Internal fighters sparring matches! tell your story!

[Kristoffer]

Im interested in hearing how you as a Internal practioner, what you did in a sparring match. What tecnique you used etc.. Did you lose? Did you win? How long had you trained your internal style?

[miscjinx]

The last time I sparred it was with someone who had 20 years or so experience...mostly Kung fu (praying mantis) and some russian system I never heard the name. His favorite style was the russian, but he knew Mantis the best.

I had 6 years of martial arts experience, mostly Yang Style Tai Chi, some Chen Style, some Aikido, and a little Okinawan Kempo Karate (where I learned pressure points). I learned old style Yang through a student of Erle Montaigue. Erle also works with pressure points.

We started with chi sou and quickly when to medium speed/light-medium contact sparring. We sparred for a while until both of us were getting winded and were bruised enough.

In summary, he quickly gave up the russian system for Mantis, the one he knew best. He at first would pull me in (where tai chi is nastiest, but he didn't know) and quickly tried to keep me at a distance thereafter. He tried a number of locks or entanglements, but I used chi na and plucks to grab muscle groups and tendons. In a real fight, I would have done a fajing to rip the muscle/tendon. He said I was very sensative, so it was difficult for him to get in on me (I thought I had a bad day and could hardly feel him). I also wasn't using my center properly, so I was limiting my options for attack and acting more external at times. He was too well defended so I never got a punch to connect other than (point) strikes to the arms; I think I could have gotten something in if I used my center properly. I've been working on making sure I use my center properly and my sensitivity every since.

In the end, I guess it was a draw - although I think I hit more vitals. I had a wrenched couple fingers on one hand that took a couple weeks to heal and he had a sore neck for a week from when I accidentally plucked too hard. We both had various bruises, both from attempting limb distructions on each other and missing. The most valuable things I used was sticking/adhering, chi na/plucks, and pressure points. They saved me more than once in close quarters standing grappling. As I couldn't get a punch in, all I could think of where plucks and pressure points.

I considered the experience a success. And a confidence booster. A 6-year holds his ground against a 20-year. The experience pointed out several problems and weak areas I have. It has been many months since and I will be trying to spar with this guy again. Actually that was the first time I sparred at medium speed free-style sparring, I had always done slow or step sparring (only so many punches/attacks).

[Kristoffer]

Thank you!
I enjoy reading about other martial artist learning and advancing in their system of choice.
If you spar him again, I would love too hear about it.

[Felipe Bido]

I had practiced Choy Li Fut for 4 years before I started Hsing I Chuan. I use to gather all my ex CLF classmates at my home, to practice and spar.

A few months ago, a guy came to visit. He practiced Judo, and wanted to have a sparring session with one of my friends. I think he was good (My friend don't have a fighting spirit and always stepped back to the guy's attacks), and dominated my friend easily. Then, one of my Hsing-I students asked me to spar with the guy. We don't practice friendly sparring, and we don't wear any protection at all; I said "Hi" and stood in front of him. He tried to grab me, and I half-stepped back, and hit the guy in the head. He looked at me in a weird way and tried to grab me again. I stepped to the side, grabbed him by the neck and kick him in the knee joint. The last thing I remember exactly was that he tried to do some sort of double leg takedown (I don't think he was very good at it), and I stepped back, and hit him with a "single wing" (A hammer fist downwards, with the backside of the fist) in the back. He tripped and ended with his head between my legs. I fell, and his head hit the floor.

We ended the fight after that in a friendly way, and we are very good friends since.

[Felipe Bido]

I haven't lost a fight since I began to understand the principles of Hsing-I (And the fights here in the island can be pretty nasty). But I know I've been lucky.

[CD Lee]

Filipe:

Have you had different successes against less trained fighters using your Xingyi, verses Xingyi against trained fighters?

I am expecially curious how successful you were closing the distance, breaking through their guard, and unleashing Xingi's powerful punches.

Also, how have you been able to stay on your feet closing against a good fighter?

-Love to hear your experiences

[Kristoffer]

Martial arts are the coolest there is!! :D
Like when in Shuai Shiao,, trying to get a hold on the otherone. And when that perfect throw comes :D Simply magic

[Felipe Bido]

In my short experience I've noted a few things:

---Fighters with little experience and training attack you in a wide, circular fashion, with most of the body gates exposed, and little balance. This is very useful for a straight, fast style like xingyi, that gives you plenty of time and space to enter their range and attack them. If you are the one attacking, usually they lost focus when you attack their guard (remember the Xingyi principle that says: "First, break his defenses and then break him).

In my few fights with non-trained people, I've noticed there's no need to "unleash the powerful Xingyi punches", or attack them until they're down. Generally when you hit them the first time, they get frozen (something like trying to stop the shocking power circling through their bodies) and they don't want to keep on fighting...or they lose their balance and fall to the ground.

---Trained fighters are a whole different thing :eek: ...In my case, I am a short guy (5'6), so I have to rely on speed and attacks to vital points. In my case, stepping back and having little balance when fighting a trained individual is a deadly mistake. I have to go in, attacking at all times, and stepping into the opponent's legs, to make him lose balance.

If my memory is good, I've been on the ground only twice; the one I described, and another time, in which I got to grab the head of the guy and slip a few Beng Quans (Crushing fists) to his ears.

I haven't as much experiences in fighting as a lot of people in this board, but my experiences have been valuable to my overall knowledge. In Dominican Republic there's not such thing as suing someone because of a fight, we don't use protection, and most times you don't know anything about the guy you will fight. So, many times a simple "sparring" ends in a bloody mess.-

[Pawa-eri-to]

Well this is more a story of me getting my ass kicked then me using tai chi against someone. For one I have very little experience with tai chi. Anyways, I was at a tai chi class and the instructer was explaining how tai chi could be used as a martial art. He asked me to come the the front of the class (I was about his size and I had the most martial arts experience out of the group.) When I got up there he told me to punch him, so I did. The first thing he did was yeild to the force and turn on his center line (was like hitting a sheet hung out to dry) then he redirected it and I fell a good 6 feet away. He showed a bunch of other uses for taichi takedown, chin na, and throws. It was pretty cool.

[lowsweep]

Has anyone ever fought a (western) boxer? I am very interested in comparing boxing to internal styles, especially xingi.

[Kristoffer]

I've sparred a boxer but never a internalist. So I cant compare. Boxers have alot of different styles so u cant really say that a boxer fights this way,, or that way. It's all up to the person. The ones Ive met are really fast

[Kristoffer]

keep `em coming

[taijiquan_student]

I have only fought one boxer, and he was very fast and had some power. He was just starting taiji, but had done boxing previously, so he came once to our sanshou class. He was good, and held his own against the students well, although he became winded quicker than most. He got schooled by the senior student.

I hadn't been doing sanshou for very long when he came, and had done very very little free sparring, so I wish now I could do it again and see how it goes. I actually did o.k. though. I did a couple good deflections, and one time hit him in the face, although by accident I kind of poked his eye lightly.

[Kristoffer]

We have one in my kwoon who has a previous boxing history but he tends to never empty his cup spo too speak. He's great with his hands, good boxer.. But he has now come too realise that he must spend more time learning the tecniques. Certanly the kicking :)
Anyway he taught me some boxing and that is great fun.

[Chris McKinley]

Especially when I used to kickbox, I've fought against a variety of styles, including boxing. My instructor was PKA World Champ Tommy Williams who, as a former Golden Gloves guy, was very fond of including plenty of boxing training in our diet. I also feel it was responsible for much of the successes I had.

Even while I was competing fairly successfully in TKD/kickboxing though, my internal arts instructor could toy with me at will, which frustrated me to no end. Later, when I first got properly introduced to Aikido, the instructor tossed me around like a rag doll and made me look and feel like an uncoordinated clutz, even with a few black belts and several years of Taijiquan training behind me. This was on the first day I met him and it's also when I got really serious about developing my listening, yielding, folding, etc. skills.

In the years since, I've touched hands with hundreds of martial artists of various backgrounds and unfortunately, the most consistently disappointing of all, on average, were those who claimed to be fellow internal artists. Over 99% of these have been Taiji stylists, and nearly that percentage were of the CMC lineage a few teachers removed. It's sad, because it seems so few of the ones I've met understand what the man was trying to teach, and have become far too imbalanced toward the Yin.

I haven't touched hands with nearly as many Baguazhang or Xing Yi people since there simply aren't as many of them in the U.S. Percentagewise, far more of them have shown some actual fighting ability, but to be fair I think that's just because those arts haven't had a chance to get completely watered down yet. Give it time LOL.

While I have certainly run into some scary players from all three of the internal sisters, every one of them has been the kind of martial artist that would have been formidable no matter what art they were studying. To me, it's just more evidence that you need both a good art AND good practitioners of it. Either one by itself isn't as good as the combo.