question about training time

[txwingchun]

I 've heard different stories about the amount of time on trains on Sim li Tao(pardon the spelling) before going onto Chum Kiu. I'm not in any rush to learn those right away I know it takes time and I'll be practicing those the rest of my life. I would like to know what other Sifu's methods are. Since i'm a new WC student i'm curious and would like to clear up some of the myths. I remember reading some where that Yip Man's students practiced SLT for one year and CK for 4 years be fore progressing.

[EmptyCup]

Learning Siu Leem Tao for 1 year is definitely too long for most students. I'm talking about students who try the form at least once or twice a day and not the one's who only practice when they get to class :) Because there are some people who have learned for four years where I go who still don't know Siu Leem Tao properly yet!!! :) And they are, like in second black level.

The form itself should be a little more challenging than learning Chum Kiu and Biu Tze because it is the beginning form and the foundation of your Wing Chun later on. Therefore it is important not to rush the learning as it will only ruin your hands and give you bad habits and form. But once you learn it properly, your foundation is "set" and the other two forms are much easier to pick up.

It shouldn't take longer than 6 months to learn it properly. Chum Kiu for four years is definitely too much. However, I'm just going on how long it takes to adequately learn the forms well, and not the pacing of the teaching. By this I mean the teacher might not want to teach the forms so fast but space them out and teach othere things in-between. Wing Chun only has three forms so if your learn all three within one year what are you going to do later?

Most teachers teach Chum Kiu after Chi Sao is taught and Biu Tze after free-fighting is taught. The dummy and weapons are usually reserved for last. That's because the more complicated the set, the more foundation is needed to learn it well. Many beginners are too eager to cram in as much information as possible before they even do any well and as a result, develop bad habits which are hard to break later on...

hope this helped somewhat but I just woke up and am still half-asleep :)

btw, Yip Man only taught a handful the whole system so the reason for his teaching so slowly is because he didn't want to teach period. He had to teach for money because the Japanese took it all away during WWII and he had no choice. Otherwise Wing Chun would never had spread so much. Many martial arts teachers in HK taught like that...dragging the teaching on as long as possible. White Eyebrow's Cheung Lai Chuen taught lke that, same with Hung Gar sifus and even nowadays, Tai Chi teachers only teach the slow form and not the combat applications. Hope that explains some things...

[weakstudent]

sil lim tao form (small idea) is the basic form that with out it you can really never progress to the other two forms. i mean its the basics, and my sifu said that without the basics how good can you really become?(you would never reach your full skill level without them)


nelson