The downfall of Traditional Gung Fu

[David Jamieson]

cma guys?

man, you should visist some karate dojos, tkd do jangs etc etc and have a peep at some real martial arts fantasy camps.

for the most part, cma might like the jammies and such, but there are a lot more cma places that go without the jammies than there are nascar gi wearing jockstraps who are into speed bowing, kowtowing and gargling cultural nonsense outta their heads all day.

I see more goofiness in jma than in cma in my experience. and taekwondo schools are outta control with the military discipline lessons for 5 years olds. lol

[SevenStar]

So long as there are good sifus and good students, TCMA will survive.

so long as there are people who want to train for ANY reason, it will survive. that is why taiji for health is so popular.

And MMA guys do train different material then TCMA. TMA have different concepts, training, techniques, and purposes then MMA.

yeah - I saw the post you deleted...of course it's different, but the techniques and principles have similarities, naturally. No, there is no fu jow in mma as you stated, but there is yielding, borrowing, listeining, pushing, and pretty much every other energy you train in cma.

MMA is pretty much a style based on bits of Boxing, Greco-Roman wrestling, Muay Thai, BJJ, and maybe some Judo.

it's more than just "bits" - it's not uncommon for bjj guys to have extensive judo experience. IME, the coaches have decent experience in what they are teaching. If they don't, it shows when their students compete. Using our club as an example, nobody teaching has less than 8 years of experience in their respective style.

And I don't usually see them training those arts completely either (maybe with BJJ as an exception).

because you don't see them on a regular basis. I don't see cma guys sparring full contact much, but I am not around them on a regular basis either anymore.

I don't know about you, but I've never seen MMA guys condition their shins against banana trees like Muai Thai guys do.

they stopped doing that years ago. Thai camps use heavy bags - sometimes called bananna bags. that's really all you need. And do you know WHY it was the bananna tree that is used? because the bark of them is softer than other types. You would not see them kicking oaks or redwoods if they had them available.

The style of MMA was a response to a venue.

this is true. evolution. grapplers had to strike. strikers had to grapple.

2) They are all sport arts.

judo was used and taught in the military. muay thai was trained by soldiers as well. they are sport arts now, but have not always been.

That leads me to conclude that MMA, being a sport, drew from sport arts. And that the baggage of TCMA and TJMA (with the exception of Judo), and other TMAs, lead people to believe that it was all useless. When in reality, that baggage is not a true representation of the arts.

because they were already established and tested sports, they already had training protocols and had already been competition tested.

Now that MMA is here, I think it’s being successfully marketed and going mainstream. And with that, anti-TMA sentiment will continue to grow.

and as it grows, so will the resentment it gets from TMAs.

[SevenStar]

the only think sifu dino ever did was drill basic punches, kicks. but never any applications, never any kind of drills except two man spar forms.

yeah, we used to sparr alot and very wildly. eventually we began to understand our gung fu in a different manner. discovering it for yourself is a method of learning that i find interesting. yeah you can show me how to use gung fu, but if i don't own my gung fu i will always be doing YOUR gung fu.

and buk sing is hung sing so i'd be in the same place.

that is the point of sparring - well part of the point. For example, another coach and I have known eachother for 12 years, and since then have trained under the same instructors except during one point in time (when I started cma, he started kenpo) we are the same height and similar weight, yet we fight completely differently. It wasn't because we weren't "spoon fed" and had to "discover" it for ourselves, it's because we sparred and competed. THAT is what led us to learn to use what worked best for us, and without the mystery of having to reinvent the wheel. I do agree with what you said here though. There are just different ways of going about it.

[SevenStar]

xia,

you wanna know something funny? even mma pratice their own forms of forms....they do things repeatedly over and over again, whether with or without someone. they are more similar to us than they realize.....they just train for sport.

single technique drills and "forms" are not the same thing. of course we drill - plenty. there are no conventional forms though.

[SevenStar]

I've argued that set combinations of punches that boxers train are their versions of forms. Of course, this idea has been rejected by lots of MMA forum types.
I think what you said summarizes why we should continue what we're doing in spite of what MMA is doing. We know what Kung Fu is designed for (fighting in situations where life is on the line) and other benefits it yields (like health, fun, etc). If we have what we want, there is no need to change what we are doing. All of the bad teachers and false information creates a lot of confusion. Because of this, many people want the wrong things out of martial arts. And many people who want the right things don’t know how or where to get it. But if you know what’s what, there is no need to worry about what some MMA guys think about what you do. That’s the way I see it.

To be honest, the mma guys in general don't care about what you do. you will find a few here and there that bash tma, just as you have many mma that bash tma. such is life. But on average, if you look at a forum like mma.tv, like 90% of their topics are mma related, unlike here, where the posters love cma vs mma threads. Where I train, we never mention kung fu or any other style - we just train. When we invited the cashier to train with us, it was him who told us he trained a traditional style and did not need grappling, as he would not go down. It was a tma school talking trash about us that led to a challenge match (the tma guy lost).

[SevenStar]

The real difference between "traditional" martial arts (Tma) and "Modern/Mixed" martial arts (Mma) is not WHAT they train, it is HOW they train

exactly. training methodology is the key.

[David Jamieson]

without getting trapped and tripped by terminology, traditional martial arts can and are trained properly and correctly in many cases and in a few instances, better training than that offered in some mma regimens.


Itg is too easy to fall into a mindset that something is better because it is more immediate and visceral. This is not the case at all.

There are likely as many ,mma schools that do not harness the correct as there are wushu clubs that think they are fighters.

it is also safe to say that the greater percentage of people who train in any martial art be it mma tma or what have you are not fighters at all, don't fight on the streets and do not fight in carded bouts. they are merely training. IN which case, there is no difference because training is just training.

[Vajramusti]

The forum is not a sample version of life. There are still lots of good folks who are practitioners and teachers of TCMA- and they dont all do it for health alone.Most are not on internet chat lists.

joy chaudhuri

[PangQuan]

Ross pretty much hit the nail in the head.

Also, for some reason a lot of CMA guys think tradition and evolution are mutually exclusive concepts. I don't see it this way.

IMO, evolution/adaption is a requirement of tradition. In the old days when people used thier martial arts to fight on a regular or semi regular basis, or they taught the military/gangs for the purpose of combat, they needed to constantly adapt and evolve thier art so it would remain fresh, alive and able to encounter new technologies, methods, tactics, and all the other multitudes of circumstances that can pop up during a fight, war, or what not.

also the more known your art becomes the more people will be able to recognize your style, constantly updating your material will give you the ability to still suprise those who thought they knew what you were all about.

I think this is along the same lines as cross training, though if you havent the ability or desire to cross train, you have to get new material from somewhere. If you dont find the new material yourself you have no other way of getting your hands on it.

[hskwarrior]

i agree with pang quan.

see, in my background i've been in gangs for many years. i had to keep my gung fu tight so not to get caught slippin'. and speaking from a TCMA point of view.....our new enemies are ground fighters cause instead of worrying about a stand up fist fight, you now have to worry this guys gonna shoot in on me, and not by shear luck either.

in the bigger scheme of gung fu's theme........thats good. because if you have a sifu with enough foresight he can adjust the training to accomadate new threats. so now, tcma schools are beginning to focus on anti-grappling to evolve their system. as i said.....good. because we can't sit back on old reputations of our masters to make us good fighters.

nothing wrong with mma, nor tcma. as long as you have the right person coaching you..........mma tends to lean more towards sport fighting while tcma still gears itself for reality training, but hopefully some great fighters will emerge on that competition level-gung fu wise. at least i train my guys with that in mind.

and sevenstar, thanks for your comments as well. you are as always on point.
hsk

[PangQuan]

its that mindset you have HSK that is the light at the end of the tunnel in todays modern world and tcma.

I think as more people wake up, open thier eyes and smell the coffee, we will see more kungfu guys getting in the ring to test thier skills.

its the current generation of active teachers and thier students that will decide where we go in the modern world in regards to a competative atmosphere.

from what i have seen though, i dont think we are in to much trouble. a lot of guys know whats up, know what is being demanded by the times and are formulating long term game plans to set things in motion to keep our gear fresh and alive as we can.

[hskwarrior]

sevenstar......

imo..........anything you string together whether advanced or basic is considered a form. not as defined as a tcma form......

[hskwarrior]

thanks pangquan......

well, if i can get some guys together i plan to start a little CLF/gung fu based fighting group and call it WARRIOR NATION.....may sound silly, but if you think of what it means or images it conjures up.......you'll understand.

my initial goal is to train clf fighters to represent our system........maybe sanshou or san da to see how that goes.......

but my guys will use clf mixed with their other skills.......and i want people to be able to identify us and say "thats choy lee fut!"


thanks again

[The Xia]

so long as there are people who want to train for ANY reason, it will survive. that is why taiji for health is so popular.

We are talking about the survival of Kung Fu as fighting arts.

yeah - I saw the post you deleted...of course it's different, but the techniques and principles have similarities, naturally. No, there is no fu jow in mma as you stated, but there is yielding, borrowing, listeining, pushing, and pretty much every other energy you train in cma.

No fair! Using deleted posts in your argument!
Anyway, I deleted that post and made a much larger one that addresses that issue, albeit, without the Fu Jow example. Anyway, to elaborate on my point I’ll use Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar as an example. Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar is built upon the four pillar sets and related conditioning. Sei Ping Ma, Iron Rings, Sam Sing drills, and Iron Hand are all found in the Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar curriculum. The style’s internal-work is highlighted in the Tid Sin Kuen set. It’s a high level set that requires a solid foundation in the style to learn. The other three pillar sets are Gung Jee Fuk Fu Kuen, Sup Ying Kuen (or Ng Ying Kuen for some lineages), and the Fu Hok Seung Kuen. Depending on the lineage, other sets may be present. But the sets I mentioned are called the four pillars. There are similarities between Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar and other Southern styles. That’s because of historical relationships. But I think you can plainly see that Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar is not similar to MMA. All you have to do is watch the sets I mentioned. I mentioned Fu Jow in my deleted post. But that’s just one technique. I don’t see MMA guys using the Ten Killing Hands. That’s because it’s not in the style of MMA. If you look at the training methods, techniques and concepts of Wong Fei Hung-Hung Gar, it is very different from MMA.

it's more than just "bits" - it's not uncommon for bjj guys to have extensive judo experience. IME, the coaches have decent experience in what they are teaching. If they don't, it shows when their students compete. Using our club as an example, nobody teaching has less than 8 years of experience in their respective style.

I mentioned BJJ as the exception I've seen.

because you don't see them on a regular basis. I don't see cma guys sparring full contact much, but I am not around them on a regular basis either anymore.

The difference is that MMA fights are all over TV.

they stopped doing that years ago. Thai camps use heavy bags - sometimes called bananna bags. that's really all you need. And do you know WHY it was the bananna tree that is used? because the bark of them is softer than other types. You would not see them kicking oaks or redwoods if they had them available.

I have seen videos of modern Muay Thai guys using banana trees. I can’t say if it’s common though. Anyway, about heavy bags, the bottom is hard. Heavy bags are usually hung from the ceiling. I don’t see how a heavy bag (even the bottom) can condition as well as something like a banana tree. Especially since banana trees are rooted in the ground. I would find that a more stable target if my purpose was to condition my shins. I also remember reading that some Muay Thai guys used to condition their forearms with pipes. I don’t see MMA guys doing that!

judo was used and taught in the military. muay thai was trained by soldiers as well. they are sport arts now, but have not always been.

That may be the case. But they are still sport arts. If you look at styles like Bak Mei, Hung Gar, or Choy Lay Fut, they are designed to kill and cripple your opponent. They are a response to a violent environment. Although you don’t have to use them for that, that’s what they were designed and used for. A good practitioner should know how to use them to that end if he needs to.

because they were already established and tested sports, they already had training protocols and had already been competition tested.

It would make sense that a new sport style draws from established sport arts. Then there is the “baggage” part that I mentioned

and as it grows, so will the resentment it gets from TMAs.

It’s only natural for resentment to be met with resentment. But take a look at how I said traditionalists should deal with the growth of MMA.

To be honest, the mma guys in general don't care about what you do. you will find a few here and there that bash tma, just as you have many mma that bash tma. such is life. But on average, if you look at a forum like mma.tv, like 90% of their topics are mma related, unlike here, where the posters love cma vs mma threads. Where I train, we never mention kung fu or any other style - we just train. When we invited the cashier to train with us, it was him who told us he trained a traditional style and did not need grappling, as he would not go down. It was a tma school talking trash about us that led to a challenge match (the tma guy lost).

From my own experience, I think that the MMA vs. TMA thing started out, and is still largely, an internet thing. But I have seen some spillover into the non-digital world of people with faces and real names. Take a look at that Eddie Bravo video.

[Eddie]

see, fu pow is almost 7 feet tall. i'm only 5'7". although we may have learned the same techniques, how its going to be applied changes due to the size difference. what works for me isn't going to work for him the same way. that's why i love choy lee fut, everything is so flexible in regards to applications.

Size doesn’t influence applications, skill does. Having said that, a smaller guy would (for example) probably be better at low foot sweeps because it would be easier for him to execute than it would be for someone who weighs say 100 kilos.

Martial Arts (TCMA, MMA etc) is all about skill and application. If you don’t emphasise that, you’re lost.

I’m not always sure what people mean when they speak of ‘traditional’ sparring methods. I see Martial Arts more as an application of methods, than anything else.

When it comes to stand up (and throwing), I don’t think that CMA lack anything. My only concern is when it comes to ground work. I see the value of being proficient on the floor, however, in my experience in this country, I’d say its probably less important (for now) to know that range of fighting (for self defence) than it is for someone from other countries (say USA) where wrestling is more common.

As for competition sparring, from a stand up point of view, I think San Da / San shou can stand up against the best of it. The rules allow for throws and take downs, elbows and knees (san da) and all ranges of kicking. Pretty complete for a stand up competition discipline if you ask me.

However, the fact that we are all so concerned about the development of MMA, obviously shows our insecurities.