing speed for Wing Chun.

We have a saying about this ... "It doesn't matter who is faster; what matters is who gets there first."

YMMV.

Regards,
- Kathy Jo

[EnterTheWhip]

It's all in the hips.

[yuanfen]

Lews

Ok this is how I view the speed thing I see people all the time (Ed from windycitywingchun.com) and the guy is quick
-----------------------------------
Part of "Ed's" quickness IMO comes from doing/practicing the motions correctly.
Speed is contextual- like many other things.

[AndrewP]

Well, Ed is quick because 1. he's been doing it for a few years (8-10), 2. he's had a couple good teachers, 3. he practices, 4. he listens critically to what people say and see what applies to himself. He correctly boasts that he's seen and touched several famous wing chun people at seminars. I've chi saoed with him dozens of times during the last half of 2000 as he and others were teaching me to chi sao.

I've seen a video with Steve Lee Swift who's extremely fast (met him in 1986) but can't get anything over Yip chun who used structure, feeling, and sensitivity to cut Swift off so quickly that Swift couldn't even start any agressive motion with Yip Chun.

IMHO speed is tertiary to structure and feeling developed through chi sao. Once bridge contact is made you can slow a person down with bridge contact and/or just wait to find an opening or make an opening to strike. Once a clear opening is felt your direct path to strike will almost always be quicker than your partner/opponent's path to defend. That's why proper chi sao is soooo important. Once you get some of the muscle memory trained, and get the correct springy pressure of the elbow aligned in the right direction, and have the correct body and arm structure aligned then your arms become so alive and so quick that you cannot think of any move but your arms and body are doing it. Only people who have better relaxation and practice with the above criteria will be superior to you.

There's one caveat: you defeat yourself by overmuscling. Once you over muscle - that's it - the end. It's just wrestling and techniques and not structure and feeling. Structure and feeling with the bridges favors a woman more than a man (at least that's my experience). Speed will come with structure and feeling. Structure and feeling DOES NOT come from speed.

That's also the reason, if you cannot strike immediately, that you want bridge contact immediately. Because after much practice once contact is made the chi sao conditioning takes over to your advantage. Don't wait or stay in kicking range, make bridge contact. Tan, bong, fook are blocks with out clashing. They control and divert. That's the advantage over the stronger, faster, and younger, and heavier without wing chun. This is not abosolute but wing chun concepts compensate superior fire power with superior evasion and targeting. With chi sao skill you don't have to be struck by hurricane you can enter the eye where there is relative safety if your smart about it. You walk out of the eye you die. You don't move with the eye you die. You don't repsect the force you die.

Forget speed. It's only an intended result. Don't seek it. It will come. Go for structure, feeling, practice and timing. Then speed will be a result.

KJ is right: "It doesn't matter who is faster; what matters is who gets there first."

AndrewP

[Martial Joe]

2.) I say just stick with the basics.Don't think about trying to move fast, infact, move very slow and relaxed when your doing air punching and chi sau...experiment.

Just remember to stay very relaxed...keep them sholders down and ralaxed!

Stick to this and you will see your speed and power coming along.

3.)Back when I was actually training, i'd have to say about everytime I practiced. Looking back on training I could tell a decent difference about every week, but that might be because im a biginer.

4.) nope.

[hunt1]

SHadowbox-start slow with simple combinations and focus on stance and mechanics. Over time good speed will come.

[black and blue]

I felt, during my 1st year of WC, that I made reasonable improvements every 3 or 4 months. (Others pointed out the improvements :) ).

But as I near my 2nd complete year in WC I've noticed my progess is much slower, despite my training more/harder, and becoming even more enthusiastic.

Perhaps the next move forward will be a big one? :( I hope so ;)

[jesper]

Lews remember that there are two kinds of speed.

Actual speed of movement and perceived speed of movement.

The first is a natural born talent, which really cant be changed all that much, although constant, hard training can improve your speed some.
The other is more important and can be improved vastly by training.

So what is perceived speed;
Look at yourself in the mirror when you do your punches and kicks. Are there ANY indignations that you are about to strike, eye movements, shouldershrug etc. These must be removed.

Another thing is that you really should look hard at when and where you usually perform your attacks. Are you striking from distance away, where your opponent might expect, from blind spots etc.
Knowing when, where and how to strike is more important than being fast

[TjD]

the problem with doing set combinations of things to improve speed is that whlie you get faster doing those set combinations, this is not the type of speed good wing chun uses. good speed is partially the ability to redirect where we are going at any moment, and explode on contact when we have a good hit - not be commited to our combination.

if you want good wing chun speed, practice your forms, do lots of chi sau