Opening /crossing at start of forms

[Paul T England]

One of my students had some interesting insight into the Cross down at the beginning of forms.

Just wondering how other people explain the reasoning for this action?

Paul
www.moifa.co.uk

[Eric_H]

One of my students had some interesting insight into the Cross down at the beginning of forms.

Just wondering how other people explain the reasoning for this action?

Paul
www.moifa.co.uk

If you do it the way we do it, it's the lower reference point - the physical boundary of the arms having structural power.

[lance]

One of my students had some interesting insight into the Cross down at the beginning of forms.

Just wondering how other people explain the reasoning for this action?

Paul
www.moifa.co.uk

Hello , anyway who was your wing chun sifu anyway ? The reason why I ' m asking is because , you learned from your sifu wing chun right ? So ask him about the cross arms at the opening of the form .
It 's the same as what everybody was saying it ' s used to define the centerline .

Lance

[LFJ]

Any human being with normal bodily awareness knows exactly where their centerline is without needing to physically "define" it in such a way, but that's a better explanation than the combat applications people come up with for it.

[Paddington]

Any human being with normal bodily awareness knows exactly where their centerline is without needing to physically "define" it in such a way, but that's a better explanation than the combat applications people come up with for it.

I have trained with Sifus who have, like others have said in this thread, insisted that the crossing of the arms is just to check a centerline.

Personally I think there are a few things that are being trained and reinforced by the crossing of the arms at the beginning of forms. I am not going to name them here though I will state why I think that in forms from the Ip Man family of Wing Chun, we often are training and can train many things from what seems like a single movement in the forms.

One thing I have noted about Ip Man Wing Chun, as that is the family of Wing Chun I am most familiar with, is that it has been progressively reductionist in its pedagogical approach.

Listening to the type of arguments that the two brothers Ip Ching and Ip Chun have had, inclines me further towards this line of thought. Efficiency in delivery of the system, I believe, has informed a lot of the idiosyncrasies and changes of the forms within the IP Man family of Wing Chun over the years, including what Ip Man himself contributed.

[wingchunIan]

Any human being with normal bodily awareness knows exactly where their centerline is without needing to physically "define" it in such a way, but that's a better explanation than the combat applications people come up with for it.

Not true at all. Watch beginners do punches or SNT and you will see a complete lack of ability to where to the centreline

[Paddington]

Not true at all. Watch beginners do punches or SNT and you will see a complete lack of ability to where to the centreline

I agree with you here, I've seen the same too.

[Robadob]

In our lineage the lower movement is similar to a centerline punch. The reason it seems to point down is this way you know you're at the centerline the moment your biceps touches your chest.
The upward movement is setting up your Wu Sau. The correct placement is checked by shifting. If for example you' ld have shifted to the left, your right hand Wu Sau is now at the centerline.

[Phil Redmond]

This is the TWC Pin San Central line theory.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBPmlvAB8jA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdOmnxmnfv8

[LFJ]

Not true at all. Watch beginners do punches or SNT and you will see a complete lack of ability to where to the centreline

Are you talking about their own centerline or the central line between themselves and the opponent? Folks who explain the crossing hands as defining one's own centerline often explain the following 'punch' as defining the central line between oneself and the opponent.

Anyhow, bad coordination doesn't mean they don't know where their centerline is. You think the majority of people can't close their eyes and touch their nose, sternum or navel, and that they'll be able to do so after crossing their arms in front of their body?

[wingchunIan]

Are you talking about their own centerline or the central line between themselves and the opponent? Folks who explain the crossing hands as defining one's own centerline often explain the following 'punch' as defining the central line between oneself and the opponent.

Anyhow, bad coordination doesn't mean they don't know where their centerline is. You think the majority of people can't close their eyes and touch their nose, sternum or navel, and that they'll be able to do so after crossing their arms in front of their body?

Your first paragraph is nothing to do with me. Knowing where the centre of your own body is, is not the same as being able to identify the opposite end of a line away from the body. being able to touch your nose with your eyes closed is not the same as being able to find and control the centreline automatically and without thought, not just close to your body but also at the furthest point away.

[poulperadieux]

Are you talking about their own centerline or the central line between themselves and the opponent? Folks who explain the crossing hands as defining one's own centerline often explain the following 'punch' as defining the central line between oneself and the opponent.

Anyhow, bad coordination doesn't mean they don't know where their centerline is. You think the majority of people can't close their eyes and touch their nose, sternum or navel, and that they'll be able to do so after crossing their arms in front of their body?

About 70 percent of my students have a bad corporal localisation to my standards when they come as beginners.

And I don't tell about the shoe and chair generation and the lumbar hyper kyphosis that gives an endemic hypotrophia of the gluteus medius and an hypertrophia of the paravertebral muscles of the area witch are not originally for the main work... (Christophe Carrio, Tom Myers for more details).


And I don't quote one of my senior student last night, on witch I could tell she was suffering from an ankle problem as she presented a bascule of the pelvis and htat her posture bended to the left during the siu lim tao.

It takes around 6 to 8 months to one year for a student who takes himself or herself in charge to get back the lumbar curvation and reverse the process of the chair and shoes (or basket shoes but I won't tell here, it's complicated and I'm not sure anyone will read, I'm not sure anyone read this so I can say banana, write banana if you read and have questions, please, I like banana, since I saw Despictable me and the banana song go on youtube and post the video here it will be fun, I'll laugh I tell you).

So You can tell : Everyone knows where their nose is... But, sadly, You are missing a lot of things.

Go banana !

[LoneTiger108]

One of my students had some interesting insight into the Cross down at the beginning of forms.

Just wondering how other people explain the reasoning for this action?

Paul
www.moifa.co.uk

I have refrained from posting here for one reason... this movement makes up the first line from my curriculum at The Yum Yeurng Academy. It's difficult to explain reasoning behind it without understanding what context you are discussing... as defense or attack to start with?

It's like applying for a job without a decent person specification!! You will just say what you want rather than be specific in your presentation in relation to what is needed

[LFJ]

@Ian,

What I refer to is this;

Jung-sam together forms the noun 'center'. Jung-sam-sin = 'centerline'.
Jung alone is the adjective 'central' describing the line, Jung-sin = 'central line'.

Regardless of terminology, lineage, or even martial arts though, these are just physical truths regardless of whether they are acknowledged or not; the body's vertical axis and the most direct path between that of two bodies.

[poulperadieux]

@Ian,

What I refer to is this;

Jung-sam together forms the noun 'center'. Jung-sam-sin = 'centerline'.
Jung alone is the adjective 'central' describing the line, Jung-sin = 'central line'.

Regardless of terminology, lineage, or even martial arts though, these are just physical truths regardless of whether they are acknowledged or not; the body's vertical axis and the most direct path between that of two bodies.

ok...

Geometric truth.

But considering the brain and the particularity of one eye, and, as we are not cyclops, both eyes functioning together, witch is at least Three more annoying parameters (there's more, but let it go for now), there's no such thing for your brain and body as the superiority of the straight line over the curve.

Some time, because you Human create space and time distorsion, the curve can seem faster than the straight line, as time is a relative notion, depends witch side of the toilets you are.


In european fencing in the XVII th century, there was a man who wrote extensively on how fencing was geometric and prédictive, "there is no such thing such like surprise in fencing" ("L'académie de l'épée" Gérard Thibault d’Anvers, last spanish Maestro before the decay of the art due to the geometry theory wandering).



Later Italians, and French learning from Italians proved him terribly Wrong.

But History repeats itself, all the time.