What MMA did to Kung FU

[David Jamieson]

a lot chinese kung fu people arent willing to accept mma because they think its a race thing. i dont get why the white ppls are clinging to kung fu i dont see any reason

people of any race who don't "do" should reserve comment.

all the kungfu guys i know for real accept mma for what it is and have even adopted some of the methods that are in the training regimens of mixed martial artists that they didn't have in their chosen martial art.

hey, if it wasn't for tma, there would be NO mma.

it's a constant journey and the journey is change.

being stuck in your ways is the worst enemy to any martial artist.

[bawang]

i disagree wit u man. this talk of constant change is bs. ur biased from schitzophrenic north american culture. punching a man in the face is punching a man in the face.

[SoCo KungFu]

This.

It shattered the following illusions that were (are) commonly held my TMA'ists:

- There are secret techniques you can do to stop much larger opponents (how many ads for these secret systems did you see in the backs of MA mags in the 80s and 90s?)

- Forms give you a large arsenal of effective fighting techniques

- You can practice alone and then be adequately prepared to fight a resisting opponent

- 10-hit combos are an effective defense against a punch (because attackers leave their arms out there after throwing said punch)

- Size doesn't matter

- Strength doesn't matter

- Don't worry about grapplers, you can stop a takedown with a knee to the face

- Your out of shape instructor is "too deadly" to spar with you

There are a lot more, but that's a good list.

There are still a LOT of people that cling to these though. Like, A LOT.....

Before MMA, I lived in this delusional world created by martial arts myths that I learned in Karate class as a kid. One myth was that I was actually able to competently defend myself because I had karate training.

After 10 minutes in an MMA class, my entire reality had changed. Years of myths and BS and "MA social conditioning" were wiped away. It was a little depressing; all I wanted from MA was to be an effective fighter, and I had been doing everything wrong.

I actually found that same moment rather refreshing. Like when you wake up and your eyes are all foggy so you throw cold water on your face and go look outside and everything is superawesome

For years:

Studying forms for secret techniques? Worthless for actual fighting.

Size and strength? Phenomenally important (unless the other person is a COMPLETE noob)

Your out of shape instructor? Never been in a fight a day in his life.

10-hit combos? Worthless. Real opponents that are actually trying to hit you don't leave their arms out there waiting for you.

Grapplers will gladly eat your knee to the face (with which you will probably miss, anyway) to take you down and dominate you within 10 seconds, especially if you don't know what you're doing on the ground).

If you've never trained against a resisting opponent then it doesn't matter even if you've trained hours a day for years; you will lose to a boxer with 1 month of training.

And yet those former kung fu brothers still try to tell us we were missing something or didn't understand, all the while they keep drinking the kool aid...

[Syn7]

as far as one on one empty hand, why not just learn all the ranges of fighting and try it out for yourself to see how well it works... try it against different styles... go roll with a bjj cat, go have a kickboxing match with a kickboxer, go try and take down a judoka, box a boxer, maybe find some well rounded opponents who do well in mma and try against them... whoever you find, try to get people who are as different from you as possible, like if youre a bak mei guy, dont go against lung ying guys and think you are crosstraining... in the end if it works it works if it doesnt it doesnt... only one way to find out tho...

also if you still dont wanna go contact atleast do padwork... good pad work... not just kicking bob or trapping a wooden dummy... i mean intricate moving targets of varying size and whatnot... muaythai style...


i'd also like to add that you cant rely on tricks that only work once... ok they are cool to have and will work sometimes but this cannot be your bread and butter...

[bawang]

also it has to do with emasculation of chinese culture combined with materilism nihilism and hedonism.

the feminine and h0m0sexual wing chun being the most popular stlye of kung fu in the entire world says it all

[Syn7]

also it has to do with emasculation of chinese culture combined with materilism nihilism and hedonism.

the feminine and h0m0sexual wing chun being the most popular stlye of kung fu in the entire world says it all

so you dont like wing chun then???




wing chun secret techniques can stop any style... its all in the secret footwork... im tellin ya...

[IronFist]

There's also the "fantasy" that so many people cling onto.

Deep down inside, a lot of TMA guys want to believe that they're learning a mystical ninja art. That they are privy to the ancient secrets that will defeat all the weightlifting boxers and kickboxers and strongmen (and today you can add to that list MMA guys, too) out there.

They are learning the secrets, and it feels good to be part of that secret club.

They buy into the BS that with their secret, ancient, exclusive training, they will be able to defeat any bad guy, even if he is bigger and stronger and tougher and a boxer and wrestler and kicked sand in your face and stole your girlfriend. He doesn't even realize the ancient power that he is about to be messing with when he fights you, for you a master of all aspects of "real" and "ancient" TMA knowledge. You don't go to a McDojo, you are a closed-door disciple learning only the most exclusive and secret of ancient techniques passed down from master to chosen student:

Iron body that makes you able to withstand hits. It can only be done with secret exercises and breath control and qi manipulation. You are learning this and no one else is. You are elite.

Ancient strength sets used by the old masters to develop superhuman strength. Weight lifting, protein shakes, creatine, that stuff is all new agey hokum. Even tho you're not getting big or testing your strength with weights so you have no way to know if you're actually getting stronger or not, your dynamic tension strength set is bestowing upon you insane strength gains. And every week you add another rep. Soon you will be invincible. And it feels so good to have this knowledge that no one else has. If only the elite-level athletes of the world knew the secrets that you knew...

You punch a wall bag filled with steel shot 500 times a day. Without pain. Your fists are like iron. You can easily crack a skull. All those poser boxers are hitting soft heavy bags wearing boxing gloves. Wusses! You possess real destructive power in your fists. Never mind that you've never actually trained against a moving opponent that didn't just sit there like your wall bag does. You know in your heart that you are so deadly, you could crack a skull with one punch with minimal effort. You walk around all day supremely confident in this knowledge. You can break the bottom brick. You can rupture organs without leaving a mark on the body. Someone would have to be completely insane to get into a fight with you!

You know a few dozen multi-hit combo techniques. You can impress the hell out of your friends. "Dude, throw a punch at me... no, not like that... use your other arm... and keep your other arm there when you do it... yeah like that... throw that punch at me... oh but do it slowly so I don't accidentally hurt you..." BAM! Bong sao, lop da, knee kick, twisting double palm strike! Your friends cry out "Whoa!!! Dude that was awesome! You're like Bruce Lee!! Do it again!" Your ego is huge.

Your ego is huge. That is why TMA "myths" are still around, and will always be around.




F.uck all of that.




You want secret conditioning? Grapple and take punches.

You want massive strength? Get your ass in the gym and lift weights.

You want a useful punch? Train against resisting opponents, heavy bags, and double end bags.

You want secret techniques that work? Learn Muay Thai and BJJ.


Forms are BS.
Secret ninja body conditioning is BS.
"Strength sets" are BS.
Cool-looking combos are BS.

edit - I'm talking about in the development of martial skill. Look, if you just want to get in shape, forms can be useful. If you need to improve circulation or whatever, qigong and taiji might help. But when instructors delude students into believe they are learning how to fight through things like forms and secret grandmaster ancient "conditioning" methods and walking in circles and 10-hit combos on outstretched arms, that is doing a phenomenal disservice to both the student, and to the MA community as a whole.

edit 2 - I'm qualified to talk on this because I wasted much of my youth on BS conditioning systems and ancient strength sets and learning the secret techniques to make me an invincible kung fu fighter. And thinking weight lifting was inefficient and this and that and all those other BS myths. And then one day I went to a gym and realized that despite training harder than anyone else for the last year in ancient strength sets I was incredibly weak, and since I wanted to get strong, I had to lift weights. And after getting my stuff completely ROCKED in an MMA class against someone who had been training for only a month I decided that maybe my secret ninja techniques weren't as awesome as I thought they were.

So I'm not a hypocrite. At one point I was a HUGE supporter of "traditional" (BS) training and spent countless hours tracking down copies of old training books with the "secret and lost methods" because I wanted to be a superior kung fu fighter. Holy crap, was all of that ever a huge waste of time. Don't get me wrong, I was super dedicated. But if any of that crap actually worked I would've been a world champion fighter by now. lol. It sucks, though, to literally spend hours a day for years doing things that you think are going to benefit you greatly only to find out that they were worthless. I had the biggest freaking ego, too; it's a good thing I never got into a "real" fight or I would've been destroyed both physically and mentally.

[MightyB]

agreed, however this thread as well as alot of people on here, sound they joined a TCMA school and got taken advantage of, or been lied to.
Thats too bad but to make sweeping genralizations is just plain silly.

This argument is becoming my biggest pet peeve on the KFM. Why is it that every time someone questions dogma - someone always tries the pithy "Your teacher must not have known real kung fu" excuse?

My kung fu Sifu is phenomenal - he's flat out one of the best 7* guys alive. His father was THE MAN.

That being said. For whatever reason, his phenomenal skill isn't translating to me being phenomenal. I have to find my own way... and maybe it's cultural, maybe it's the result of my culture being thousands of years old too, but it's fighting styles were based on wrestling and boxing. Maybe it's in my cultural DNA to be able to pick up that style of fighting more easily.

Or, maybe we could say that TCMA had rules too. And it's rules don't coincide with the rules that we're using now. Maybe it has to adapt.

Or, maybe some of us joined Martial Arts because we like a real martial workout... but that's not in today's TCMA. It's not - because you want to tell me about culture and mysteries and etiquette and blah blah blah blah blah... and I want real skill. Since I'm in the minority, I can't find enough TCMAers to train live with and against. And lo and behold - martial arts needs two people participating to be MARTIAL ARTS. If I don't have a variety of real martial training partners - then I can't develop real skill.

Guess what you have in Judo, Jiu Jitsu, Boxing, Wrestling, Thai, BJJ etc? Training partners. They've left their egos at the door and are willing to put it on the line on the mat with you. Guess what happens? You both grow because of it. You grow because it's Live - it's techniques in action - it's resisting. It's more real.

[-N-]

They started doing basic straight right and lefts in motion, stationary, side to side, etc. They then did this thai or boxing slip with the elbows thing that I've never seen before. They drilled that in motion too. After about 15 minutes of this. He had them face off and one was a striker and one was doing the slip to get outside then move in thing. It was controlled at first. Then he had them add speed and broken rhythm. It was unchoreographed but far from being a sparring session...

Some kung fu schools train that way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oH3IRqC7QQ

Video from the day after they were given that drill.

[EarthDragon]

started a thread to discuss why is this posted on the MMA board

[David Jamieson]

Some kung fu schools train that way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oH3IRqC7QQ

Video from the day after they were given that drill.

when i first started into kung fu, bag work was pretty regular, and I lived with my si hing, so we banged quite often. when the school finally opened, it had to appeal to a wider range of people, it's that simple.

most smart mma gyms have a cardio class and plenty of people who are not in the stable of fighters and for sure, the greater majority of the schools are used for simple fitness and of course, to get the t-shirt

And the sun is always in the middle of the sky, somewhere on the earth.

[YouKnowWho]

Some kung fu schools train that way.

Here are more clips about that kind of training method.

http://johnswang.com/Taiwan_sc_4.wmv
http://johnswang.com/Taiwan_sc_5.wmv

[EarthDragon]

thanks YKW, why would you post these clips???? this is not the way kung fu schools train? (insert sarcastic voice)wheres th chi blasts and the silk pj's this must not be kung fu..


Shui Jiao = kung fu this thread should read how has kung fu given birth to MMA

[-N-]

when i first started into kung fu, bag work was pretty regular, and I lived with my si hing, so we banged quite often. when the school finally opened, it had to appeal to a wider range of people, it's that simple.

Yep. Most people don't like the other kind of training. Students quit after 1 class.

Here are no clips about that kind of training method.

http://johnswang.com/Taiwan_sc_4.wmv
http://johnswang.com/Taiwan_sc_5.wmv

Need more schools like that.

[Knifefighter]

hey, if it wasn't for tma, there would be NO mma..

Yeah, that's true... there wouldn't have been that many guys for the grapplers to beat up and nobody for the MT, boxers and kickboxers to beat up.