Reaching Rules of Thumb

[k gledhill]

I understand perfectly what you are talking about -- I've seen it, and its variations, since I began WCK (almost 30 years ago).



People don't put and hold some "arm in your way" -- on the outside they throw bombs from all directions, all angles, all ranges, while moving.


You don't seem to grasp what "chasing hands" means. It doesn't mean to not actively seek contact or maintain contact with an opponent (or his arms) but pertains to what your objective is with contact (what you are doing with your contact). If your objective is only to maintain contact, then you are chasing hands. It is purely defensive sticking.

However, using contact/attachment actively, to try and control your opponent while striking him, is not chasing hands. In that case you are chasing control, and using your attachment to your opponent, regardless of what part of the opponent you are in contact with, to obtain that control.

Letting an opponent initiate contact will put you behind the timing. That's not a good place to be.


No, you have no idea. I'm not going to be fighting your hands or your face. I am going to be controlling you, your whole body. I would be tossing you around like a rag doll while I continually thump you. You don't seem to grasp that my attack is what establishes the contact. And that I will break your structure on contact and keep it broken. That is WCK's method of fighting.

30 years means little, quality not quantity.

if you understand what I'm talking about why do you answer like you have no clue ?

You really dont understand. Saying you do understand, wont change the fact that what you write, contradicts this.

you will fight my hands....

[HumbleWCGuy]

At the risk of seeming like I am picking on anyone... If my focus is on not getting hit, I will get hit. If my focus is on striking and I use good WC principles I should not get hit.

Certainly, strong offense is a part of good defense, but at the same time WC isn't toughman fighting either. Also, if the best advice that you can give is, "the best defense is a good offense," you might be lacking something in your defense. Also, I am not really willing to summarize defense is such a cliche manner. Spar with some good boxers under their rule set and you will see that nearly every boxer within a weight class hits the same and the only difference in each is the defense.

[Sihing73]

Hello,

I think that anyone with a clue would realize that Man Sau is an effective tool which can be used to occupy the line and force the opponenet to remove it in order to strike to center. Having said that, Man Sau does not "reach" for the opponent, rather it occupies the line and forces him to deal with it. In order to effectively use Man Sau you must be able to coordinate your facing, without proper facing the opponent will simply avoid the Man and attack from another angle.

Man Sau should have subtle forward energy, imho. One should not extend the Man Sau else it becomes something else, which sometimes is what is needed.

My point is anyone who thinks that Man Sau is ineffective or not useful for fighting really does not, imo, understand Man Sau.

Also, while talk of range is all well and good, keep in mind that once the opponent enters the range where they can hit me, in most cases they are also in the range where I can hit them.

[k gledhill]

Hello,

I think that anyone with a clue would realize that Man Sau is an effective tool which can be used to occupy the line and force the opponenet to remove it in order to strike to center. Having said that, Man Sau does not "reach" for the opponent, rather it occupies the line and forces him to deal with it. In order to effectively use Man Sau you must be able to coordinate your facing, without proper facing the opponent will simply avoid the Man and attack from another angle.

Man Sau should have subtle forward energy, imho. One should not extend the Man Sau else it becomes something else, which sometimes is what is needed.

My point is anyone who thinks that Man Sau is ineffective or not useful for fighting really does not, imo, understand Man Sau.

Also, while talk of range is all well and good, keep in mind that once the opponent enters the range where they can hit me, in most cases they are also in the range where I can hit them.

agreed , movement is required to angle strategically ...the tan sao's role in seung ma toi ma drills is the 'leading' entry 'line of force' delivered in a regular drill... it makes us react to counter 'that' particular flank/angle correctly with the correct distance to also make a punch with our jum sao ...or pak sao etc.... iow not to simply put an arm in the center and rigidly stay there drills and fighting. Sometimes the abstract methods can be misleading to the uninformed.

If we aren't stopped, we are punching with man sao ~ wu sao...in continuous cycles.

And yes if man sao moves forwards it becomes something else, a punch, usually ...unless something stops it.

[shawchemical]

Alan and his guys, like all sensible people today, cross train for MMA.

WCK is for fighting in a phone booth.

No. VTK without any footwork is for fighting in a phone booth. Add footwork and you become mobile.

[CFT]

No. VTK without any footwork is for fighting in a phone booth. Add footwork and you become mobile.

He's talking about the operating range. The footwork helps you maintain the most effective (for VTK) range, i.e. the space encompassed by a phone booth.

[Sihing73]

He's talking about the operating range. The footwork helps you maintain the most effective (for VTK) range, i.e. the space encompassed by a phone booth.

I hope WC/VT is for more than fighting in a Phone Booth. It is hard to find a Phone Booth in the US let alone get my opponent inside of one for us to fight

[t_niehoff]

He's talking about the operating range. The footwork helps you maintain the most effective (for VTK) range, i.e. the space encompassed by a phone booth.

Exactly.

WCK teaches a strategic approach and the tools necessary to implement that approach for getting safely in the phone booth (entering/bridging the gap), staying in the phone booth, and being able to fight effectively in that operating range.

WCK's signature drills, chi sao, lop sao, etc. are unrealistic drills in that operating range.

[sanjuro_ronin]

I hope WC/VT is for more than fighting in a Phone Booth. It is hard to find a Phone Booth in the US let alone get my opponent inside of one for us to fight

I carry one with me everywhere I go

Reaching is BAD anytime you over -extend yourself beyond what you need to do.
In other words, if you don't need to reach ( the strike is coming to you) and you reach for it, that is a bad thing.
If you need to reach 6" and you reach 8", that is bad.

Context is everything as always.

You do only as much as you have to, you need to do, beyond that, it can be counter-productive.

[k gledhill]

Centerline fighting encompasses our bodyweight behind the arm actions. The elbow positions trained by the SLT ensure the body is behind the 'elbow in' actions, ergo one reason why we maintain the elbows behind the wrists.
If you reach, lean forwards, etc...you lose the total of the sum of the parts in motion as you attack .
Economy of motion , all in a 'grenade' attack with a belt load of grenades . Using the hips in the actions, ensures the legs are being 'shocked' into the action of the arms simultaneously.
Everything we do should be in a flowing moving attack. When we do the dummy we are using the arms as the explosion point , timing 3 actions into a flowing assault while cycling the man sao / wu sao with punches or lead jut/pak/bong etc...
When we do a bong/wu on the dummy we use the rotation of the hips to generate force, coupled with fast rotation of the arms..in one beat. BANG !, creating openings with displacing force, like the dan gwan of the pole before striking .displace , strike, only the hands can do it in one beat.

[shawchemical]

Exactly.

WCK teaches a strategic approach and the tools necessary to implement that approach for getting safely in the phone booth (entering/bridging the gap), staying in the phone booth, and being able to fight effectively in that operating range.

WCK's signature drills, chi sao, lop sao, etc. are unrealistic drills in that operating range.

NO they're not, but it is clear that your flawed understanding of them makes them, as you believe, unrealistic. However, given that it has been established time after time that you don't know what you're talking about, saying that the drills themselves are unrealistic is fallacious.

[HumbleWCGuy]

On a basic level getting in and staying in is what we want to do, but depending on one's attributes versus the opponent it is often necessary to move in and out of that phone booth. WC can also stay on the outside kick and use some of the various hand tactics to get off outside counters. Where WC is weak is inside "boxing" hands, like most traditional arts. Similar to traditional MT, and other arts with standing grappling, WC stifles inside boxing with the clinching/attaching tactics.

[t_niehoff]

NO they're not, but it is clear that your flawed understanding of them makes them, as you believe, unrealistic. However, given that it has been established time after time that you don't know what you're talking about, saying that the drills themselves are unrealistic is fallacious.

It doesn't matter what my "understanding" of the drills are -- anyone, even someone with no WCK training, can look at the classical WCK drills and see that they are not realistic. What makes training realistic is that your opponent is behaving realistically, genuinely resisting you (like he does in fighting) -- and that means realistic levels of force (like you have in fighting), realistic action (as opposed to limited, proscribed ones), etc. In other words, realistic drills are snippets of fighting/sparring.

That people come to believe the WCK classical drills are realistic only underscores how unrealistic training brainwashes people.

[k gledhill]

It doesn't matter what my "understanding" of the drills are -- anyone, even someone with no WCK training, can look at the classical WCK drills and see that they are not realistic. What makes training realistic is that your opponent is behaving realistically, genuinely resisting you (like he does in fighting) -- and that means realistic levels of force (like you have in fighting), realistic action (as opposed to limited, proscribed ones), etc. In other words, realistic drills are snippets of fighting/sparring.

That people come to believe the WCK classical drills are realistic only underscores how unrealistic training brainwashes people.

If you see the drills as the vt 'fight' then your looking at the abstract 'parts' , nobody has shown you the whole picture yet. T comes to mind
The drills simply serve to give us a modular approach to developmental stages, involving mutual force exchanges with partners using the opposite partner as a knife sharpens on a stone before it gets used for real....the sharper the blade the easier it cuts.

If you are not developing a blade, then you will become a clinching,controlling, over trapping , chasing feeler

We strive to start students sparring from day one they walk in. Under strict control with advanced students, who will encourage them to attack with basic levels to simply get them used to the goal, fighting , not the 'way to get there', with drills lacking any resemblance to the fighting they do every class.

Understanding the intention of chi-sao as a way to get to sparring is required early or you tend to think you fight with 2 extended rolling arms , like the drill.

fighting with VT is fast explosive and aggressive , aiming to be relflexive rather than stand roll clinch lop/chop repeat 234...

speed, momentum, timing, force alignment, balance...

[shawchemical]

It doesn't matter what my "understanding" of the drills are -- anyone, even someone with no WCK training, can look at the classical WCK drills and see that they are not realistic. What makes training realistic is that your opponent is behaving realistically, genuinely resisting you (like he does in fighting) -- and that means realistic levels of force (like you have in fighting), realistic action (as opposed to limited, proscribed ones), etc. In other words, realistic drills are snippets of fighting/sparring.

That people come to believe the WCK classical drills are realistic only underscores how unrealistic training brainwashes people.

Unless of course, you perform those drills by building up the techniques to the point where the opponent is "behaving realistically, genuinely resisting you (like he does in fighting) -- and that means realistic levels of force (like you have in fighting), realistic action (as opposed to limited, proscribed ones), etc" However, if your opponent is specifically resisting you, they are probably not trying to hit you. Thus, they become your plaything and you can do with them what you will.

It definitely matters what your understanding of the drills is. Because you clearly lack the fundamental level of understanding what the drills are for, but also how the drills should be performed.