Wing Chun only train vs. Wing Chun?

[fa_jing]

Paraphrased Quote (PQ): Augustine Fong -
Wing chun should only train vs. wing chun. If not, you play other person's game. Train to play your own game, make your opponent play your game.

PQ: my old Cheung Style Sifu: Wing Chun is so superior to all other styles, you should always train vs. wing chun. They present the most difficulty, so you should train against the best. Any other style will be easily defeated.

vs.

PQ: Ted Wong, Bruce Lee's second Student, my Sifu's JKD instructor: Wing chun suffers for only training wing chun. When a wing chun practioner fights against another style, they don't know what to do.

PQ: My sifu : Nobody fights by walking up to someone and touching hands. Yet, that's the first thing another Wing Chun practioner always wants to do when they meet you and find out you study WC. You have to learn to engage. What if your opponent doesn't put his hands up, how are you going to lop sau his lead arm? What if he dances around like a boxer? What if he fights low, or crouches? You have to learn to make the necessary adjustments. You must have power, you must sting the opponent so they won't walk all over you. You've got to have your punches, you've got to have your kicks, none of this pitty-pat stuff. The best thing you can do is train against a wrestler, or against a boxer, etc.

ME: WC vs. WC is good if you want to flow in a drill. Otherwise, I'd much rather spar against a different style. More fun, more realistic. Fortunately, my sifu, although expert in Wing Chun, often imitates other styles when we spar. I won't be surprised if I fight against another style.

Let the opinions fly!
-FJ

[straight blast]

Ted Wong is absolutely right. My soon-to-be Sifu trains sparring against a world champion Thai Boxer at his Thai Boxing gym. He's a lot more dangerous because of it.
Of course you should train against other styles. If you train only against Wing Chun, you'l be great against Wing Chun, but completely unprepared for anything else. It's just plain simple. If someone won'r spar against any style other than their own then they're afraid of something. A lot of "mighty" warriors have had their a** handed to them once they stepped outside their own comfy little kwoon.

"Pain is merely weakness leaving the body"

[Novox77]

I think the key word here is "train." I can see how it could be hard to train with a karate person, seeing as wing chun training comprises of mostly drills for wing chun. Putting aside the whole engagement, what would you do when you are in punching range? Well since the karateka doesn't chi sao, I suppose you could start chain punching. But that's not really training is it? However, you gain lots of experience engaging with practitioners of other martial arts. It is definitely to your benefit to test out your skills on other styles, but it's unrealistic to train with them. Then there's sparring. IMO, you don't spar with wing chun. If you pull your punches, then you're not doing wing chun. The intent is to nullify your opponent, so that he stops launching any offensive. I see sparring as a game of who can tag whom the most. While wing chun has drills that approach this type of sparring, there's always a contact reflex involved; not just free sparring.

So here you are, face to face with, let's say, a TKD person. You engage with him... and get clocked by a roundhouse kick. OK, now you know you'll need some more work on your engaging and get a better sense of distance and timing. Here, your "training" with the TKD guy will make you better.

Next, you encounter a wrestler/grappler. You engage, and before you have time to react, he's grabbed your frong leg and is shoving you back. You lose your balance and come crashing to the ground: his turf. A defeat, but definitely a learning experience. Now you know that you'll need to have a nice knee or gaun sau ready for a grappler.

I believe that wing chun is the most efficient martial art around, but that doesn't mean that a person training wing chun for 6 months can take on a expert TKD practitioner who's trained for 30 years. Wing Chun may give the practitioner an advantage, but by no means does it ensure a victory against other styles.

[Novox77]

To expand on my belief that you can't spar wing chun: Many times I find myself demonstrating the effectiveness of wing chun on a person who studies a different art. As this person is a guest at the school, my intention is not to hurt the person. So naturally, I have to pull my punches... usually by throwing the punch at full speed, but landing just shy of contact at a fragile location, such as the throat, or eye. More often than not, this person does not acknowledge that if I had let my fist fly unrestrained, they'd be in serious pain. So they would continue to attack in whatever fashion. The point I try to make to them is that the fight would have been over within the first 2 seconds, yet, they are trying to continue to fight. In my experience, grapplers are most likely to do this. Sure, you've managed to come in close and knock me to the floor. Only because you didn't acknowledge my knee to your face, or my elbow to the back of your neck. This is especially true if you have gloves and padding on. Now, I can actually knee the grappler in the head. But since he's got head gear on, he shakes it off and continues to attack.

In Wing Chun, we're fighting to win. That's why we aim for the nose, throat, groin, soft tissue, etc. We don't rely on a knockout punch, although it can be achieved through practice. Instead, we rely on a machine gun flurry of fairly hard punches. These are our primary advantages. What good is sparring when we do not employ these advantages, either in consideration of our opponent, or because the rules prevent such actions?

[whippinghand]

Do you guys actually believe that this discussion has anything to do with Wing Chun?

[Duncan]

We train against upper cuts, hooks, jabs, knees, grabs etc. Anything that we think might come up in a fight.

My favourite techniques seem to spring from very close quarters - which is difficult. A fast, short/tight hook from two feet away is pretty scary. Yet to work on techniques from the ground - but can't wait to give them a go.

Full whacks when padded up are also on the cards... ah, the joys of Wing Chun.

[jameswebsteruk]

If you disagree, maybe you would like to explain why it doesn't have anything to do with Wing Chun?

The chalice from the palace has the pellet with the poison,
The vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true!

[Steven T. Richards]

The trouble with just about ALL TCMA 'systems' is that they implicity train to fight against their own geometry/structure/energy etc. That isn't 'scientific' it isn't 'pressure testing - to failure point' in order to improve. Any 'thinkers' out there, try a 'thought experiment' (borowed from theoretical physics as a conceptual tool): design your own martial art - from scratch, based on human beings fighting against human beings: start with VERY basic principles do to with awareness and survival instincts. You might benefit from studying the psychology of perception, and, how psychologists have studied the effects of real-world military combat, and those factors that make information processing efficient - as in fighter pilots. Primary studies where done in WWII to see what made fighter aces better than the 'rest'. Maybe then consult with ethologists, primatologists and anthropologists to look at combat and fighting behaviour in primates and other species in the 'wild' - then, maybe think about a style as such. The result won't look very much like anything so artificailly 'cultural' as a TCMA.

Culture is an imporatnt thing - very human, but, sadly, so is mising the frickin point by being wrapped up the auto-suggestion of a closed peer or reference group that just happens to identify itself by ritualised movements and beliefs (styles).

BTW I'm by no means an advocate of post-modern Jeet-Kune-Do eclecticism, I have practiced TCMA for 36 years, but I've also studied 'other' things.

[chi-kwai]

With regard to your statement about acknowledging hits, I have seen this often and must agree. But to be realistic, it is simply a friendly demonstration. if the person is not capable of seeing your fak sao crush his trachea, or any other number of attacks that may have broken through his defenses, then allow him to continue thinking what he thinks. It certainly does not diminish your skill in any way.

--
chi kwai

[LEGEND]

Well if u train with CHEUNG group then u better watchout for the PROPAGANDA...here's my theory...if wing chun is sooooo superior...why not SPAR with the lesser style and see what happens??? Sure u won't be able to use the palm strikes to the groin or the BIL GEE strike to the eyes...but I'm sure the THAI boxers won't be trying to kill u with his elbows/forearms or headbutts either!

A

[CerberusXXL]

Wing Chun VS Wing Chun is great way to learn and to train.
However, the chances that you will fight someone who knows wing chun are pretty slim, so it's a must that you train or experience sparring with other styles to be a better rounded fighter.

[Bessho]

If wing chun is only good against wing chun then wahts so good about it?? Wing Chun is a fighting art. It was created to solve problems (fighting against other fighting systems). Train against other styles! The more experience you get the better. Other styles are great also.

[Novox77]

You are right; if they are dim witted or won't accept that I neutralized their attack, it's only to their disadvantage. However, it's for this very reason why I don't think sparring works well here. And the people who do acknowledge the hits will either: switch to wing chun because they see how kick-ass it is; or stop sparring because they get frustrated. So to reiterate: it's good to experience engaging with other styles of MA, but not too realistic to train with them.

[reysem]

When you have achieved a level of expertise in wing chun, I think you should spar with other styles. I recently sparred with a TKD and a boxer and the experience was an eye opener.

When sparring with a TKD, I find it a first difficult to bridge the gap. The TKD guy is very elusive because of his footwork. He sometimes hit me with a roundhouse kick if I'm not careful. After sometime, I got a feel of his timing and I was able to bridge the gap and established contact. Once contact is established, my chi sao training took over. I was able to trap him and hit him. His kicks are now useless in such a close range.

When I sparred with a boxer, we put on boxing gloves. I found out that with the gloves my techniques are limited. It is hard to grab and trap my opponent. I also find it hard to bridge the gap because he is elusive. It is more to my liking when he decides to fight toe to toe.

Sparring with other styles can give you a perspective of reality in combat.

[Steven T. Richards]

It's the biggest mistake you could ever make to simply train against your own styles geometry/structure/energy etc. Real fights just aren't like that and any 'style' that encourges it's practitioners to think that way is deeply flawed and misleading. Real world application is completely diferent from compliant school house games. It isn't the perogative of SOME WC people only, to make that error, it's common in TCMA of all Pai that I've witnessed and experienced over 35 years. thge ability to translate the informational code inherrant in a 'styles' principles and techniques is something far more refined and real world applicable than mistaking the end product for the base structure. To make these mistakes is similar to a geneticist mistaking DNA for its complex - interactive - expression, or perhaps more simply mistaking genotype for phenotype. There is a massive field of psychological suggestion and real world avoidance in many martial arts training systems. having the courage and the intelligence to amp-up into real deal application is a higher refinement typical of mastery in martial arts. Playing pati-cake in a school house and living vicariously thru other peoples fights real or imagined is simply a sad dispalcement activity - only a little short of a psychological delusion. Those who 'know' don't need telling, those who will (eventually) know won't be offended, those who never will know will simply over amp their ass.

[Tomhands]

Lee-Yin-Sing.
That was refreshing. If people understood this, though, there would be a lot of cyber-martial artists with a lot of free time on their hands. They could actually go train for a change.

[joy chaudhuri]

Some of the replies have creeping JKDisms in them(quoting Ted Wong etc).People with insufficient good wing chun training or background tend to do that- quite understandably so. No problem in trying out
your development against other styles. A good wing chun styilist with good wing chun training and skills
is an individualised and adjusts while still playing ones game. Wing chun is a very detailed and thought through system. Good and correct wing chun practice and chi sao and some experimental sparring when ready is a pretty good combination.
Chi sao is not just effective for chi sao... the
"radar" and automatic skills that you develop is helpful in knowing timing at any distance.... assuming that you have learned footwork, balance, mobility in wing chun (not jkd-drills)

[Steven T. Richards]

Bruce Lee was perhaps the first 'Post-Modern' martial artist - I say perhaps: as he was overly exposed media wise; there were others around the same period. Post-Modernity in MA is 'anti-form' without a sufficient understanding of 'form' in itself. As a counterforce to 'abstract form' it has its place within the MA as it has within broader art and culture. Post-Modernity eventually reduces itself to absurdity, and along the way starts to take on the 'form'of that which it set out to overcome. In JKD this has happened thru the emergence of 'styles' of JKD post-modern eclecticism - which themselves become fixed monistic systems every bit as rigid in dogma and practice as the traditional systems of the past.

JKD people do not have the monopoly on critical reflection or efficient causality in the development of the martial arts - as post-modernists they couldn't - could they...

[cha kuen]

My opinion

Train your wc for a long time. WC will work against other styles at close range. So you ask... what if he jabs and doesn't stick? Well if you're at short range, **** , YOU HIT HIM FIRST and hands will connect and you do your wing chun thing.

If you train wc and only fight wc, then you may be in danger when you're at a longer range. Thta's when you need to learn soem distance fighting. Some kickboxing or thai boxing would be good. Try maybe 6 months or a year of that to konw what it really feels like to fight long range, for real.

Then go back to your wc and train hard. Once every couple weeks, spar with a boxer friend to keep your long distance skills so that you still remember how to bridge teh gap and get into your range.

Done with. =]

[fa_jing]

Wing Chun, or any other complete MA system can handle all the requirements of a real fight, as well as being useful for sport applications with minor modifications. Key is the ability to handle fighters from another style. Thus the adequate wing chun school will train against a selection of techniques from a variety of systems. But, I ask you, how skilled is the person you are training against in the style he is supposed to be representing? Often it is a person with no training other than Wing Chun, supposedly immitating a boxing or wrestling move. This is not how a real boxer or wrestler will actually move. If your school happens to have a lot of students with extensive training in other styles, then you are lucky. Otherwise, it is necessary to either cross-train in another style yourself, or else seek out genuine practioners of the other styles, to train with. It is necessary to learn to be able to defeat a practioner of your own style - this alerts you to difficulties of your system that you must be aware of. In addition, only a fellow Wing Chun'er can easily perform certain drills with you. However, it is even more important to expose yourself to other methods of fighting.
I would love to have a training partner from another style with whom I could invent drills - me using wing chun moves and he using the moves of his style. -FJ

[whippinghand]

is not a good approach to training.

It is a deterrent of skill.