What's your training enviro like?

[Jeff Bussey]

In your classes, do you guys have a relaxed environment or a structured one?
Can people show up throughout the class to join in or once class starts is that it?
Is it very physically demanding? Like could you use it almost as a weight loss program while you train ving tsun?
Do people warm up on their own or do it as a class?
Care to share any warm ups?
Are there certain areas that you guys emphasize more than others?
Do you guys have a school or train out of your basement or garage?
_
Kinda the voyeur in me without looking
_
I'll start.
Our classes have start and stop times but the stop times aren't set in stone. If you show up late, you do some push ups but nothing big. A lot of times our classes go past the 2 hour mark and people will train as long as one of the instructors are there that can lock up.
Our warm up varies on who does it, some of them are more demanding than others but if we really want to get into shape it's something that we'd have to do outside of class. Mind you I'm usually full of sweat so it's fine for me plus I'd rather spend most of my limited time training ving tsun than doing a workout. I'll do that on my own time.
We've got a school and like I've said before that's a real sacrafice on my Sifu's part because there have been too many times that he's paid out of his pocket to teach us.

I'm really interested in hearing some warm ups that you guys do because I'm getting my house at the end of the month and I'm gonna have a basement to workout in finally. I can't wait. Plus we're expecting a baby girl in March so my attendance to class will probably be truncated if not comletely stopped for the first little while

l8r,

J

[t_niehoff]

Hi Jeff,

We are very informal (come when you want, leave when you want - though most everyone arrives and leaves at the same time) and break a typical training session into:

1) a warm-up (everyone does their own thing - jumping rope, stretching, shadow boxing, etc.);

2) a conditioning part (building good general fitness, with a focus on cardio, joint strength, core strength, punching/kicking, etc.);

3) a lesson part;

4) a fighting part (sparring drills or free-fighting).

The structure is organic, with the drills in the lesson often evolving into more of a fighting environment, or by someone interceding in the fighting to give pointers (so that it becomes a lesson).

We also have sessions that just involve fighting or just involve lessons.

Regards,

Terence

[sihing]

In my kwoon we are a commercial school, and offers lots of classes per week. Last month alone we performed over 180 classes (including private lessons). The basic structure of a typical evening would include 3 one hour classes, to which two of them will be skill type classes and one cardio/conditioning class.

Skills classes consist of anything the instructor wants to teach or drill but since most of these types of class are open to all students the instructor has to have a lesson plan for what will be taught for the varying levels represented in the class, although twice a week we do have just beginner classes and senior classes. It is formal and everybody warms-up following the instructor leading the class, but people can show up late and enter the class at anytime.

Cardio/conditioning classes represent the typical kickboxing type exercises, push-ups/sit-ups, stretching, running, focus pad work, bag work with kicking and punching combo drills, and sometimes old style Kung-fu drills like last night's Iron Broom training. The heart rate is up the whole class and people really love the affect it has on them after a while.

We allow personalized training sessions on one side of the room anytime the kwoon is open for business for those students that want to work on specific things with a partner, or those preparing for a grading with an instructor. Included with all students’ tuition programs are private lessons with any of the instructors that are available at the Academy, as we demand a high quality standard for our students and want them to understand thoroughly what they are learning in the classes offered.

James

[YongChun]

We run an informal class that lasts for two hours. Students are at all different levels and backgrounds. So we will have an Olympic caliber Judo guy, a wrestling champ, a guy with boxing background, an Aikido guy, a government worker who knows nothing, a small 12 year old girl, some University students who dabble around in Capoeira, Hung style, a Tai Chi guy, an Escrima guy and so on. We mix them altogether and everyone helps everyone.

People mostly arrive on time, if they are late, no big deal. People do a bit of their own warm up. We used to do a group warm up for maybe 5 minutes. The class starts with everyone doing the SLT form as a minimum. We do it relatively fast and leave the slow versions for people to do at home if they feel so inclined. We might or might not follow this with punching, stepping, kicking for a bit of exercise. Then we go to sticking hands where we do single sticking hands, the Lap sau exercise, rolling hands or Poon sau, then work on techniques, then go into freestyle Wing Chun technique and then for those who know what they are doing freestyle anything goes. After that we work on the distance part where we concentrate just on closing the distance. Then we mix it all together and try to apply what was learned in chi sau in the freestyle sparring session. That's kind of the most basic standard training model. During this practice question may arise and those can get turned into drills for people to analyze.

When we have a break, some people punch the sand bag hanging on a tree, or punch, kick and elbow some pads held by someone or snap the long pole up and down to try to beat some other person's record or play with the dummy.

If most people are at the same level in a class then we might go through all the forms once as a warm up exercise. So then we do the SLT, the CK and the BJ form and maybe the pole and knife if the group is small enough and they know that stuff. Other times we won't do any forms because some people hate forms and just want to do chi sau. Other people just like to do freestyle distance fighting.

With family commitments for some, cross training for others, and heavy study schedules for the University students, most people come only once a week, some people make it twice a week and the rare person comes three times a week.

What we do in class is determined by what kind of student mix shows up. I look at each person to figure out what they need to work on. Some people are too tense and so they have to work on that maybe by doing relaxed rolling. Some people haven't got a clue about distance fighting and are mentally very passive so I work on introducing them to sparring. Some people can't remember anything so I might work with them to introduce a few more movements on the dummy or whatever form they are working on. Some people like to learn the knife or pole so we work on that.

Over the years the student mix has been quite varied with fighters some years and non-fighters other years. The fighters liked tournaments or fought as part of their job with the police, as jail guards or as bouncing work. The non-fighters had no interest in competition and were happy with forms, drills and chi sau. So people like the comfort of drills and some people hate drills and just like to freestyle it. Some people just have no ideas and repeat the same movements over and over again and so these people maybe are introduced to some drills for ideas.

Over the years we have discarded most of the drills I learned and that we used to do and go more on a react to what is happening model with advice given on how they can improve their reactions by doing right thing at the right time. The students are very creative and put anything from anywhere into the mix (most of it doesn't work) while others are totally lacking in creativity and can only do very simple things. Each develops in their own way.

Sometimes for variety we work on knife attack and defence, which for the most part is random play unless someone has no ideas and then he is given a few ideas to try.

For us safety is a number one concern. So that takes precedence over total combat realism. It's up to the student if they want to go out and fight other styles and some who are capable go and do that. People over the age of 40 tend not to want to train such that they will get injured because they said injuries take a long time to heal, they have a family to support and they are doing it more for health and not to get injured. We had people from Kyokoshin Karate and Judo who juts got tired of the injuries received there and could no longer do that stuff.

Up here it's pretty peaceful so no one really does Wing Chun because they are scared they are going to get beat up by some gang the next day. Few people have an aggressive mental attitude except some of the past people who were into fighting as part of their livelihood. So the atmosphere is relaxed.

When I learned in the Wang Kiu lineage, the classes were about 4 or 5 hours long. The basic structure was warm up, form, just rolling only for 30 minutes then Lap sau, chi sau techniques and drills and the second half of the class spent on distance, knife, dummy, pole and last freestyle fighting. The emphasis was always on proper form, relaxed feeling, exact positioning, sharp techniques and doing the right thing at the right time, using the forms as a guide.

It seems the only person who really gets injured is myself when students can't control themselves. That's still rare though but when injury like wrist or shoulder occur it seems to last for 5 or 6 months. One injury forced me out of practice for 7 months and another for 2 years. A knee injury from Karate put an end to my useful kicking career. So that's why I am more cautious these days. It's just not worth it after a certain age.

We had one 15-year-old girl who managed to punch everyone in the mouth. Everyone could have done the same in return but they were nice and after figuring her out just employed more caution. She had only one speed fast and fast with no control or even an idea that control was a good idea. Mentally she was very aggressive. I misjudged her in Escrima stick fighting thinking she might control herself in a drill but she powered through a number one strike to my temple which I only blocked with 50% effort and so it went through to give me a bleeding head and black eye for two weeks. The damage could have been worse. After that I decided not to teach her that stuff for a while.

This girl brought another 15-year-old girlfriend, a rather large athletic girl to the class a few times. I was explaining about kicks to the knee. So I told her, I'll do something and you kick me in the shin or thigh but don't kick my knee. So then wham, she gives me a full force kick to my knee. Fortunately I had it at the right angle where no major damage was done. I told her "I thought I said don't kick me in my knee?" She said "Oh, I thought you said kick you in your knee?" I told her in real yes but for now I like my knee. The concept about control was foreign to these girls. For real fighting they had the right stuff and I didn’t totally want to kill that. However when teaching, liability is an issue and it’s the teacher’s responsibility to keep the environment safe.

[Jeff Bussey]

Hey guys,
Thanks for the responses so far.
What do you guys think about the stricter environments like in most Japanese martial arts schools?

I just find that alot of the clubs that are pretty relaxed seem to not have as high of an attendance or student numbers as the stricter ones.
I wonder if it's a perception that the visitor gets when they come into the kwoon.

Do you think that maybe the high turnover rate in some clubs could be due to lack of structure?

For example, we just did a demo last month and it's not something we do alot of and frankly I don't really care for them but being part of the club I go along with it. We literally threw it together during the practice run which was a couple of hours proir to the show.
Some of the new people were freaking out but I know that's how our club operates so you just have to go with the flow.
Can't help but smile sometimes


J

[sihing]

We have what you may call a strict/traditional club also, but it’s not militaristic. For example, when a new student joins I bring them through the etiquette list which lets them know what type of behavior is acceptable while in the kwoon, like Sifu is called Sifu in and out of the school, but I am called Sihing only while in the school or at a school function like a X-mas party.

When I teach class I'm a little more laid back, since I am of the Monkey sign in Chinese astrology, this is my nature, lol. But some of the instructors are a little more strict, but we tell them to not be so hard on the students and that having a little fun and laughter is a good way to mix things up a bit. People get enough of being bossed around at work so they don't need that at the Martial Arts school too.

Our turn over rate is low in our school as people enjoy the family atmosphere and realize the quality is very high and the prices are reasonable.


James

[KingMonkey]

Jeff, push ups for being late ? I'm always amazed when I hear this sort of thing in the context of an adult class that people are paying to train at.

What kind of grown adult with professional and family commitments who struggles to make a class and is paying for the privilege puts up with some jerk off telling them to do push ups just because they arrive 5 minutes late ?

Anyway to answer your last post I dont think you can generalize and say strict schools do better than more relaxed and vice versa.
There are too many other variables.

People stay if you're giving them what they want. As hard as it is for me to understand some people like the giving and receiving of minor punishments, belts/sashes and crisp sir sandwiches as part of the MA experience.

Does it stifle progress ?
Would definitely stifle mine.

[YongChun]

Originally posted by KingMonkey

1. What kind of grown adult with professional and family commitments who struggles to make a class and is paying for the privilege puts up with some jerk off telling them to do push ups just because they arrive 5 minutes late ?


2. People stay if you're giving them what they want.

1. I agree with that. That's maybe good for children.

2. It's the same as meetings at my work. If there are no free donuts and coffee then nobody comes.

Ray

[anerlich]

My academy prefers the term "professional" to "commercial".

Classes are one hour.

We have a group warmup; arguably making it part of the class is part of duty of care. People cannot join class after warmup is over unless they can come up with a suitably convincing or inventive story. I might let a person jump in late if there are odd numbers and they are doing partner drills, but not otherwise. It's correct to treat people like adults, but that works both ways, a sense of punctuality is expected in many areas of adult life. Do you expect the train to wait if you're running a bit late? With about 40 classes a week it's not like missing a single class is going to really hurt anybody. The students should make an effort to get to class, just as the instructors should make an effort to teach. Having people come in at all times is disruptive for the others. If your so-called adults act like spoiled brats or idiots they may get treated accordingly.

A sense of discipline and structure is necessary to keep the class focus and training intensity up. We don't run a boot camp either, but people are expected to follow the instructor's direction and not do things that would spoil the learning for others. This is a class, not a play group.

I don't really like people turning while class is on and training on their own at the back. Especially when their own skills could benefit considerably from the material covered in the class. I am even less impressed with people that run their private practice groups in class time, especially making noise with focus mitts, etc. while the instructor is trying to talk. (Never happens when MY instructor takes the class, only the rest of us). There's ample time for private and informal training at the academy outside class times. I usually strongly encourage such people to pack up and leave, and so far they always have.

That said, I'm really pretty friendly, caring and approachable. I encourage people to enjoy themseves. Retention rates indicate few people have problems with the way we run things.

[KingMonkey]

People cannot join class after warmup is over unless they can come up with a suitably convincing or inventive story. I might let a person jump in late if there are odd numbers and they are doing partner drills, but not otherwise. It's correct to treat people like adults, but that works both ways, a sense of punctuality is expected in many areas of adult life. Do you expect the train to wait if you're running a bit late?

A train isnt a good analogy here because if the train were to wait for you that would put lots of other people out, not the case if you miss the first five minutes of a class where the only person missing out is yourself.
A better analogy would be this.

I hire a contractor to work for an hour, pay in advance and due to unforeseen circumstances I dont arrive until 5 minutes after the start of the hour. He then scolds me for my tardiness, refuses to engage in the work I had hired him to do and then keeps the money.
Sound reasonable ?

A sense of discipline and structure is necessary to keep the class focus and training intensity up.

No not necessary.
The intensity in my current relaxed informal class is much higher than any previous MA class I've been to where there was more 'discipline and structure'.

That said, I'm really pretty friendly, caring and approachable.

Frankly you sound nuts........... still some people like that crap as I said previously.

[sihing]

Originally posted by anerlich
My academy prefers the term "professional" to "commercial".

Classes are one hour.

We have a group warmup; arguably making it part of the class is part of duty of care. People cannot join class after warmup is over unless they can come up with a suitably convincing or inventive story. I might let a person jump in late if there are odd numbers and they are doing partner drills, but not otherwise. It's correct to treat people like adults, but that works both ways, a sense of punctuality is expected in many areas of adult life. Do you expect the train to wait if you're running a bit late? With about 40 classes a week it's not like missing a single class is going to really hurt anybody. The students should make an effort to get to class, just as the instructors should make an effort to teach. Having people come in at all times is disruptive for the others. If your so-called adults act like spoiled brats or idiots they may get treated accordingly.

A sense of discipline and structure is necessary to keep the class focus and training intensity up. We don't run a boot camp either, but people are expected to follow the instructor's direction and not do things that would spoil the learning for others. This is a class, not a play group.

I don't really like people turning while class is on and training on their own at the back. Especially when their own skills could benefit considerably from the material covered in the class. I am even less impressed with people that run their private practice groups in class time, especially making noise with focus mitts, etc. while the instructor is trying to talk. (Never happens when MY instructor takes the class, only the rest of us). There's ample time for private and informal training at the academy outside class times. I usually strongly encourage such people to pack up and leave, and so far they always have.

That said, I'm really pretty friendly, caring and approachable. I encourage people to enjoy themseves. Retention rates indicate few people have problems with the way we run things.

Yes I like the word professional also. Commercial to me means profit making, and although I love to teach WC I don't believe there is anything wrong with making money at teaching it, as long as the quality of the teaching and transmission of the information to the students isn't affected and student concerns are being addressed then it is fine in my book.

With students being late, in Calgary it is sometimes necessary to be tolerant of it due to the lousy road system they have here, so when rush hour is on people do get late at times, especially in the winter months and bad driving conditions.

As for running two classes at a time, in our situation we have a barrier seperating the training floor, and when one is training on their own privately or with a partner, they have to do so quietly and not disturb the scheduled class in any way.

James

[Jeff Bussey]

Hey KingMonkey,

Jeff, push ups for being late ? I'm always amazed when I hear this sort of thing in the context of an adult class that people are paying to train at.

I don't see a problem with it.
It also doesn't stop anyone from being late. I don't think anyone is hurrying up to get to class so they don't have to do push ups. I guess we're lucky that no body at our school has complained about something as small as that. If someone protested it then I'm sure it wouldn't be a big deal, nobody has yet.

What kind of grown adult with professional and family commitments who struggles to make a class and is paying for the privilege puts up with some jerk off telling them to do push ups just because they arrive 5 minutes late ?

What's the big deal about a few push ups? I know you're not talking about doing push ups but about someone telling you to do something cause you're late. I use to go to a boxing gym and those guys were hard. If you don't want to work or want to be lazy, you might as well go home cuz you'd be wasting their time.

[anerlich]

"A better analogy would be this.

I hire a contractor to work for an hour, pay in advance and due to unforeseen circumstances I dont arrive until 5 minutes after the start of the hour. He then scolds me for my tardiness, refuses to engage in the work I had hired him to do and then keeps the money.
Sound reasonable ?"

No. I said they'd be let in if they had a reasonable excuse. And if other people that also engaged my service get their time disrupted for no good reason and the conditions of lateness were explained up front, then you lose. Don't like it? B*gger off!

"The intensity in my current relaxed informal class is much higher than any previous MA class I've been to where there was more 'discipline and structure'. "

Aren't you a lucky boy!

"Frankly you sound nuts........... still some people like that crap as I said previously."

And you sound like a charming young man, real diplomat material ... who deservedly got his butt kicked by an instructor somewhere due to his inability to deal with chronic tardiness.

[Ultimatewingchun]

I teach three classes a week - on three different days. A two hour class on Monday nights - a two hour class on Wednesday nights - and a three hour class on Saturday afternoons.

They are very formal: each class starts on time - beginning with a twenty minute warmup period...quite a bit of stretching exercises - followed by Hindu pushups, Hindu squats, situps, back bridges, concentration drills, and chi kung breathing exercises.

If someone comes late - they must do all of the above on their own before they can join the rest of us.

I only carry about a dozen students at the present time - though for many years it was anywhere from 20 to 40...but now I prefer smaller classes.

After the warmups - the Monday class begins with SLT and then becomes pretty much all chi sao...some kiu sao and some Wooden Dummy...but the major emphasis is chi sao and it's applications.

On Wednesday's - after the warmups...SLT...a short amount of time spent doing some punching and kicking drills...and then the class takes a very big turn - into standup fighting in the clinch...which includes elbow and knee strikes (as well as defenses against the same)...defenses against various grab-hold-and-hit scenarios...head controls and takedowns...duck-unders, arm-drags, under and overhooks - leading to various kinds of locks, takedowns and throws (as well as defenses against various attempted shoots, throws, and takedowns)...use of standing submissions - and how to transition from striking to clinching/standing locks/throws/takedowns...

defenses against various grappling moves like headlocks, bear hugs, chokes, arm locks, etc...and then wrestling on the ground...which includes positional controls, escapes, reversals, submissions, rips and strikes...(I teach Catch Wrestling).

The three hour Saturday class is almost all standup Wing Chun...after the warmups...some forms...footwork...punching and kicking drills (including using mitts, bags, and shields)...some chi sao drills...some kiu sao drills...followed by isolated combat techniques (what to do against this or that kind of punch, kick, or grab)...isolated drills meant to teach various attacks...differentiation drills against several different attacks without knowing which one is coming...into light and totally spontaneous sparring...into heavy contact sparring with protective gear.

Occasionally - Saturday light sparring will also include clinch, takedowns, groundfighting and submissions (without protective gear)...

And sometimes Saturday's also include unarmed defenses against weapons and/or multiple opponents.

Also...occasionally the Wing Chun Butterfly Swords and Dragon Pole are covered instead of contact sparring.

[SevenStar]

Originally posted by Jeff Bussey
In your classes, do you guys have a relaxed environment or a structured one?

I think you mean relaxed or formal... our environment is relaxed, but the curriculum is structured.

Can people show up throughout the class to join in or once class starts is that it?

you may show up at any time, but if you miss the warm up, you warm up on your own before you join the class.


Is it very physically demanding? Like could you use it almost as a weight loss program while you train ving tsun?

it's very demanding. a lot of us step in the ring, so we train accordingly. We do have a guy that dropped from 230 to 195 in about 4 months.

Do people warm up on their own or do it as a class?

as a class

Care to share any warm ups?

skipping rope, shadow boxing, medicine ball drills, footwork drills, skip knees, etc.

Are there certain areas that you guys emphasize more than others?

does this pertain to skill set, or conditioning?


Do you guys have a school or train out of your basement or garage?

school. we've got it in sections - the upstairs area is the carpeted, typical dojo-type area which is where the capoeira and kenpo classes are held. In the basement is the gym - we have tatamis in a big room for judo, aikido, thai and bjj, and out side of that area we have several heavy bags and a full size boxing ring. We are working on putting some weights down there. It's a pretty cool set up - basically a bunch of MA sharing and teaching out of the same building.