kung fu sparring without kickboxing

[MightyB]

42 minute mark spars with another dude, dude has a long MA background.

[GeneChing]

gene can you put up a link to your book with the challenge stories at the shaolin temple. sound like a very interesting read. i would like to buy a copy

There is a whole thread dedicated to my book here: Shaolin Trips by Gene Ching

Actually, I didn't document many challenge stories in my book. I discussed a street fight I saw, and there may be a few casual references to some other conflicts, but if that's the sole reason you want to read it, you might be disappointed.

[pazman]

Wiz Cool C, how do you spar with your Shaolin teacher?

[Lucas]

got some answers last night from my teacher, seems you shorten up all your movement from the forms in fighting. heard that before from a hung gar teacher back in the states. seems the fighting stance is hands up,like a boxer but lead is more forward,and hands are open,cause most application have a grab with one hand and strike with other.


seems the blocks are similar to the standard kickboxing blocks, but to be honest,seem a bit vague. like maybe there is no real straight forward way of blocking for sparring or real fighting. grab strike, ,throw sometimes,hands up and open.

I personally have a 'street' version of my two shaolin sets I still retain. the reason i did this was for myself, so that i have built up repetition of doing these things from my own personal point of movement and feel for fighting. if you are expecting to just take these large movements and adapt them at the time you need them, i dont think thats going to be as successuful as it could be if you prepared ahead of time. for that what i did is raised the stances, tightened up my guards and shortened most of the movements, excepting long range attacks. after i started doing this i noticed a difference in my sparring after some time. imo blocking is one of those things, that is purely instinctual and you have to rely on your training and muscle memory. you arent going to have a thought process of; 'oh i better block this' you just do it. what your follow up is after/during a block really just depends on your reaction, whats available, and how quickly your body reacts and exploits an opening.

[wiz cool c]

Wiz Cool C, how do you spar with your Shaolin teacher?

no we never spar, he does show me applications and we have done some two man drills. i feel like i am being disrespectful, and feel awkward if i ask to spar with him. almost like there is an unwritten rule that are not supposed to. and i don't mind it either. but if i got a very clear answer on how to use the techniques in class ,i could find a friend to spar with and work applications.

the only sparring i have done in china for 7 years is from shuai jiao,which is throw sparring. and a few times some mma and striking sparring with my one shuai jiao coach Yao,who is a pro mma fighter with a shuai jiao background. and i have studied hung gar ,bagua ,shaolin and ying qi gong here,along with shuai jiao.

[wiz cool c]

I personally have a 'street' version of my two shaolin sets I still retain. the reason i did this was for myself, so that i have built up repetition of doing these things from my own personal point of movement and feel for fighting. if you are expecting to just take these large movements and adapt them at the time you need them, i dont think thats going to be as successuful as it could be if you prepared ahead of time. for that what i did is raised the stances, tightened up my guards and shortened most of the movements, excepting long range attacks. after i started doing this i noticed a difference in my sparring after some time. imo blocking is one of those things, that is purely instinctual and you have to rely on your training and muscle memory. you arent going to have a thought process of; 'oh i better block this' you just do it. what your follow up is after/during a block really just depends on your reaction, whats available, and how quickly your body reacts and exploits an opening.

my teacher also was explaining this last class about shorting up the stances and the techniques from the forms. but it still seems vague. i already know a **** load of martial arts,how to block all types of attacks from a modern fighting stance,and could teach this as well. i just feel like i wish i could get it from the kung fu.but honestly seems it is not there. even that shaolin fighting clip posted. it is a bit obvious that teacher does not have that much sparring experience. cause if he did he would eventually change his fighting stance. there is a reason all pro or competitive fighters keep their hands up. i think we have all seen this before. some video of a traditional guy fighting an experienced fighter. he comes out overly confident,in some kooky stance. and after a minute or two of eating some hard punches he starts to change his stance to a boxers type stance.

[Shaolin]

Now I know this guy will be criticized by our san da friends for not holding his hands up, but watching him, you can see that he's smooth and competent.

You would do well to take this guy very seriously if for some reason you provoked him into a fight.

Shaolin Sparring

1. I wouldn't criticize him for his skills or style, I would criticize him for his choice in sparring partner. The kid had very little to no experience and the monk was basically just picking on him.

2. One would be a fool to take any opponent lightly regardless of their martial background. As we say, "everyone has a puncher's chance."

[SevenStar]

I don't think sparring looks any different way. The basic strikes you see performed are prey much the same amongst all styles. If you watch Thai boxing, kyokushin, tkd and longfist, you will see the same strikes, for the most part. differences can be seen in footwork (or lack of footwork). Not "looking like kung fu" can be frustrating to some people - it used to upset me because the only time I "looked like" I was doing kung fu was during applications work and chin na.

[SevenStar]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mc4Y...e_gdata_player

This is from a taiji tournament... The striking doesn't "look like" taiji, Burr you can see a couple of decent takedowns.

[SHemmati]

please don't mix non-Chinese martial ideas with Shaolin fighting logic.
in other martial arts, like Karate, Taekwondo, etc, they show you a technique and say 'this is a block,' 'this is an attack,' etc. this is not the case in Shaolin fighting logic. in Shaolin, and all the other ancient kung fu styles, every movement is considered everything, whether defense or attack, block or press, take-down or throwing, ..., even for qigong practice. if we don't know it, we should practice more, learn more, and then practice more again and again. for example, i can safely say, for your question, every movement you see in, e.g., Xiao Hong quan, every movement, can be used as many kinds of block. so when you ask somebody who has trained under this principle he may look at you and say what???? because in his view every movement is a block, and asking him how he blocks is like asking him about what movements he knows in general! and you know, it is almost impossible to list every movement you know!
however, most the modern Shaolin monks have not been taught under this principle. they've mainly learned the forms, and may even know one or a few applications for many movements in the forms, but they still have no idea how to fight with those forms!

[wiz cool c]

please don't mix up non-Chinese martial ideas with Shaolin fighting logic.
in other martial arts, like Karate, Taekwondo, etc, they show you a technique and say 'this is a block,' 'this is an attack,' etc. this is not the case in Shaolin fighting logic. in Shaolin, and all the other ancient kung fu styles, every movement is considered everything, whether defense or attack, block or press, take-down or throwing, ..., even for qigong practice. if we don't know it, we should practice more, learn more, and then practice more again and again. for example, i can safely say, for your question, every movement you see in, e.g., Xiao Hong quan, every movement, can be used as many kinds of block. so when you ask somebody who has trained under this principle he may look at you and say what???? because in his view every movement is a block, and asking him how he blocks is like asking him about what movements he knows in general! and you know, it is almost impossible to list every movement you know!
however, most the modern Shaolin monks have not been taught under this principle. they've mainly learned the forms, and may even know one or a few applications for many movements in the forms, but they still have no idea how to fight with those forms!

how is a reverse punch a block?

[-N-]

how is a reverse punch a block?

When it cuts over the other guy's punch from the outside.

Your forearm redirects his punch while you land on his face.

Boxers do it all the time.

[Orion Paximus]

When it cuts over the other guy's punch from the outside.

Your forearm redirects his punch while you land on his face.

Boxers do it all the time.

Yeah I seriously thought this was common knowledge amongst CMA practitioners. My teacher always told me, "I will show you three applications for every technique you learn, it's up to you to learn the other 100."

[wiz cool c]

When it cuts over the other guy's punch from the outside.

Your forearm redirects his punch while you land on his face.

Boxers do it all the time.

ok i have not seen that before.

[SHemmati]

the subject is interesting. i can list the levels of combat training in Shaolin quan in a rough scheme as:

learn the forms -> learn their combat applications -> learn more forms -> learn more applications -> learn more combat applications for the same techniques -> spar -> learn to spar with imaginary opponents while you perform the forms -> spar with opponents, whether imaginary or real, barehanded or with weapons, single or in groups (in many Taoist circles, as their level of mastery gets higher and higher, fighting in the mind, with imaginary opponents, becomes more and more important than fighting with real opponents! you guess why.) -> combine different forms and their applications together -> try to test every movement in every situation in your imaginary and real sparrings -> deduce new applications yourself -> later on, you'll know many applications for every movement -> and so you'll know how to use every movement in many situations, as part of your instinct -> at the highest levels of mastery, you may be able to do almost all the applications you have in your mind with only one or a few forms!!! (there are stories about great masters who have concentrated only on one form, like Xiao Hong quan, and have done the other forms rarely thereafter!)

in parallel with this technical development, the practitioners learn various principles from time to time, and may even deduce their own principles as well! also they must develop basic requirements and improve their body and mind qigong. the procedure is the same for many other schools, like Wudang, etc.