does ti work??????

[shaolin white crane]

plese help I have no acces to a taijiquan techer or one that has actual figthing expirience. Could some one tell how to train figthing, I practice yang style long form.

[Taoin]

Yes, taijiquan does work for fighting. It works very well as I have seen my teacher comfortably handle Muay Thai boxers, western boxers & Tae Kwon Do practitioners.

The only way it will work, though, is if you train Taijiquan as a martial art. Unfortunately, most teachers today only teach it as a form of gentle exercise---no different from a dance really. Even those who purport to teach it as a martial art, if they do not pay attention to stance & force training, you will still not gain the fighting abilities you are looking for.

This isn't something you can learn from a book, video or e-mail. You absolutely need a good teacher who will train you in Taijiquan rather than tai-chi dance.

While you are looking for a teacher though, you CAN practice a lot of standing meditation which will not only increase your overall health if done correctly, but also increase the power of your movements. In fact, if you want to train in Taijiquan for combat, you should do at LEAST as much standing meditation as you do form practice.

I don't practice Yang-style, but it does occur to me that you might take some inspiration from the patriarch of your style Yang, Lu-chan. Yang reportedly practiced only one or two movements from the form a thousand times a day and would use thes movements to defeat his opponents. He was also heavy into standing meditation from what I understand.

Anyway, hope this helps you in some small way.

The thorn defends the rose, and only harms those who would steal the blossoms.

[TheBigToad]

Taoin made a great point. Form alon, more so where the internal arts are concerned is nothing in the great schem of things. Taijiquan for the most part is an art of moving stillness. A posture is born and comes to maturity its power manifested and then in it's death flow into the rebirth and a new postures and the cycle continues.
Its when you examine each posture on an individual basis and and perform the same posture over and over and hold that same posture in long standing exercises is when you train the mind/intent to bring a relaxed and vital strength into it.

-Kevin

The circle will always be, but you alone decides when it starts and where it ends.

[shaolin white crane]

First of all, thank you for your valuable comments, I have been a shaolin practicioner for about four years (very litle time) and have only recently started lerning tai-chi, the only problem is that it has been thought to me like you say, like a dance and not a fighting art. I have nou joined a kickboxing class and found mi tai-chi chuan to be ineffective. One of you both says that his master has fought this tipe of fighter wiht succes. Could you comment on the situation, how he acted? what move he used?. So i could get some pointer in his aproach to fighting.

Thank you
He who conquers other, has power
He who conquers itself knows the way
Lao tzu

[Taoin]

The sparring match between my teacher & the Muay Thai fighter was almost 2 years ago, so I really can't give you a very good blow by blow of the match. It was actually a pretty friendly encounter. Two of the advanced students at my school had trained in Muay Thai before switching to Taijiquan and the Muay Thai fighter who stopped by our school had known them both from previous training.

Essentially, the Muay Thai guy could not believe anyone would switch to Taijiquan and wanted to test himself against our teacher. A friendly match was then agreed upon.

Again, I can't give you a complete description given the fact this took place almost 2 years ago & the action took place at a very high rate of speed. One thing I did notice was that my teacher remained very calm & composed, almost distant or non-chalant during the whole encounter. I can give you this illustration: atone point the Muay Thay boxer managed to get a partial grip on my teacher's shoulder & raised his knee to strie him in the ribs (by that time, the action had gotten rather heated). My teacher raised his left knee against the inner side of the attacking leg and simultaneously moved his upper arms against the Muay Tai fighter's elbows to dislodge the grip. He then ended up bouncing the MT fighter up against a wall.

That is the only "technique" I can clearly remember at this point. I also remeber being impressed at how he variously fended off attacks with open hand parries while at other times he only guarded his face while allowing himself to be struck several times with no ill effect. My Grandmaster & Great-Grandmaster also developed the aility to absorb punishing blows with no negative consequences, so I suppose I should not have been too surprised.

Again, I understand my teacher and advanced students have successfully handled exponents from other fighting styles---some I've seen others I only know about second-hand.

Again, you cannot learn any of this from a video or e-mail. You must find a teacher who will teach you Taijiquan as the combat art it was meant to be. Easier said than done.

Hope this is of some help to you.
*****************************************

"The thorn defends the rose, and only harms those who would steal the blossoms."