Chi Sau and How We Learn

[Wayfaring]

I just read the below breakdown on the process to develop fighting skills, and consider it to be very good. We have been having a lot of discussion lately surrounding the flagship drill of WCK - chi sau, reviewing of chi sau clips and expression surrounding their applicability to developing fight skills or not. Questions have been coming up surrounding what might be necessary to supplement chi sau with and for what duration to develop real fight skills.

Now the reality of this is that for the average businessman, chi sau is a great comfort level. You can get a little hands on, and you are never in a great deal of danger. The average businessman may have real apprehension about live free fighting represented by sparring.

So what are your thoughts on the below writeup that describes a pattern for how to develop fight skills and chi sau?

I'm more starting a conversation here, not criticizing youtube clips or needing to prove a point. Maybe some have done this, some are curious, and some have strong opinions. All good. I'm mostly interested in what everyone does with chi sau along the below lines...


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When we break it down, there are FOUR Steps:

1 - Observation

Before we can learn something we must observe it. This usually occurs when your instructor begins to demonstrate a new technique. From the spectator view, you gain an idea of what is supposed to be done.

2 - Practice

After having the idea, you begin to practice the technique. Practice is slow and clumsy at first, because you have to think your way through the technique. Through practice you gain a better understanding of the technique, but you still are missing key points.

3 - Drilling

It is when you begin drilling that you build your skill level. When you are drilling, you are not thinking. You are performing the technique at 100% intensity. Your drilling will not be perfect since you lack perfect expertise. However, you will gain enhance proficiency through drilling.

4- Sparring

Sparring is one of the key elements in the learning process. It is the equivalent of a grade school test. It will provide you with valuable feedback. You will learn what works and what doesn't. Certain parts of your technique may have been executed poorly, and sparring will reveal that to you.

This is NOT a checklist - it is a cycle.

You will many repetitions of periods of observation, practice, drilling and sparring before you master a technique in the following fashion:

1 - The feedback you gain from sparring gets plugged in to your observation step
You observe what mistake you made during sparring.

2 - After acknowledging the error, you practice to correct the mistake that was made.

3 - You use drilling to retrain your instincts and develop proper technique

4 - You spar and see what feedback you gain, which restarts the cycle.

You will also know what steps you need to follow to perfect your technique.

[Alan Orr]

I just read the below breakdown on the process to develop fighting skills, and consider it to be very good. We have been having a lot of discussion lately surrounding the flagship drill of WCK - chi sau, reviewing of chi sau clips and expression surrounding their applicability to developing fight skills or not. Questions have been coming up surrounding what might be necessary to supplement chi sau with and for what duration to develop real fight skills.

Now the reality of this is that for the average businessman, chi sau is a great comfort level. You can get a little hands on, and you are never in a great deal of danger. The average businessman may have real apprehension about live free fighting represented by sparring.

So what are your thoughts on the below writeup that describes a pattern for how to develop fight skills and chi sau?

I'm more starting a conversation here, not criticizing youtube clips or needing to prove a point. Maybe some have done this, some are curious, and some have strong opinions. All good. I'm mostly interested in what everyone does with chi sau along the below lines...


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When we break it down, there are FOUR Steps:

1 - Observation

Before we can learn something we must observe it. This usually occurs when your instructor begins to demonstrate a new technique. From the spectator view, you gain an idea of what is supposed to be done.

2 - Practice

After having the idea, you begin to practice the technique. Practice is slow and clumsy at first, because you have to think your way through the technique. Through practice you gain a better understanding of the technique, but you still are missing key points.

3 - Drilling

It is when you begin drilling that you build your skill level. When you are drilling, you are not thinking. You are performing the technique at 100% intensity. Your drilling will not be perfect since you lack perfect expertise. However, you will gain enhance proficiency through drilling.

4- Sparring

Sparring is one of the key elements in the learning process. It is the equivalent of a grade school test. It will provide you with valuable feedback. You will learn what works and what doesn't. Certain parts of your technique may have been executed poorly, and sparring will reveal that to you.

This is NOT a checklist - it is a cycle.

You will many repetitions of periods of observation, practice, drilling and sparring before you master a technique in the following fashion:

1 - The feedback you gain from sparring gets plugged in to your observation step
You observe what mistake you made during sparring.

2 - After acknowledging the error, you practice to correct the mistake that was made.

3 - You use drilling to retrain your instincts and develop proper technique

4 - You spar and see what feedback you gain, which restarts the cycle.

You will also know what steps you need to follow to perfect your technique.


Yes this is good.

You can also apply the same model to sparring as well. You can drill a sparing application and then play to make it work and build it to more live sparring.

[Hendrik]

I think to develop the engine before chi sau or sparing is a must .otherwise one has no based.

In traditional Chinese martial art, the Kung and the fatt, or the engine and application are like the two wings of the bird. Missing one will go not far.


In modern era, people ignore the Kung and thinking application is all. But not aware that when application called for Kung or engine to support, there is no support.

For example, chisau of WCK, if one doesn't have the engine to play with momentum, one cannot stick. In the past, the level of chisau is based on how good can one stick, and neutralized , not how good cannot hit. We today can't do that type of stick, as describe in Gm Ipman article.


Only after the Kung or engine develop then the list four steps above make sense. Otherwise, it ultimately depend on the size of the body. As we can see from the current few chisau clips on different grandmasters and their junior . With Kung or engine, one can play, not neccesary win, but without it one cant even play with a bigger guy.

And also, the better ones Kung or engine develop the better one can play . Which is boosting the application and no engine but brute physical type of practice.

Thus, this is the reason I brought all 1850 kuen kuit up with the siu Lin Tau set. The aim is the engine development via the set. If structure and triangle geometry is good for stationary sustain, then the siu Lin tau set Practice is needed for develop the entire engine prepare for dynamic. And doing away the set is make the support void.

How can one do chisau , if one cannot perform the basic three chi sau function, recieve, issue, and stick? But these three functions need the support of the engine.

[k gledhill]

Wayfaring what do you think chi-sao is for, curious.

[Yoshiyahu]

Good Post...right on point....Way to go...i absolutely agree

[Wayfaring]

Wayfaring what do you think chi-sao is for, curious.

For when you earn it.

[k gledhill]

For when you earn it.

Huh ? I meant , why are you standing in a basic stance with arms touching?
lets start with Dan chi-sao, what are your thoughts on that ?

[Graham H]

For when you earn it.

Classic! :D:D:D:D:D

[Wayfaring]

Huh ? I meant , why are you standing in a basic stance with arms touching?
lets start with Dan chi-sao, what are your thoughts on that ?

WTF k. I started the thread with thoughts about it. How about you giving a turn at answering that question with your over 30 yrs of WCK?

Otherwise I might get the wrong impression that you are trying to hire me for privates....

[k gledhill]

:confused: okay no pressure, you dont want to reply, cool.

[k gledhill]

Classic! :D:D:D:D:D

:rolleyes:............

[Wayfaring]

:confused: okay no pressure, you dont want to reply, cool.

that's not it. what is it is that this is a discussion thread. in a discussion thread people discuss their views by participating. if you want to discuss views with me, present yours.

i have already presented one round of mine.

it is not an interrogation thread where you get to grill people and leave snarky comments.

so, what is your viewpoint on chi sau and how we learn?

[k gledhill]

that's not it. what is it is that this is a discussion thread. in a discussion thread people discuss their views by participating. if you want to discuss views with me, present yours.

i have already presented one round of mine.

it is not an interrogation thread where you get to grill people and leave snarky comments.

so, what is your viewpoint on chi sau and how we learn?

STFU Wayfaring. just kidding mate ; )

[k gledhill]

What is chi-sao ? A process of introducing the elbow into a striking concept we know as lin sil di da.
We take a striking idea of SLT and progressively introduce the requirements, elbows in, hands not used, relaxation for speed to generate force and change to a next technique.
Not to touch hands and sense intentions.
Dan chi-sao is introducing the elbows of jum sao and tan sao. An arm is like a dual edged sword/pole, capable of deflecting , using acute angles that also allow penetration of force if the intercepting line is weaker. If stronger the interception requires change, from who ? do we follow a hand back, stay with and angle, jut it, lop it ??? If step in to hit and the opponent moves at random angles do we hesitate to attack, end up too close to generate force, too far away, off balance..?

Not a feel fest of hands chasing hands. It encompasses a tactical trigger mechanism. When a certain action is made we respond tactically to make it intuitive rather than set -piece move seen so much in clips. The high level of reps conditions good elbow striking unity so we dont eat a fist as we attack. Positioning and angling are critical to make the system function. As mentioned in other threads, a slight angle, degree off line and its easy to hit people if you understand the centerline fighting theory.
Chi-sao is a way to learn to pat the stomach rub the head, like playing a piano ( i suck at it btw ) tempo, timing force of pressure has to be learned in a mutual exchange of skill development.

[Wayfaring]

lets start with Dan chi-sao, what are your thoughts on that ?

i'd say it is to start to introduce a beginner to develop elbow position and to sense energy on the bridge. single hand to simplify then double hand to start to introduce simultaneous action, referred to as lin sil di dar.

that's ip man though.

hfy has quite a different concept of chi sau and learning it. i started training that by first learning kiu sau and the specific drilling aspects of it in snt.

[Wayfaring]

STFU Wayfaring. just kidding mate ; )

ok so some snarky comments are fine as long as there is content too.

[k gledhill]

i'd say it is to start to introduce a beginner to develop elbow position and to sense energy on the bridge. single hand to simplify then double hand to start to introduce simultaneous action, referred to as lin sil di dar.

that's ip man though.

hfy has quite a different concept of chi sau and learning it. i started training that by first learning kiu sau and the specific drilling aspects of it in snt.

Elbows are brought into the center during the introduction of SLT , a multifaceted conceptual group of ideas based on a simple center-line/interception approach.


Lin sil di da can be achieved with one arm at a time, not two together , a common misconception and making a student rely on the idea of utilizing two of their own hands to the opponents 1 always....It also induces too much body rotation to engage the blocking arm with the incoming strike, rather than simply MOVING and ANGLING long before you got into a bad position leaving you chasing arms with one of yours and hitting with the other in parallel.....
The worst mistake students make is to over rotate. Why CK has to be trained , so we control our own force delivery so it doesnt spin us into counters.

[Lee Chiang Po]

Using Chi Sao properly and for what it is meant for it has many good purposes. Mainly, it does teach maintaining proper elbow position, How to use your hand techniques without over extending, and you can also learn to sense your opponents moves when bridged or in arm contact like wrestling and such. It is a drill where 1, 2 or even 3 men can develop these skills. However, it is not useful beyond that point and should eventually be shoved to the wayside.
It has become a game, a passtime in most schools to take up your time and money rather than being taught Wing Chun.
I have been a practitioner for somewhere near 57 years now. Or I started 57 years ago. In all this time, I have not met a single Wing Chun practitioner outside my own family members. I suggest you will not either unless you hang around WC schools. If you fight someone, he will not even know what it is. And Chi Sao will be something you will not be able to use. If you can not take him out within the first few moves he is going to be aware of your intent and take a defensive stance. You will then be faced with dealing with the possibility of getting that a$$ whipped. Just from what I gather from this forum, there are few schools and even fewer teachers that are quailified to teach good Wing Chun, and have all ended up with Chi Sao being their main end. It is no wonder it is not usable in the ring.

[Wayfaring]

Elbows are brought into the center during the introduction of SLT , a multifaceted conceptual group of ideas based on a simple center-line/interception approach.


Sure.



Lin sil di da can be achieved with one arm at a time, not two together , a common misconception and making a student rely on the idea of utilizing two of their own hands to the opponents 1 always....It also induces too much body rotation to engage the blocking arm with the incoming strike, rather than simply MOVING and ANGLING long before you got into a bad position leaving you chasing arms with one of yours and hitting with the other in parallel.....
The worst mistake students make is to over rotate. Why CK has to be trained , so we control our own force delivery so it doesnt spin us into counters.

Haven't heard your concept tied to the lin sil di da term before, however, yes in practical application a flanking position allows the bridge to be controlled by one hand. In HFY we tie many of these concepts to the word "jong", or pillar. For example, "mun jong" describes the range at which simultaneous offense/defense occurs.