For everyone who actually trains...

[Martial Joe]

I want everyone who trains quite a bit tell me what they do when they train.

I want you to tell me all the little things you do and how you do them...
...I am sure this wil bring some descussion to this almost dead forum...

NOTE:Dave dont lock this this is a serious post.

[This message was edited by Sihing73 on 07-29-01 at 07:18 PM.]

[Martial Joe]

Anyways...thanks man...

[cho]

I train whenever I have free time and feel like it. I don't have a schedule or routine because I can't stick to it.

what I do varies depending on what I feel like doing, but almost always I'll do 45 min. to an hour of chain punching straight.
I mostly drill what I do in class by myself. from what I've seen it's these repetitions that makes a big difference.
I have a heavy bag, but I only use that for kicks.
other than that, it's the usual leg lifts, push ups, crunches and squats. I don't use weights. my teacher said it restricts chi.f

[weakstudent]

well i dont know very much but i train according to what i learnt in my classes before moving
i jog for 3min , then do about 50 squats ,
i do sil lim tao once then practice the four gates,blocking, then blocks with punches,thats all i really know but i try to practice everyday.
but now i'm really making a effort to do some wing chun everymoment i'm not doing something else

nelson

[wingchunwsl]

in class, i do sil lum tao, qwan sao, tan da, biu da, etc. then, i do the stepping and punching and the moving tan da. after, i practice single hand chi sau by myself and do double hand chi sau stuff. i do kicking somewhere in between too and go back and do whatever is needed later.

hey joe, i get to stay. my friend's now taking me during sunday classes. :p talk to you guys later.

[Martial Joe]

That is good to here...


I should have added what do you guys do at home alone and in class?

[cho]

at my school, most of the class are beginners, so they mostly do drills on techniques in SLT. The advanced students do chi sau. only after my teacher thinks we've done well at these stages will we actually do sparring. or actually sparring occurs occasionally, when my teacher wants to know how much we've learned.

one thing I forgot to mention about my home training, practicing the SLT. I normally just practice to remember, I don't see it as really training. Forms are the textbook, the drills and sparring are the practice books.m

[Ish]

at my class we start with half an hour doing forms then do lots of chain punching, turning punches, turning tan da etc then lots of kicking and stepping. Then we do all the basic blocks in pairs and different applications for each the finish off with dan chi, lap sau and chi sau.
We also sometimes do a bit of sparing if a few people want too.

[jameswebsteruk]

Everyone goes through all the forms they know. Then more forms for the beginners. Everyone else, chisao, chisao, chisao, until the end of the lesson.

Then chisao some more. :)

"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running
around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music." ;)

[Big Vern]

my personal training revolves around 3-4 runs per week, stamina and shuttles.
forms every day. weights all supersets, on major muscle groups only.
bagwork and wooden man training 2 times a week.
chi-sau sections and free 2 times a week and sparring when ever i can.
my students follow the same class breakdown at every class:
warm up
forms 15 mins
applications 15 mins
spar drills 15 mins
pad work grades 1-4 or chi-sau grades 5 - black badge 15 mins
and 15-20 mins free sparring for everyone
warm down. go home or grab a beer.
and by the way weights do not inhibit chi flow.
my chi-gung advisor is a retired power lifter.
Big Vern. hit like a rhino, sleep like a sloth.

[Gandolf269]

In class, we start with SLT, then break into groups depending on skill levels. Since I'm a newbie we usually will do advancing steps, lead arm defences, kicks, and forms/applications. Then we do lat sao training with our senior students.
At home, I start SLT, then I try to practice what I have learned and been practicing in class to reinforce the muscle memory, then I end the session with 500-1000 chain punches.

____________
'...and China is still serving rice in Tibet!'

[JasBourne]

well, there's training in the kwoon and training at home. In the kwoon, I do whatever the teacher tells me to do, knowing it is appropriate and necessary for my level of instruction.

At home, I usually do the forms, punching and kicking on the bag, and lots of stretching and balance exercises (mostly while I'm watching TV). Basically, I try to walk through my day and look at everything I do to see if there is an opportunity to better my body. Like, I'll bike to the store instead of driving. I'll walk up starirs instead of taking the elevator. When I'm hanging outside on a break, I will stretch some. etc etc. I'm getting pretty good at suggesting weekend things to my friends that involve some kind of physical activity. :D

[Martial Joe]

Frank Exchange~That sounds like some classic hong kong training there...thats good to hear!


Cho~ "I don't see it as really training. Forms are the textbook, the drills and sparring are the practice books"


Forms are everything from my prespective.I know how you say that you only do them to remember the movements,but there is way more to them then that.

You need to think about your body more,aswell as your footwork.When you do SLT you train your stance,when you train CK you train to move your stance that was once stationary.There is a term in the prespective of Chum Kui called bridging the gap...well it isnt only the gap between you and the opponant,it is the gap between you and the ground.

Now to Bui Jee...
...BJ teaches you to get out of emergencies,when your in positions such as being off balance ,up rooted,or out of position.Now sure you may look at it as being just some moves and now you know them so now you drill them...nono it isnt that way,you have to train train train all the forms,but in the Bui Jee form you are teaching your ma(stance) to be able to move in odd positions.And that is why it is the most advanced of the open hand forms,mainly because it is the hardest to preform.

But personaly I think that SLT is the most important.You train it all in that one...
It may be simple but you can be alot better at your wing chun if you can just stick to those forms.

Joe Kaveyhttp://www.stopstart.fsnet.co.uk/smilie/lolup.gif

[Martial Joe]

Is this wushu or wing chun? :D

[Martial Joe]

that wushu wing chun thing was to Jas by the way...

[jameswebsteruk]

Hey Joe.

Yep, the last few times weve been to Hong Kong, I was pleasantly surprised to see we train in the same informal manner. Particularly at the VT Association in Kowloon.


Agree with you about SLT. Definitely the foundation, the dictionary, upon which all things are built. :)

"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running
around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music." ;)

[JasBourne]

Martial Joe: wing chun, wiseguy :p

Think about it for a sec - I have to use the natural advantages of my physiology. I will rarely if ever be stronger than my attacker, so I must be faster and more accurate. To have speed and accuracy I must have excellent body control. And to have excellent body control I must have a lot of flexibility, endurance and balance. So, I keep very limber and I do things that build up my endurance and balance.

If I can stand on one leg, kick the crap out of your knees with the other while chainpunching the beejezus out of your face with my fists and still have enough wind left to sprint like hell once your butt touches the ground, I get out alive and I win.

Plus, being limber means its tough as heck to get a jointlock on me, just ask the guys when we train chin na ;)

[harry_the_monk]

Just like to say about the limber thing... I do yoga as well as wing chun, and the guys really can't joint lock me that well either...
There's something to be said for flexibility :D
Peace...

[Martial Joe]

Guys stop I am going to start stretching in my computer chair...

http://www.stopstart.fsnet.co.uk/smilie/lolup.gif IXIJoe KaveyIXIhttp://www.stopstart.fsnet.co.uk/smilie/lolup.gif

[martialdoulos]

Hey there,

I train daily, and my training is serious, and normally solo. I don't know how much benefit I can be to you without more specifics, as I am a JKD and JJ man, really. However, there are many parallels to Wing Chun, so I'll give you some general principles:

1. I cannot overstate the importance of supplemental training, such as running, weights, calisthenics, and stretching. Such training regimes are what separates the world champion kickboxers, boxers, karate men, etc, from the rest of martial art-dom.

2. Simplify your technique body. Reduce the number of techniques you train, otherwise you cannot achieve any depth with what you have.

3. Work a technique, tactic, etc (or 2), for several consecutive sessions before switching to something else. Press toward depth in your technical/tactical ability

4. Train for speed in movement. Work on relaxation and explosiveness for more speed.

5. Work in front of a mirror. Check your telegraphing, check your head and neck position, hip alignment, fluidity, etc -- and remember to retract all blows quickly.

6. Train for power. Hit a combination of targets -- not just one. Hit a heavy bag, a wall bag, a punching post (or mook jong), focus mitts, and just air. Any one of these alone will either lead to limited power (eg. air), or limited speed (eg. heavy bag).

7. Shadow box. Shadow boxing is more than just hitting the air -- its either
a. forms practice
b. visualization training

Hope some of this is helpful. Feel free to emailmbarsotti@ara-sa.com

[TzuChan]

Well I'm a beginner at WT (1 month now) and what I do is repeat the moves I already know for the first form Sil Nim Tao, so that's just drilling and trying to remember. Then I do couple of chain punches just to get the technique good (not quantity but quality) and study my steps (how to move forward) that's basically it. Ow and for my own personal "pleasure" I practice to be able to do a full split, just to be more flexible cause it has been some time that I haven't done sports.
And my horse stance I practice while showering :D

Wing Chun is h o l l y

[Sharky]

you need to do more than 2 chain punches. try 2000. then do some more.

My anus is superior™

[Ars vitae]

Flexibility is a good thing, personally it's allowed me to avoid getting trapped while crosstraining with other arts and continuous focusing on a technique is essential, so that it becomes instinctive. Training normally involves for me 20 minutes to go over forms together, before breaking off and focusing on the forms individually. Afterthat it's whatever Sifu or si-hings decide need focusing on at the time, so it's kept pretty informal. After about an hour we go through the forms again, before some exercises to warm down. :)

[Martial Joe]

What do you guys think about doing each form 10 times a day,then some stepping then some punching on the wall bag and then more footwork...and maybe even ocationaly fighting????

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[chessGMwannabe]

my regime underwent many changes when I moved out of the town that my kwoon was in. fortunately I was able to get private lessons by an instructor that I already knew a little bit and greatly respect, :) fair change if you ask me. the quality of my instruction has risen greatly because of that, not that I had anything to complain about before, but the one on one instruction time REALLY helps. the difference that this made to my home practice, was that rather than going to kung fu and practicing my kung fu twice a week, I go once a week and cram all kinds of great new stuff in and it's mostly up to me to do the bulk of my stuff. we don't do any of the solo drills and chain punching and footwork drills that I used to do at class. now I go and BOOM chum kui. work on that, and when that's done, you guessed it frank exchange, chisao :D , which I think is a blast! so then I go home and this is what I try to do:

morning--
set the alarm half an hour early, hit the snooze a while, fast shower. and then use the extra fifteen minutes to do gan lik. then, after my extra fifteen minutes are used, go through slt and chum kui. rub some dit da jow in while I get ready, eat breakfast, etc. (it smells yummy :) ) show up to school five minutes late, but no one really cares because at seven in the morning the professor isn't even awake yet.

day--
get back home a little before noon. lunch. slt, ck, ddj. leave to work.

night--
my most sporadic, but somehow this is when the bulk of my real training gets done. ranges from 1/2 - 1 1/2 hours from 5:00 to 12:00 pm. here of course I start out with the forms I know, dit da jow and some hand conditioning with rice bags, 100-2000 chain punches, hand drills from slt: tan da's, gan das, pak da's, etc., footwork/ balancing drills, chinese slaps, basically anything that I remembered doing at the kwoon, practice my chisao strcutres in the air, lap sao drills in the air, sometimes up to an hour of gan lik. (often I'll tanrish the WC by busting out the chaks for eye hand coordination, muscular developement, muscle memmory, for fun, besides, my family and friends get a kick out of watching me cause they think I'm bed and they don't get much out of watching my forms and stuff that really matter ;) , but I've noticed that it can tense up my shoulders, so I've started to do fak sau's to heop loosen myself up afterwards)I basically do whatever I can think of that seems to help my kung fu. now you're saying how does he do all of that in half an hour, I don't. I'll never have two nights in a week that are even close to eachother ;)

the reason that I started to practice three times per day is because I heard that you should apply the ddj that much for best results (which I've noticed). to be honest, I usually don't really practice all three times everyday, soemtimes I'll mush day and night into one session, or don't even bother getting up, or be lazy and go strait to sleep without any kung fu that night. but I'll almost always get at least two in, sometimes only one, but always some. and I've noticed that the quality of my training has been improved since I've been doing my forms so much because my body doesn't have time to forget the form by the next time I do it, like it was when I was only doing it every day (which was closer to twice a week with the way that I slack ;) ), so I get a much better sense of growth. so I hope that you find that interesting joe martial :p

frank exchange, have to say that I loved your pac man thing! :D

[jameswebsteruk]

Hey chessGMwannabe,

Nice post. I like the pacman quote too, Im a bit of an old-(and new) skool computer gamer, so I always check out the game sites before I hit the WC ones. Funny quote, actually from on of the original producers of Pacman.

Sounds like you have a punishing training schedule there. Are you still at school? Ah, the energy of youth... ;)

Agree about the private lesson thing, you can absorb so much more. One thing I have found really improves skill is to mix private lessons with classes (appreciate you may not be able to).

I find that against the instructor it is difficult to measure your own progress, but chisaoing against others of different skills and heights (very important) helps you realise what you have learnt. When your instructor has 30 years experience over you, your perfect pak sao seems like arse, but will work quite well against a lesser mortal ;) Ok, its find for the instructor to say you are improving, but you only really know when you can start hitting people more!

"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running
around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music." ;)

[Ish]

What do you guys think about doing each form 10 times a day,then some stepping then some punching on the wall bag and then more footwork...and maybe even ocationaly fighting????

I work during the day which limits my training time quite a lot. I only know the first form and the first two sections of the second for but just doing that ten times would take about four or five hours and an extra hour or two for stepping punching etc. I think i could probably manage it for the first day mabe even two, but every day? I think my arms would fall off.

[Martial Joe]

I planned on everyday...

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[chessGMwannabe]

FrankExchange,
I showed my sister that pacman quote and she almost bursted her splean laughing over it. WE were wondering where it came from, the original makers!
I definately agree that mixing the private and the lessons are great. and I love to go back to prescott and guage my skill against my classmates. I got my fourteen yearold brother into WC a while ago too so I always make him practice with me while I'm up there too. (lots of fun, because I wasn't ever really mean to my brother when he was a brat so here's the chance for payback :eek: )
I'm taking philosophy and history this summer and tomarrow is my last day. I just need to get off of the internet and type my papers :D
forms 10 times a day! each?! that's a lot, I usually end up doing it three to five, cause I'll keep doing them until I feel satisfied that I did something that resembles the form my instructors do:) but ten times would really get you good I guess. I'll try it, tomarrow :)