Here's the Fourth Generation Bagua master interview that I mentioned at 8:30 ruclips.net/video/EQBh_RFbK1g/видео.html If you haven't seen Ma Baoguo's ridiculous fight yet: ruclips.net/video/8GdqJ_wj2nE/видео.html Like always, thanks for watching! I'll add more links to stuff I talked about as I think about it. Here's our Qi La La playlist: ruclips.net/p/PLtdbPxlsaM_nvgs0NVFFL5_ma47EV4_1O A followup analysis about Sanda: ruclips.net/video/NDOkPNzKGBg/видео.html Here's our new channel focused on BJJ! ruclips.net/channel/UCQfBeZEQXbiGfgR_BEySSPQ
Fake MMA masters? I think there are a few. I can send you one privately via Instagram ;) Not trying to start anything with that dude. He's roided up like crazy.
Nice video Jerry. My 2 cents: I think western culture/media mystifies Asian culture so TMA for the most part in all parts of Asia flourished. MMA is practical and direct. Even BL said that 2 years TMA and 2 month boxing/wrestling training can beat the 2 year TMA. I think it's been known among those of us that have practiced martial/combat sport/art for at least 10 years or grew up training in an earlier era. I like Qi La La, he's a thinker/fighter, it'll be a pleasure to spar with him, please ask him to come to LA. Maybe setup a GoFundMe account after this conronathing is over. As for this back and forth with MMA and TMA. I started with TMA, moved onto MMA, and with age back to TMA. if you start young, before puberty, you learn discipline with certain TMA, then with puberty, you use TMA but start incorporating MMA or other styles, at least for me it's a historical and physical journey. because you'll reach an age or point where you mind is trying to cash checks your body can't. Hello TMA ;)
Takeaway from the video: A lot of martial arts look like kickboxing/the same since there are only so many moves that are effective. It doesn't mean that a martial art necessarily stole moves from another. Makes sense. Like swordfighting having a lot of the same moves. There are only so many ways of attacking a defending against someone in practical ways. Just because a kung fu fighter isn't performing forms like a performance on stage doesn't mean it's not kung fu.
Bruce Lee said this years ago... It doesn't mean he got everything right but he was already on this path. I find it somewhat embarassing that traditional martial artist are only now realizing it.
The form and function of the human body will dictate its effective movements, combine that with things like weight displacement and leverage and you'll get alot of whats effective. Makes perfect sense that all practices refined through testing will eventually look the same.
@Stian Johnson yeah i know that, the government banned the traditional forms and tournaments the last century, that why tai chi is what we know right now and not the martial art for war it used to be
This is really interesting to me! I was very taken by the mysticism of TCMA back in the 70's and up until recently (partly from watching your videos) I didn't really know what was BS what what wasn't. Back in the 80's I briefly took classes in Tai Chi from Dr. Yang Jwing Ming (who also taught Kung Fu) and he made it very clear to us that we were not learning self defense. In fact, it was a lot more like learning Yoga with some of the same mysticism (the flow of Chi and meridians). There was a very strong emphasis on the health benefits and I suspect there are some, but I do think the benefits of Tai Chi were exaggerated (though maybe not more than Yoga...). As you describe here about Qi La La, I think Bruce Lee was also endlessly testing and trying things to measure effectiveness. It is kind of surprising how controversial this mind set is. It really would explain a lot if the combat effectiveness of TCMA really was intentionally suppressed at some point during China's history as you discuss in this video. That really is fascinating!
@@rolanrepolido5655 That argument is used by many schools to avoid not applying the techniques in sparring, and that is why their art loses effectiveness in real combat. If a technique attacks the throat, for example, it can be fatal if studied scientifically. You don't need to apply it to a sparring partner to know it. Don't let that stop you from training to improve yourself as a fighter.
A number of years ago I coached boxing in Taipei, so it's always a treat to see your channel. Watching the Qi La La videos takes me back to cornering fighters at those WAKO and amateur San Da tournaments
I know a wing chun instructor that has used his style in real fights (not in the ring). He has definitely modified it for a more combative scenario and teaches it that way. As always, it is the ARTIST that makes the art useful.
@@phamhuyphu7517 Therein lies the problem. Wing Chun hasn't modernized. It simply doesn't work against modern MMA. Also, this whole "I'll bunch your nuts and gauge your eyes" forgets something: you touch my nuts or eyes, and I'll do the same from a dominant position. We need to stop this whole "it's deadly in the streets, but I can't practice it" BS.
@@del1000005 but it's true. Wing Chun originally focus on kicking the Opponent in the Crotch, Knee and hitting the Opponent in the Eyes and Larynx. It was a Survival Skill in it's Origin, not a Sport.
I love your channel. I am a life long practicioner who’s studied various martial arts and have come to a lot of similar conclusions. For those of us who have a passion for martial arts these are essential discussions to have. Martial arts, to remain relevant, must evolve. As much as tradition is important, part of that tradition should be evolution of the art. Times change and the arts that don’t change with it are dooming themselves to ineffectiveness.
Bruce Lee was criticized for his Jeet Kune Do , which had it's roots in Wing Chun. He incorporated elements from boxing, fencing, and even studied Judo at Seattle dojo when he was living here. He understood the importance of being well rounded and keeping what works and discarding what doesn't. he was constantly evolving his style. When I studied, the school had two instructors who had boxing backgrounds and the head teacher was from a judo background
Considering the Wing Chun he learned from Ip Man was the most radical style of Wing Chun, Jeet Kun Do is in reality just the next step in evolution for Wing Chun.
TMA is primarily light exercise, and it accomplishes that excellently. I lived in Shanghai and I see old people doing taichi every day in the park. I think it's great that old people can stay relatively healthy in their retirement. In terms of combat effectiveness, yes of course MMA is better and there's no question about that. But how many retirees do you see stretching and getting exercise with MMA drills in their old age? Both MMA and TMA each serve their own purpose, and they're both very good at what they do.
I wish when Qi La La retires to become a master and professionally train Effective Wing Chun with the discarded techniques that don't work,...actually it's better to call it *Qi La La's Wing Chun* because they are techniques working for HIM.
He's smart, a lot of practitioners of Chinese Martial Arts remain close minded, in the sense that they'll stick to using it alone. To be effective in competitive fighting you need to watch and learn from all styles, because all of them useful things and useless things. So yeah you can use Chinese martial arts to fight, but you'd need to know how to grapple and get around the other fighting styles as well.
I mean, if that’s what you think he should call his school, sorry to burst your bubble. Chinese people like to give “cool” names even to effective dojos. Like Dragon Claw MMA or something. It’s all about market appeal.
This is true, my teacher told me once, one must have 2 things to be a complete warrior, the knowledge of routines and also have fights, the two must complement each other, If you are only good at routines but you do not have fights it is useless, and if you have many fights but you do not do routines, you have no history, you cannot say that you make an art if you do not know what you do, that is why both things must be combined, both routines and sparring, there is also some truth and that is that sports competitions have too many rules, you can't hit the eyes and throat and neither the genitals, the traditional martial arts are very limited, not only the Chinese speak of all the traditional arts, and sports combat occupies most of the time only basic techniques, As straight punches, hooks, uppercuts, crossed, and kicks since the most basic ones that are circular, thigh, twist and instep kicks, nothing very complex I suppose that for make the fight more dynamic and not so boring, I agree with the man who said, that MMA fighters come to do traditional martial arts, and that the traditional arts sparring, everything must have its balance.
Love your content bro cause this is so true. I came up boxing and fighting irl so had to learn new shit mainly kicking after getting beat sometimes and realized what works and what doesn't via applying that. there are so many schools out there that have idiots with fake ranks that have never been tested. the best fight technique people fail to mention is knowing when to hit the Escape button.
Just subscribed to Qi La La’s channel! I agree on your points regarding what makes something a *martial* art & which views to take when looking at old concepts. If something isn’t working, its time to move on!
The dude at 12:25 was spot on. This is the only reasonable way forward, rather than these guys sporadically getting the shit kicked out of them and winding up the government.
I dont agree: I have spent most of my time in western competition orientated sports programs like boxing or being a trainer for semi professional wrestlers at the verge of becoming international full professional wrestlers. I spent some month in china. Went to Shaolin. It didnt took me six month to realize that Kung Fu styles are not worthless, but inferior to the western systems. In the west it is about what works and makes you successful in competition. In the east its what tradition and the authority of a master tells you.
@@scheisstag that"s sounds about right.....in china, that below average MMA guy is making all these master's look really bad....and he's not even that good of a fighter (said by himself).....we could probably send a group of western MMA guy's (with maybe 1 yr of training) and am thinking they would mop the floor with most of these masters.....
I'm glad SOMEBODY finally made a video essay on this. You've earned a 31-year practitioner of Kung-Fu as a new subscriber. 12:00 I agree 100% with this man. If Kung-Fu had no combative value, then Anderson Silva and other MMA fighters wouldn't bother training in Wing-Chub style & add it to their arsenal
You know now that I think of it... It's a really weird feeling when I learned the most about how to apply Wing Chun while training Sanda. I didn't learn shit while fully training Wing Chun, but after training Sanda for a couple months... I suddenly just got how a fucking Bongsau worked.
Same lol. I did Wing Chun as a kid and as I got older I thought it was pure BS. Picked up Muay Thai much later, and during a clinching/hand-fighting spar I finally understood how to apply Chisau. Halfway through I realised how weak my partner's framing was, and how his lack of "forward pressure" (as my Shifu would constantly talk about) left him open for me to just walk in and intitiate a hold. I'm not amazing at MT by any means, but it's sad to think there are all these useful techniques locked away behind an unwillingness to spar.
@@foursix32 Yes! This exactly! I didn't get too deep into Wing Chun so it was really the more basic stuff that clicked. But Chisau helped tremendously in clinch-fighting, added a whole new dimension. Instead of positioning for quick throws in the clinch with orthodox hand fighting, I kinda figured how to trap and position for short strikes before throwing. Very cool stuff!
Same here bruv. I did sanda for 4 years, did no gi for a few months and learnt some wing chun moves from my friend. Bong sau. Pak sau works. But i could never get the tan sau. Imo tan sau will not work against a non telegraphic hook or a tight hook. I would just block like how we usually do or roll under. Huen sau defitnetly work while rolling for sure
@@yip2454 Yep! Paksau and Bongsau are part of my bread and butter now. As for the Tansau, I have the exact same problems. I've heard people say that it shouldn't be used as a block but more as a proactive bridge. Not entirely sure how that works.
Agree with Qi La La. In my experience: I've been practicing Taiji Quan and Xingyi Quan for a year and a half now, but I entered into two gyms to train MMA. I'll be clear, to get your sparring done, and done well is a life saving activity. After that experience I talked with my wushu teacher, and he told me there is a an aspect about getting the most out of wushu it's to: read the theory, practice the forms and getting your sparring done. That means that in order to learn how to use each tool in TMA, you should get your hands into the action or you'll never become a competent fighter.
Yeah, certain things are like that. I learned better head movement after getting jabbed in the face a few times. Getting hit (safely) is a necessary part of training MARTIAL arts. Too many arts forget about the martial part. That's why BJJ is so effective. You're constantly testing techniques on other people and yourself.
I studied Wing Tsun for 10 years. After 2 -3 years I found out for myself, your Sifu teach you a Concept. You have to find out how it works best for you. It depends on your Physical strenght, your Body, your Speed, so much details to look for. Most Ppl never understand this and just try to copy Techniques shown by the Sifu. Also you need Combat experience in Sparing and real Fights. I lived 8 Years in Thailand and I went into a few ugly Situations, my Wing Tsun never let me down. Just my 2 Pence
That's exactly what I thought, I never thought just practicing wing chun makes you a beast at fighting, it's a concept you can apply but you need to test it in order to improve it and your own skill, it makes me sad that wing chun is becoming kind of a joke due to these so called masters
Bruce Ludlow very true. The effectiveness of things like modern Shaolin Kungfu should be questioned. I think the history should be questioned as well, like, how did a martial art that was used in war and actually fought alongside armies become this shadow that is used for entertainment on talent shows and tourist attractions.
@@yanyanzhang5813 i believe in one of his videos, the wing chun guy qi lala or someone explain it very well. There was a time in China when the dynasty forbid any practice of martial arts. Ppl still practiced though, but changed it more into a health thing than combat. That way if they get question they just say, im not practicing martial arts, im just exercising. Things n arts got lost over time. Another thing to consider is, there are many great masters out there. Every master seeks a worthy student to pass the art n secret onto. If no student of such comes around, the master rather have the art n secrets die with them than leave it in the hands of someone who would shame n dishonor the master's name n art. When you reach the stage when your hands n feet react by themselves; by the time u noticed, ur limbs already go. This is the secret behind Bruce's "don't think, feel". Many, if not all the ppl on videos are thinking too much. They stop and thinking "what to do, what the oppo gonna do, what should i do?" A river flows, never stopping to think which way it should go or turn next, cuz there's no time. The water just keeps going, bending at every obstacle. That is another secrect to Bruce's "be like water". There's no time to think in a fight, fist n kicks become a blur. Great example of limbs moving by themselves before u realize is Michael jai white's interview where he tells story of him accidently punching a guy for checking his watch in subway station.
[Mr.][Asian][Guy] [Plays][Video][Games] that was during the Qing Dynasty, where martial arts was basically outlawed. However if I do remember correctly, the Shaolin temple is not under direct jurisdiction of the Emperor. I may have remembered wrong though. China has always been different from European cultures since Europeans have this God before Royalty idea such as the Pope having more power than Monarchs while it is the opposite in China since Emperors will always have more power than a monk. So I could’ve remembered wrong when I said that Shaolin was not under the Emperor, but for now, I stand by what I said. Also combat sports was banned for a few years around the time post WWII and the unison of China under Mao.
@@yanyanzhang5813 Shaolin Martial Arts doesn't actually exist - There is not a SYSTEM of Shaolin exclusive martial arts, Martial Arts MASTERS come from everywhere to practise in the Shaolin temple. Some martial arts arose from PURE BS and delusionality like Crane Style
The puzzling thing about TCMA is that up until about the first few decades of the 20th century, there was a tradition of "open platform" fights where the TCMA did actually do fairly brutal fighting with all sorts of styles mixing it up with hardly any rules, more or less like the early UFC. That's actually how Tai Chi and some of the other well-known styles became famous in the 19th century. Looking at the broader picture, we're sort of lucky (East Asia and the world generally, just from an antiquarian perspective) that guns became widespread relatively later in East Asia than in Europe - it meant there was still a bit of a hangover of unarmed/melee styles and schools that had been combat tested in the real world for centuries. Compare and contrast with the Western MA, which pretty much either disappeared completely or were subsumed into dueling or sport forms by about the 18th century or so - so much so that it was more or less a surprise when (over the past few decades) people started taking a closer look at the mediaeval "fight books" (first scholars, then MA enthusiasts) and discovered that Western MA had at one time been fully as sophisticated in terms of what one might call weird techniques as the East Asian stuff (e.g. with wrestling moves closely integrated with melee weapons, etc., etc.). And here it's also important to note that the unarmed forms in EA MA were generally considered as just a kind of basic training and fallback - the real meat of a "style" was with melee weapons, the whole point was training towards that. (And you can still see a bit of a remnant of that in some of the TMA which have lots of different weapons forms too.) So what changed? Surely Communism had something to do with it - the ditching of a lot of tradition, the forbidding of the practice of traditional things during the Cultural Revolution, etc. If you zoom in on the base style of Tai Chi (Chen style, which was a clan village style), the continuity of that in the latter half of the 20th century hung on the very thin thread of a few clan guys who defied the authorities by continuing to train the younger generation, even sometime having to do it in secret (one of them was even imprisoned for it IIRC). Another consideration might be the twin factors of the romanticization of the TCMA in wuxia novels in the early 20th century and their glorification as national treasures in the nationalist period. That's probably the originating cause of a lot of the fakery around. Closely related, there's the factor that there's a continuous "half life" phenomenon with the "reality" of combat sports - again and again, you have the phenomenon where a form of competition starts off with a quest for authenticity, and then eventually the combat sport becomes commercialized, and the participants choose a quiet life with less likelihood of injury, so everything becomes a work, and then the quest for authenticity starts up again. This has happened many times in the West, certainly (e.g. early pro Wrestling to WWF, early UFC now transitioned to something more staged - although MMA does seem to be holding onto authenticity a bit longer than similar phases in the past, probably on account of pressure from below because of the vast number of amateurs into MMA who are too knowledgeable to be easily fooled.). Similar "waves" of transition from authenticity to commercialization and fakery have no doubt occurred in East Asia too. I think part of the problem is also that there was always a certain secretiveness about the various clan styles, etc. - which was perfectly understandable of course, in a context where a) surprise is a huge element in combat effectiveness, and b) historically, combat actually did mean life or death. But where lines of transmission were broken because of the upheavals through the fall of empire, nationalism and then communism, that secrecy meant a kind of fragmentation. (And to understand the reasons for secrecy even better, look at it from the other point of view, consider what's happened to the Gracies: at one time, when BJJ was a surprise to the world, they ruled the roost, but eventually everyone and their mother learned BJJ, and the family itself lost that "edge". No big deal in the modern context, one might say - compensated for by financial gain, etc. But consider a comparable scenario right up to the, say, the 19th century, when the EA combat arts weren't sports and did mean life or death.) And this leads to the other point: if you look at the ancient styles of combat, there's a lot to do with breathing (prana in India, qi in China, ki in Japan - but there are even vague hints about "spirit" here and there in ancient and mediaeval Western lore), which suggests that fascia conditioning was much more important, probably as important as muscle conditioning. But that's pretty recondite stuff, that, again, would have been closely guarded - so if lines of transmission were broken, you'd end up with a situation where you have a lot of forms where the techniques were empty, or one might say, had lost their engine. There's also a logistical point that in order to train live you need partners - and again, that's a problem if lines of transmission are broken and scattered. What this all means, I think, is that the fat lady hasn't yet sung on the TCMA. There probably is a "real thing" but it's probably as rare as hens' teeth, tucked away in obscure villages here and there, where a) there had been some continuity of training from the early 20th century to the present, and b) there was a sufficient pool of people who could do live training. It may take a while yet before those kinds of things come more into the light, get sportified, etc. Or to put it another way, China perhaps needs to go through a similar phase to what Jigoro Kano did with old jujitsu forms, or how Muay Thai was codified and consolidated as a national sport.
If you are learning Kung Fu there is definitely hidden knowledge. and there should be. There are certain things that just need to wait until the skill level is high enough. Adding Mysticism just makes it fun, and a lot of people are learning KF for that reason... its escapism, it keeps their interest and members will stay around longer. Sparing can be confronting and uncomfortable and a deterrent. But you're right, its about balance and relevance. a progressive school that always bring their traditional learning into practical applications is a good school, but Im guessing most cant do that. The Sifus at my school are all hardened from the days of full contact fighting. My SiGung was the Australian full contact champion and that experience flavours everything we learn.
if its called a martial arts, then someone spending years of their life/money should be able to effectively defend themselves ......Sparing can be confronting and uncomfortable and a deterrent....interesting statement .....so can someone punching you in the face with bad intentions......at least sparring is done in a controlled setting, where students will learn what it feels like to be in a uncomfortable situations......this mentality is what is killing off traditional martial arts.....especially wing chun....where most teaches don't spar because the techniques are too dangerous .......right......
spanishh2001 martial arts is for anyone, if you want to learn to fight you can. If you just like the way it looks and feels you can do that too. Horses for courses. Horses can be confronting too.
@M T you are correct...you can take any martial art you like ....even if its known not be effective at keeping you alive in a real fight ...not a problem....just don't call it self defense....call a form of dance.... meditation etc.... because if getting punched in the face, is too uncomfortable for many ...which is understandable....don't try to sell it to people as a form of self defense because ....rename it for what it is Bushido....I know alot of people don't like for wing Chun to be called out for being a joke ....which it is, to me anyway...don't try and sell it as a form of self defense...it will get you killed in a real situation ...with someone who isn't your friend or paid to take a dive .....and please do t mention to me all these secrets contained within most traditional arts which take 30 yrs of practice to be discovered .....then to get your jaw or leg broken by some kid with 6 months of MMA ....I've seen this happen more then once ....am mainly talking about wing Chun and Kung Fu arts....yes I have seen some very good karate and Korean fighters ...but for some reason I've yet to see any good Chinese fighters ...without the usual can't use the technique because it's too dangerous and that finger strike will paralyze me and lead to sudden death .....😁😁😁
We knew this for years since the UFC 1... The reason to practice traditional martial arts is like practicing yoga and immersing in Chinese culture. You get a nice insight studying the evolution of fighting which I looked from trying Japanese Ju jitsu to judo to doing bjj or look at old boxing/pugilism to modern boxing. You see how the needs change an art significantly but sparring is a great driving force for simplicity and efficiency. You must note in the context of old martial arts they worked during their times which are not our times being much more skilled in hand to hand vs in the old days weapons ruled all (thinking of my knowledge of HEMA). We need to train modern arts for self defence but we shouldn’t hate each other but understand each arts flaws like BJJ sucking at striking etc... Still MMA is prob the best right now though I’m more of a BJJ guy in terms of martial arts as it fits in to modern context the best as we’re not allowed guns and knives in the UK and many countries.
Very interesting video, Jerry. Thank you. If you do not write, you cannot claim to be a writer, no matter how many pens you own. If you do not paint, you cannot claim to be a painter, no matter how many brushes you own. If you do not fight, you cannot claim to be a fighter, no matter how many forms you know. TCMA came down from people who had to use them to fight for their lives, so the *arts* work but what we have is generations of *people* who do not know how to *make them work*. Just as we no longer know how to make Greek Fire. So, in many schools, the fighting art is dead. How did this come about? Speaking for the lineage of Wǔzǔquán (五祖拳) that I come from, the master who founded our branch (Chee Kim Thong) fought and killed Japanese soldiers hand-to-hand. But he was the last of our lineage who needed to use his art as a killing art. He killed so many people that he was sick of fighting and often said (at least the few times that I met him), that fighting was not as important as health. I agree with Jerry that if you practise your art only for health, it is no longer a Quán (拳). Of course, Master Chee was in his 70s when I heard him say that health was more important. I have noticed this change in elderly TCMA teachers (including myself). Their focus changes from teaching about fighting to teaching about health as their own mortality looms. I have also seen teachers change their focus from teaching about fighting to preserving the body of knowledge. So, their students end up spending most of their time practising 30, 40, 50 or more forms (which was fine if you were a monk with nothing else to do in the 17th Century) and less time *pressure-testing*. One of my bugbears in TCMA is using 2,500-year-old language to describe phenomena that can be clearly explained using modern terms, e.g.: "Sinking your Qì (氣)"; "Directing your Jìn (勁)". This, combined with an absence of pressure-testing, creates an unnecessary aura of mysticism which attracts those who want to defraud the naïve, as well as the naïve themselves, and deters practical-minded people who could benefit from some excellent arts. There are too many so-called "Masters" who wear silk brocade and speak in serene tones about "energy", and too many people who desperately need everything to be made of rainbows. I feel some who practise MMA have decided for themselves that it is the standard against which *all* fighting should be measured; if your art doesn't work in the MMA cage, then it doesn't work. But put a sword in the hand of an MMA champion and put him up against someone who has been doing HEMA for a year and he'll be soundly beaten. HEMA fighting is no less "real" than MMA fighting, in my opinion. They are both one-on-one contests in artificial circumstances: a perfectly flat and relatively soft surface, a constrained area, a referee, rules. This "artificiality" gives many TCMA people the (lame) excuse that their art is for "real" fighting, not combat sports. But then they don't do "real" fighting either, unlike their predecessors. How could they? The "real" circumstances under which TCMA flourished no longer exist, thankfully. They often say: "My art is for self-defence only". But you cannot test self-defence unless you live in a part of town where you are *constantly* being attacked in the street. And if you cannot test it, how can you teach it? One of the best lessons I ever learned was when I was 20. In fact, it was two lessons. I was not yet a black sash in an Americanised form of CMA and I entered a Kyokushinkai full-contact competition. I came up against a Kyokushinkai green-belt. I immediately whacked him with three uppercuts to the ribs in quick succession. Zero effect. Lesson One: you don't know whether your stuff works or not until you try it out. I was shocked and didn't know what to do. He took advantage and roundhouse kicked me in the neck. I staggered back. He then hit me with an uppercut that cracked a rib and front-kicked me off the mat. I was unconscious before I hit the floor. Lesson Two: what it feels like to get hit hard. The fight lasted about 30 seconds. I say "fight", but it was quite one-sided. I would say almost no TCMA practitioners today have ever learned those two *invaluable* lessons. As an aside, I switched to a TCMA school under a Chinese instructor not long after that fight and, within six months, my uppercuts were knocking the wind out of people who held the heavy-bag for me. I will turn 59 soon and, like many ageing TCMA practitioners before me, have little interest in fighting now. But if I were to start teaching classes again, I would pressure-test my students from Day 1. I wouldn't have them do MMA competition - but I wouldn't prevent them either - because A) I do not have the experience of that world to be able to coach them and B) I do not *want* to coach people for the constraints of combat sports. But I would insist that they spar and encourage them to spar people from as many fighting styles as they can. I have a couple of related videos on my channel. I won't provide links here but if anyone is interested, they are called "What is Mastery?" and "If you practise traditional Chinese martial arts, you're probably not a fighter." Kind regards. Declan Chellar
Yeas ago, I saw some old black and white movies of Tai Ch practitioners sparring. It was very circular and fast! I felt it might be functional when done that way.
Excellent video (I am too old but trained under Chuck Norris legacy in the day) and wish MMA was around back then. Back then an athlete trained a bit in fighting and boxing destroyed untrained folks. Though I wish I spent more time at the HG combat courses before I got old.
Dude just found your channel like now and I totally agree with you. Many martial arts came from how human imitate certain animal to defend themselves, but as time goes on, they met another style and tried each other on and the style will be revised again and again by each generation. Unfortunately, some master of certain martial arts sadly sunk in arrogance to keep their style "original" then after couples of generations they even forgot to spar against each other while still overshadowed by the tale of their great great great grandmaster. People mistook traditional martial arts as fake martial arts. Well, maybe the "quality" is already deteriorated, but the martial art itself is real. . I learnt tae kwon do (a year) and silat (5yrs). For silat, the same as my previous paragraph, the practitioner travelled to many places and sometimes spar then the technique is being developed. Now, we can see that many silat covers the pretty same movement, this shows either that silat was born from the same root or they develop together and exchange their technique. . Sadly, as for silat, I see many "fake" are style still going. I'm not telling their style name, but I can say their style covers lots of weird step who shows your back towards the enemy.
>"if you go to business school, how would you know about business if you don't do business" Great analogy, people think that if you study business you will be a good businessman and the funny thing is that most successful business people didn't even touch an university. Practice and theory must go together, but in the end, between a pure theorist vs a pure pragmatist, the pragmatist will win.
As someone who studied karate and Hung Gar Gar, and who lucky that my school did sparring , and it looked like Kick boxing when we sparred. The lack of sparring with all the mysticism have made TCMA a joke. . Hopefully it changes. Most traditional Martial arts have the same techniques punching, kicking, Throws, elbows, knees...it is just the application, the mind set that makes a huge difference.
MMA is basically a combination of White Western boxing and wrestling with a little Brazilian jiu jitsu thrown in. I know some will say I'm wrong but the majority of western MMA fighters use these styles because they work in real combat. Here is a old Western video of a Boxer vs Karate master ruclips.net/video/YakX27RHTRI/видео.html
@@PirateTubeTV about that MMA thing...would never take away from Boxing, but seems that BJJ seems to be the common base to all these MMA guys. For eg..for punching- some train Boxing, some American Kickboxing, some Muay Thai. For takedowns, some guys Wrestle, some do Judo.. But for the ground they all BJJ. Either train in it or train to defend against it.
that was the mindset, a few are incorparating useful parts of broader disciplines more recently, taking what works and discarding the rest, instead of ignoring the whole out of hand & never really looking to see if any value's there
Thanks for the video bro I practice wing chun a lot and I got an idea of practicing wing chun with other martial arts like Muay Thai and filipino martial arts 😁
Thailand is ahead. since 1970's Thai fighters have always known Kungfu was just entertainment. Our golden era fighters have fought against every style.
I'm glad I chance upon your video when i did (after I watched videos that debunk TCMA and reading comments and watching videos that defend it as well). You've brought a middle ground to the arguement, as well as showcasing people that actually have a mature mindset from the TCMA side that accepts the limitations of TCMA, respecting the combat effectiveness from MMA practices. On the other hand, also trying to evolve their combat style while preserving tradition. I agree that as long as there is this group of TCMA practitioners that are realistic in their approach of evolving their combat style and willing to put it to the test, we can reach an appreciation of TCMA for its own values of discipline and effectiveness while casting out the mysticism to reach a more wholesome view of the subject
Thank you for saying how Chinese folks are starting to react to some of these fake "Masters" because I have been curious about that too. Living in Dongguan I don't really see too many people using different Kung Fu styles except for mostly Taiichi in the park (and those are mostly older folks) as Taekwondo is more popular here, but it is good to hear that more people are seeing the flaws. I hope that in seeing them they can be willing to adjust and learn how "traditional" Martial Arts can change and grow.
@@FightCommentary Not bad honestly. We are considered to be in a low risk area, so school is pretty much back to normal, however there are still no interschool sports competitions planned for this year just in case. And still when taking the taxi, subway, or DD you still are required to used a mask. Other than that things are pretty good. How are things were you are?
Man your channel is very entertaining and I'm glad that there is some criticism and not just religiously believing in just one style and don't use anything, just like I was thought in wing chun class, but I was always critical about that. I want to share my opinion about this too. We all have to understand that Martial Arts like everything else in the world evolves, some people still live in the past. I mean yeah maybe in the past wing chun could work against some styles because long time ago there were barely some practitioners who mixed some other style in their basic fighting style and that's why one simple wing chun had some success, maybe not all the time but, lets say it had some success. Now days there is a MMA thanks to bruce lee and joe lewis who broke that fighting style religion of not mixing other styles, that's why MMA this days is the best type of fighting style, because you have punching, kicking, grappling and everything mixed and now that is modern type of fighthing style, also you have lots of guys who weight lift and can get bigger and stronger, just like Xu Xiaodong is. I know that wing chun is still old type of style now days, not because of the same practice method, but because most of wing chun practitioners don't do sparring and also its very important like the sparring is the endurance type of training that is must now days. I think you can see the lack of endurance in Qi La La, idk if you have noticed, that when he fight the first round he is more explosive and energetic to win, but when the second round comes he is so exhausted and that's why I think he lost the most of those fights he had.
Bro, You forgot a key aspect. 80% of the attacks and blocks in Wushu are made to end a combat quickly and with a lot of damage. There are hits to the groin area, the knees, elbows,neck, throat,eyes and other soft points. If you want to do a combat sport train sanda/sanshou
Ramsey Dewey does a great explanation about this idea, if someone throws a head kick or and elbow its “must Thai” or if someone chokes someone while on their back it’s “Brazilian jujitsu” Striking only has a small amount of proven effective strikes for any level of experience fighter. Same as grappling. The four world’s most popular fighting styles are boxing/muay Thai for striking and freestyle wrestling/Brazilian jujitsu for grappling. Nobody realizes there are many other forms of fighting since those are the most popular and assume when they see a similar move in a fight they assume they must practice one of those arts instead of the art they have actual background in.
BTW, talking about BJJ, I launched a new channel focused on grappling: ruclips.net/channel/UCQfBeZEQXbiGfgR_BEySSPQ Would love to have you as a subscriber!
It's really not a Chinese martial arts problem but a problem with what commonly *passes for* Chinese martial arts today. People from my Bagua/Taiji school have won the large majority of their fights in boxing, sanda, and kickboxing tournaments. Just these last couple of years they've brought home maybe 10 golds. Note that these people are pure Chinese martial artists conditioned using Bagua/Taiji methods, primarily zhanzhuang, and employing kungfu techniques in the ring. And yes of course we spar. It's simply not possible that we are the only CMA school with effective training methods - other styles of Chinese martial arts *must* have them too. In fact, I have seen a lot of very good stuff from other legit schools; but what gets eyeballs are the circus acts. Though to be fair the good schools do seem to be outnumbered by the bad ones.
Interesting video thank you :). When you were talking about someone who'd learnt everything but is still untested it reminded of that great expression: No plan survives contact with the enemy
I visited most of the Wing Chun schools in Hong Kong about 10 years ago. There is a huge variation in style of teaching. Some is absolutely deluded bullshido. Some masters teach the 'soft force' and how it overcomes hard energy. I could have filmed all the woo woo masters and ridiculed Wing Chun, dismissed the whole style. But I also met some masters that were absolutely authentic, hard as nails and with lots of real fighting experience. Just one example - Wan Kam Leung (student of Wong Shun Leung) who has terrible scars on his arms (from knife fighting) to prove it. The bit everyone misses with Wing Chun is hardness. The style simply won't work without hand conditioning. Anyone who misses this out will find it ineffective. The whole style is based around it and yes wearing gloves takes this advantage away. Power is sacrificed for speed, hardness causes the pain and damage. Wan Kam Leung wasn't muscle bound he is all conditioned sinew and bone and has hands and arms of iron. He hits hard and heavy without effort and he was much older than me. Look him up. Watch his videos. But you won't get it until you feel his hands on you. He'd be your worst nightmare in a real fight.
I can't believe in something I'm not allowed to question. Asking is the purifier of our thoughts and it helps us stay on the ground. Throughout history, man is prone to delusion and I'm not just referring to religion but more things than that like gender. The moment people stop asking questions, that's the end of our freedom.
When I lived in NYC I studied tui shou under a genuine and skilled master who daily and routinely tossed men from all walks of life around like rag dolls and he himself was a combat veteran in WW2. But, at one point there was a crowd of men gathering who tried to goad me into seeing if I could throw and land a one step punch. I didn’t want to do it because of my background but my teacher and others insisted. I stepped in quickly an caught his lip. He seemed happy and slightly surprised, but even with my competitive judo background I had trouble moving him when we wrestled. I feel that the easy answer for the general public is to pick a side MMA v Traditional without any real investment. I loved my training in catch wrestling , wrestling , judo, MMA, BJJ, Muy Thai, boxing, etc., but I also enjoyed Tui Shou, kali, Silat, HEMA, JKD, Krav Maga, even some of the Aikido and wing chun, etc., I would just say to people who are interested in martial arts not to forget to pressure test, randori, free fight, etc., and to have fun with these systems. Enjoy life, and don’t forget that there are other hobbies out there besides martial arts that can enhance the quality of life as well, like playing musical instruments, woodworking, making ceramics,traveling, tennis, etc. life is short. One minute you’re planning your future and the next minute you are thinking about your past.
I wonder if it’s kinda like accents in a single language. When speaking, the accents are distinct, when singing the distinct accents become less noticeable. The closer martial arts come to real combat application, the closer they will resemble each other or lose their accents.
@6:45: I've been saying this for years. Thanks bro. I personally think they're all congruent, if not alike in movement. Just have different names. I'm over 20yrs in Kenpo and I realized this late '90's as I was going over "BJJ" basics. Good vid. I totally agree!
I went 4 times to China to train taichi and kungfu. Been training Chinese martial arts for 15 years, mainly taichi in fact. Tremendous benefits to all facets of my health. Never thought it taught my to fight though, it really didn't. I figured defending myself against stress and stuff that attacks your system everyday was a better way to spend my time. Couple years back I started bjj and a mix of muai thai and kick boxing. I know with solid basics, at 6'4 220lbs lean I can defend myself against most people, not looking to become a champ. Lots of people who practise Chinese martial arts think they're badass even though they actually have no clue what fighting really feels like. Also, god damn man clean your room lmao
I’ve been doing Gung Fu for many years. I’ve had many opportunities to fight a variety of styles (karate, kempo, TKD, MT, bjj, etc) I was appreciative because I found that my experiences in class were limited. As I fought various styles I tried my best to implement techniques and I would analyze the fights to see if I had an issue with timing, speed, concepts, or BS techniques. What wound up happening is that I found timing to be too difficult for complex techniques. So I simplified. But the concepts remained relatively in tact. Simplification and maintaining certain concepts seemed to do well for me. But it wasn’t until my son started wrestling and doing judo that I saw how other techniques applied. I understand controlling space and position, leverage and physics. But I also feel subtle movements with my son because of many years of sticky hands. So I do sticky hands with him as we explore the things I know and it might benefit him. Constant sparring, analyzing, and truthfulness.
Actually that's what kung fu was for as well. It was not just a set of fighting skills, it was also survival skills. Kung fu practitioners didn't just train to fight, they trained to transform the way their minds and bodies dealt with various situations, including the exact situations in which you'd apply parkour skills today. Unfortunately, this versatility gets lost in translation, and people nowadays expect kung fu to be either all about fighting or, if if can't be that,"it must be useless", which is honestly ridiculous when you think deeply about it.
@@tranquil_dude But the thing is, most people including me didn't learn parkour trough Kung Fu, Parkour itself is a *non combative martial arts* practice. (Even though i´m not here discrediting your argument). Parkour was primarily more a practice for freedom of movement and body exercise based on natural elements instead of the gym.. I don´t do parkour anymore but the feel and excitement is definitely something i miss.
@@Zoza15 gong fu (功夫) didn't exactly mean combative martial arts either. It means a fine skill acquired through hard work, usually with transformative effects on mind and body. That means in China, it's perfectly acceptable to say, "You have impressive Parkour gong fu !". On the other hand, gong fu has also been used so often as an euphemism for practices involving combative martial arts (both within and outside China) that there is confusion about what the purpose of doing gong fu is, especially for people outside China. The Chinese term that can be most accurately translated as "martial art" is Wu Yi (武艺), which literally means "martial art". And it has slightly different connotations than gong fu. Whereas having gong fu implies some impressive skill (which can range from wrestling to Parkour), having wu yi implies specifically that you have the skills to fight in battle, subdue a criminal (i.e. as a policeman) or be a bodyguard etc. ( And yes, wu yi can be considered a type of gong fu. ) Unfortunately, as I've mentioned, in the modern world, there's some confusion between "impressive skill" and "martial", especially when it comes to things like traditional martial arts. And even more unfortunately, this has gone beyond just a semantic problem. People *really* aren't clear about what the purpose of a particular (traditionally handed down) skill is. Which in turn means the skill doesn't get practiced properly and in the right context. And that's why, for example, we have all these incidents of "traditional martial arts" supposedly being "proven useless".
@@tranquil_dude *gong fu (功夫) didn't exactly mean combative martial arts either. It means a fine skill acquired through hard work, usually with transformative effects on mind and body. That means in China, it's perfectly acceptable to say, "You have impressive Parkour gong fu !* Gong Fu?, ok 👍🏽. Sorry dude, i dont speak Chinese (no offense), as i mentioned is that Parkour is defined as a *Non Combative Martial Arts* By its founders.. The arts and skill to freely move and jump and run wherever you want, with minor injuries hopefully. I did Parkour for many years until i messed up my knee, but i can still run but now i have simply outgrown the desire to practice parkour daily but the skills i have learned over the years is still in me.. *Unfortunately, as I've mentioned, in the modern world, there's some confusion between "impressive skill" and "martial", especially when it comes to things like traditional martial arts. And even more unfortunately, this has gone beyond just a semantic problem. People really aren't clear about what the purpose of a particular (traditionally handed down) skill is. Which in turn means the skill doesn't get practiced properly and in the right context. And that's why, for example, we have all these incidents of "traditional martial arts" supposedly being "proven useless".* The world is busy and full of traffic, most people these days are just trying to get by to make sure they have dinner on the table and a roof over their heads. Things could be different with a new mindset but in the modern day time is money and many people wouldn't care about traditional martial arts and the efforts and the philosophies behind it..
Basically: Never mystify Martial Arts. Use what is effective (Same logic as MMA). And there is a possibility that both MMA and TMA can learn from each other. (IMO I think TMA can learn more from MMA ). I saved you like 16 minutes of your life.
@7:20....the Wing Chun master forgot that they had two weapons. The single-headed long pole (descended from spear) and the twin butterfly swords. Two popular weapons among the Cantonese militia. It was for war. But even the people practicing these arts today forget this. They treat weaponry as “training tools” for strength training smh
Having trained both Wing Chun and Koryu, I doubt Wing Chun was used in war. It feels more like a civilian style. First of all, if it was for war, the weapon techniques would be thought first, unarmed combat would be last. Second the techniques would be focussed on weaknesses in armor. I also doubt Wing Chun long pole was derived from the spear. At least, it did not retain any spear specific elements. It lacks the corkscrew motion and shortening and lengthening of the spear. It is a very typical long pole style. Finally, the double knives in Wing Chun are more chopping instruments, while all historical southern double knives, which were used by militia are very much designed for stabbing.
Dimitron ....the simplicity of the system being suitable for mass training, along with the prominent thrusting techniques, in addition the pole being traditionally long + tapered in my opinion lends credibility that it is related if not came from spear technique. (Honestly I try to practice it shortened to mid-grip too sometimes for closer fighting but that’s just me...it’s certainly possible with the techniques). It’s also entirely possible that the weapons and unarmed techniques developed separately and then brought together at some point. We have to understand the alot of the styles that survived to this day, the unarmed portion at least were very much a “modern” development. Back then in real battle (not fistfights) between villages, weaponry was used, not barefists. As times progressed and society “modernized”, the focus moved to unarmed fighting instead of weaponry. The weaponry portion of any of the kung fu styles, flowery or diluted they may be (depending on the school or style) were likely older and were for battle at some point in the past.
Dimitron ...it’s well-recorded that gentry (yes civilian) have led and trained local militia for self-defense, in support of the state, fight bandits, or attack other villages, etc. This is still warfare, no? By Qing period which WC and many other surviving Chinese styles are formulated during, armor has become very rare. From what I understand a stab and a chop is enough from a simple spear or sabre. Specialized armor-breaking weapons like maces, iron whips, halberds, are long out of fashion with the armor. No doubt the antique double knives are longer back then, and there seems to some serious debate whether the flipping of knives for reverse grip is considered “orthodox”. Regardless of what weapon and the techniques with it, is it not thought of for killing or maiming (whether war or self-defense)? It can’t be possible that all the various masters in the past thought “let’s bring in a bunch of weaponry and make up a bunch of movements to strength-train or sell our arts in the marketplace?”
Dimitron ...but I do agree with you WC is very much a “civilian” style. But judging how turbulent that era was in the Pearl River Delta (Opium Wars, Red Turban Revolt, Punti-Hakka wars, the rampant banditry and piracy, etc) I wouldn’t be surprised that the progenitors/practitioners of Wing Chun, Hung Gar, Bak Mei, etc have seen at least some action up to the Republican era.
I agree with everything said in this video. If I can add something which may be of interest, and represents my point of view on TCMA: I've been practicing K1-style Kickboxing as my main martial art for 8 years, and then Taekwondo for 2 years and a half. Those two disciplines came at different times for different purposes: from Kickboxing I learned what it meant to spar, to take a punch, and to give one. That, along with basic punches, kicks, knees, and sweeps. Then with Taekwondo, I've refined what I felt lacked in my previous training: kicks and agility. Now I've moved to traditional Kung fu, and what I notice is that once again the focus of the practice is different: Kung Fu, in my experience, is based on movement mechanics - not techniques. What that means is that in a Kung Fu form what matters the most is the body handling which then generates the movements: for example, when you throw a punch, does the force travel cleanly from your foot to the hand which expresses the technique? Are you tense? Are you really transferring your movement from foot to hand (so that the foot generates the punch, not the arm) or are you just coordinating the legs with the body while your shoulder's doing the work? What is your spine doing while you punch? Is it active or is it just a "thing" attached to the shoulders and hips? Small details which are game-changing when you put them together: a punch may look like one "thrown from the arm" but behind it the body's acting in a completely different way which makes the result look the same, but much more stable, stronger, heavier. When practicing a form that's what I focus on, not the single applications. Those come later on, once the body handling skills have become predominant, you put those movements (which are again, movements, not techniques) into actual techniques, so that whatever technique you're using (palm strikes, punches, throws, deflections) are fueled by the mechanics you learned before. Then comes pressure testing, then comes sparring (it must be present!). All those things should have a place and be used in a correct manner, it's like a cooking recipe: you can't obtain the intended result if you don't use each ingredient the way it's meant to be used. So, in my experience, if you use a Kung Fu form just to replicate the movements without handling the body in the way it's meant to be handled, you end up with an "empty dance". Your techniques are just half correct, the shape is correct but what's inside is not what it's meant to be. Once you have an understanding you have to apply it too, otherwise, there is once again just half of the work. The effectiveness of something comes in great part from the way it is used: not just in sparring, also before that phase of the training comes correct use. Again: if you learn forms but move through those forms without using correct body handling, you're replicating a shape. That's why it's better to practice one form in the correct way rather than 10 forms with just the external shell being present. Techniques are contingent and situational, body handling skills are not, they should be the foundation of your movements. I hope this can be of help to someone, this was a great interview to watch! :)
I think the greatest gift TCMA has to offer modern combat sports is the emphasis on physical health and conditioning. Those giys you see training traditional shaolin kungfu may not have the most economical techniques but they sure are tough. Alot of that emphasis on cultivating strength and overall fortitude has been diminished or forgotten all together.
Nice throat singing! No, great analysis though. I’ve been in both setting of sparring and non-sparrring traditional martial arts and left some communities because of their opinions and lack of respect for each other. Could not agree more. Southern Chinese styles’ practitioners have often said to me they think the northern styles are too flowery and not “effective” but they don’t spar in their school. I say to myself “ at least wushu guys know they’re dancing.”
I think the point about application is definitely the key here. It’s not about TCMA vs MMA or style or anything like that. MMA practitioners have the advantage because they apply what they learn and know how to react to an opponent. If you could magically transport a top TCMA master from China’s most turbulent era, when martial arts were depended on for life and death self defense on a regular basis, I would bet that that the TCMA would destroy an equally skilled MMA fighter in a no holds barred, no rules fight. Why? Because MMA still has rules. The person who has more experience knowing how to not only react to the opponent but to their own mind in a life or death fight is going to win.
In my opinion, some of the so call, BS master, it is lacking sparring. The truth is sparring isn't sufficient either. There is a big difference between warrior training and martial art training. All warrior know martial art, but not all warrior are great martial artist. On the other hand some martial artist are great warrior while others are crappy warrior. Warrior training and martial art training are different, but sometime they overlap. Think of it this way, in math, there are calculation skills and application skills that you are train in. Application is e.g. a question that ask, Jack got 5 dollars and Tina got 2 dollars, how much money they got together? calculation is obvious 2+2 = ? and the student give an answer. Martial art training is like calculation, it is about teaching you a set of fighting skill, warrior training is about teaching you how to apply in actual combat situation. The two got different focus, warrior training focus more on application and how to be effective in real world environment, but less training on fight skills, although such training do exist. Martial art training focus more on fighting skills, but not as much on how to deal with real world environment. In the ancient world, there was no dojo, there were warrior training academy and in those days, martial art skill was very important. But since then, the two start to split. However, martial art training still need some level of warrior training and that is especially in terms of sparring, this is because, most civilian that practice martial art are training for self defense, not for sport, so you need to provide them with a level of warrior training. Warrior training find they still need a set level of martial art training, in fact in term of police brutality in the US, a lot of criticism from former cops claim, the issue is, not sufficient martial art training, leading to cops been scared and when cops are scare they get very trigger happy. US army still consider martial art training to be very important, while British army consider it as none important, however, a lot of soldier still find it important and learn martial art in dojo. In the ancient world, for example with the Samurai, Karate and Judo are both training that Samurai got, but Samurai are warriors, not martial artist. In that instance the Samurai are both great martial artist and warrior, today, people that train focus usually on only one of the two arenas. A lot of martial artist said, they been helping police to train in martial art, to increase their martial art standard, but going out on the field and fight like the cops do, they can't do it, while cops say, they might be able to fight better, but they don't have as much fighting skills.
A lot of good stuff in there, and I can vouch for it. I started with western boxing, and we'd learn a little bit, then get matched up in tournaments with others with a similar number of fights, experience, age group, and weight range, and we'd learn to apply it in the real world context: getting progressively better. In the old days in China, exponents of Xing Yi, for example (because there were extensive numbers of tournaments) would usually kill, or at least maim, their opponents. But that physical, real world application simply isn't there any more with traditional martial arts, so that aspect is dying, if it's not cremated already. Even with karate and their kumite setting, there are an extensive number of rules: no groin or head attacks, for example, which does the same thing. If you want to seriously hurt somebody, and that's the whole point of it all, that is exactly where you hit. So, people train all their lives in some cases, to fight in a certain way, to make all their movements instinctive, and when they're placed into the kumite environment, they can no longer operate on the instinctive level, they have to stop and think. They act hesitantly for that reason and, believe me, if you're up against a halfway decent street fighter, and you have to think instead of operating on the reactive instinctive level, you are beaten before you even start. On top of that, there are other factors that come into play. Many people take up a martial art out of fear, and that's natural enough. It's rapidly becoming a very alienating world. But, because of this aversion to violence, they then neuter everything they work toward by saying they don't want to learn the martial aspect, as they're just doing it for health. If you're going to learn a martial art, learn all of it. Yes, there is definitely a mind/body and even spiritual aspect, but it's also a martial art, so learn that also. If you're going to learn it. learn it comprehensively. Then, practise the movements involved in a systematic way, by way of a practical form of movement. Then work them out on the bag. And then, if somebody picks you on the street, get stuck into them in a big way. Employ the situation. In the old days, Taiji practitioners would thank their attackers for the practice. It takes a lot of years - at least ten to become proficient in Taiji - but it's an excellent martial art. They weren't royal body guards because they looked pretty. The last couple of demos I've seen with Taiji practitioners up against MMA fighters have deserved everything they got. The art they are representing definitely didn't. They have obviously, never practised their art. The opponents have. They haven't impressed me as being particularly good, but they have had the practical component, know what it feels like to get hit, have become conditioned to it, have match fitness (which is totally different to standard physical fitness) and have gained the required result.
It feels like it's such a common trope in movies that the hero will learn a Martial Art through drilling and never actually use it until it's needed and even the hero is surprised at how effective it is. Then you have the Dojos, Dojangs, Gyms, whatever that really want to teach and retain students, but don't want people to get hurt and quit.
Bro, you make so much sense! My brother in law was a top guy in his art. One day I said to him, “I can beat you easily!” I stand 5’ 7””, I weigh 82 kilos. In a street fight I would be killed, I’m no fighter! He took my challenge. He got ready, I stood there. He moved in. I stood there. Then I pulled a water pistol from my back pocket, and soaked him! He stood there horrified! I said, “no man no matter how good or how fast can’t dodge a bullet.” I won the point. He didn’t talk to me for six months! He no longer practices his art!
HAHAHA :) So you'd be the Wing Chun master's disciple ;) But in all seriousness. I've had a cousin pull a knife on me when I was showing him some Jiu Jitsu, so there's definitely more to fighting than many of the arts train for. The reality of fights are so much more crazy than the ring. That's probably what the Wing Chun Master was trying to say, but it all got lost in his emphasis on health and his Watermelon Knife analogy ;)
This is similar experience to me when I played command and conquer two weeks ago. Back then i used to be very good at it so i went online and looked for an opponent thinking it would be a walk in the park since i know alot of tactics and tricks. Got into a match but immediately my hand starts shaking and i got very nervous, i was getting irritated that i was not able to do things effectively the way how i thought i was able to execute the moves and tactics then i lost the match. Just like martial arts. If you dont spar, you wont be able to know how to deliver those techniques against a resisting opponent.
Is a similar thing, even in videogames you train some brains routines, muscle memory (of the hands of course) real time strategies cause you're opponent thinks different from an AI
@@LeonYuL sanda is practically kickboxing, is nothing compared to the lei tai were the people used the traditional systems like choy li fut, tai chi, bagua, etc. Now if you practice kung fu they doesn't teach you how to improve the movements and concepts to a fight, they teach you apart sanda
@@juanantonio192 I only see names, nothing system like is shown on the stage, maybe I haven't seen a lot, but I think I saw enough, it's hard to watch tbh
There's a secret art called gun-fu. To use the full power, you have to go to its "power center" called "gun shop" and pay some money. You also have to routinely train in "shooting range". A single hit from its technique can render your opponent incapacitated. However, it is not worth spending that much money on this art because (1) it's too dangerous to use in the ring and (2) MMA rules makes it impossible to unleash its full power in the ring.
I'll tell you the problem with many traditional martial arts ("TMA"): they didn't evolve. When wrestling and jiu jitsu, for example, became more prevalent, there was little effort from TMA practitioners to modernize their fighting skills to address/incorporate more modern methods of combat. Worse yet, due to pride, when confronted about this time and time again, the only response seems to be, "well, in a real fight, I'd bite your face off" or "I practice only street lethal techniques". Pride gets in the way of growth.
Such a good honest explanation of why some of these masters are almost delusional. A good example is animal styles that have a lot of grabbing, clawing, and open palms techniques if you don't train your hand on top of sparring those techniques are worthless because you don't have the hand conditioning to apply them. Without getting into style wars one thing I would say in general is the Japanese traditional martial artists are more likely be more comprehensive because they usually do it all (kata) fighting conditioning, hardened their body, spar, incorporate philosophy and breathing techniques compared to Chinese traditional martial artist who mostly trains lots of forms and maybe some sticky, push hands Go look at some of those older Karata Sensei compared to TCM Sifu's and you'll see what I'm talking about. This is coming from someone who likes traditional Chinese martial arts and trained Hung gar for 10 years though I would say our school was really unique in that we sparred a lot had a lot of members who had done other martial arts and were used to sparring hard. our Sifu was open to having visitors and other schools come around so we used to get a lot of different people coming through wanting to do some hard sparring. At the same time, I got to spar with other schools who had great forms but when it came to fighting it was a joke, they had no timing and were afraid to take hits at all.
Great feature. There are a lot of Bulshido masters out there and I met a few. Saying that I trained in Choy li fut and found it to be very effective for fighting. We sparred regularly and that’s the time you test out techniques that you’ve learnt. One teacher told me that if all you do is come to class and train with the others you’re not going to learn much, you have to go away from class and pick out techniques from the forms and drill them, then go back to class and try them out in sparring, if they don’t work, bin them and try something else. This is what I did and it worked very well for me. Most people are naturally lazy and think they will become Bruce Lee just by turning up, then they battered and leave the class or whatever.
Here's the Fourth Generation Bagua master interview that I mentioned at 8:30
ruclips.net/video/EQBh_RFbK1g/видео.html
If you haven't seen Ma Baoguo's ridiculous fight yet: ruclips.net/video/8GdqJ_wj2nE/видео.html
Like always, thanks for watching! I'll add more links to stuff I talked about as I think about it. Here's our Qi La La playlist: ruclips.net/p/PLtdbPxlsaM_nvgs0NVFFL5_ma47EV4_1O
A followup analysis about Sanda: ruclips.net/video/NDOkPNzKGBg/видео.html
Here's our new channel focused on BJJ! ruclips.net/channel/UCQfBeZEQXbiGfgR_BEySSPQ
Thank you. What I'm hearing is MMA seems to be the top! It would be nice if you expose fake MMA masters XD There are many foundations
Fake MMA masters? I think there are a few. I can send you one privately via Instagram ;) Not trying to start anything with that dude. He's roided up like crazy.
The bagua master is Zhao da yuan
Founder of Zhao clan qin na seventy something now xu xiaodong has a great chance to blow him away
Yo what was that buzzing you did at the end about? You made me lol with that one haha
Nice video Jerry.
My 2 cents:
I think western culture/media mystifies Asian culture so TMA for the most part in all parts of Asia flourished. MMA is practical and direct. Even BL said that 2 years TMA and 2 month boxing/wrestling training can beat the 2 year TMA. I think it's been known among those of us that have practiced martial/combat sport/art for at least 10 years or grew up training in an earlier era.
I like Qi La La, he's a thinker/fighter, it'll be a pleasure to spar with him, please ask him to come to LA. Maybe setup a GoFundMe account after this conronathing is over.
As for this back and forth with MMA and TMA.
I started with TMA, moved onto MMA, and with age back to TMA. if you start young, before puberty, you learn discipline with certain TMA, then with puberty, you use TMA but start incorporating MMA or other styles, at least for me it's a historical and physical journey. because you'll reach an age or point where you mind is trying to cash checks your body can't. Hello TMA ;)
To quote Mike Tyson, "hard to remember ancestor's teaching after getting punched in the face."
Takeaway from the video: A lot of martial arts look like kickboxing/the same since there are only so many moves that are effective. It doesn't mean that a martial art necessarily stole moves from another.
Makes sense. Like swordfighting having a lot of the same moves. There are only so many ways of attacking a defending against someone in practical ways.
Just because a kung fu fighter isn't performing forms like a performance on stage doesn't mean it's not kung fu.
Bruce Lee said this years ago... It doesn't mean he got everything right but he was already on this path. I find it somewhat embarassing that traditional martial artist are only now realizing it.
I believe people will be surprised at what works as mma evolves.
The good Masters always says that good kung fu isnt pretty in a fight
The form and function of the human body will dictate its effective movements, combine that with things like weight displacement and leverage and you'll get alot of whats effective. Makes perfect sense that all practices refined through testing will eventually look the same.
@Stian Johnson yeah i know that, the government banned the traditional forms and tournaments the last century, that why tai chi is what we know right now and not the martial art for war it used to be
This is really interesting to me! I was very taken by the mysticism of TCMA back in the 70's and up until recently (partly from watching your videos) I didn't really know what was BS what what wasn't. Back in the 80's I briefly took classes in Tai Chi from Dr. Yang Jwing Ming (who also taught Kung Fu) and he made it very clear to us that we were not learning self defense. In fact, it was a lot more like learning Yoga with some of the same mysticism (the flow of Chi and meridians). There was a very strong emphasis on the health benefits and I suspect there are some, but I do think the benefits of Tai Chi were exaggerated (though maybe not more than Yoga...). As you describe here about Qi La La, I think Bruce Lee was also endlessly testing and trying things to measure effectiveness. It is kind of surprising how controversial this mind set is. It really would explain a lot if the combat effectiveness of TCMA really was intentionally suppressed at some point during China's history as you discuss in this video. That really is fascinating!
Love how you didn't bother with putting a backdrop or staging a background or even tidied up...subscribed!
It kind of represents the state of Chinese Martial Arts.
@@JerryCricketGaming yeah a mess 😆😆
Relatable!
Looks like my brothers house. He tells me, he would clean up, but he doesn’t give a fuck.
Looks like he moved house 3 years ago and is still unpacking haha
It's not an art, it's how you train it. Train techniques and apply it in sparring. Then you will see what works and what isn't.
Yep
I only know one martial art... "1000 step"
wing chung doesn’t work bro
If you practice a technique that can kill your opponent, who will practice it with you? How to test it to be sure it works?
@@rolanrepolido5655 That argument is used by many schools to avoid not applying the techniques in sparring, and that is why their art loses effectiveness in real combat.
If a technique attacks the throat, for example, it can be fatal if studied scientifically. You don't need to apply it to a sparring partner to know it.
Don't let that stop you from training to improve yourself as a fighter.
A number of years ago I coached boxing in Taipei, so it's always a treat to see your channel. Watching the Qi La La videos takes me back to cornering fighters at those WAKO and amateur San Da tournaments
Awesome! You still in Taipei?
@@FightCommentary I'm in Singapore now. I left TW back in 2014, so this is a great nostalgia trip
@@matthewpernsteiner2163 Wow! Cool. I'll visit Singapore some time and film you!
This video is awesome.
Also, I've been teaching Wing Chun for 15 years and Qi La la looks 100% Wing Chun to me. Love it!
Wing Chun Practioners nowadays don't know what Wing Chun's key Techniques are. Wing Chun main target is to attack Opponent's Crotch and Eyes.
I know a wing chun instructor that has used his style in real fights (not in the ring). He has definitely modified it for a more combative scenario and teaches it that way. As always, it is the ARTIST that makes the art useful.
@@phamhuyphu7517 Therein lies the problem. Wing Chun hasn't modernized. It simply doesn't work against modern MMA.
Also, this whole "I'll bunch your nuts and gauge your eyes" forgets something: you touch my nuts or eyes, and I'll do the same from a dominant position.
We need to stop this whole "it's deadly in the streets, but I can't practice it" BS.
@@del1000005 but it's true. Wing Chun originally focus on kicking the Opponent in the Crotch, Knee and hitting the Opponent in the Eyes and Larynx. It was a Survival Skill in it's Origin, not a Sport.
Qi lala use style similar kickboxing and Jeet Kune Do not real traditional chinese martial arts
I love your channel. I am a life long practicioner who’s studied various martial arts and have come to a lot of similar conclusions. For those of us who have a passion for martial arts these are essential discussions to have. Martial arts, to remain relevant, must evolve. As much as tradition is important, part of that tradition should be evolution of the art. Times change and the arts that don’t change with it are dooming themselves to ineffectiveness.
Did I invite you into the Discord server, btw?
Bruce Lee was criticized for his Jeet Kune Do , which had it's roots in Wing Chun. He incorporated elements from boxing, fencing, and even studied Judo at Seattle dojo when he was living here. He understood the importance of being well rounded and keeping what works and discarding what doesn't. he was constantly evolving his style. When I studied, the school had two instructors who had boxing backgrounds and the head teacher was from a judo background
Considering the Wing Chun he learned from Ip Man was the most radical style of Wing Chun, Jeet Kun Do is in reality just the next step in evolution for Wing Chun.
TMA is primarily light exercise, and it accomplishes that excellently. I lived in Shanghai and I see old people doing taichi every day in the park. I think it's great that old people can stay relatively healthy in their retirement.
In terms of combat effectiveness, yes of course MMA is better and there's no question about that. But how many retirees do you see stretching and getting exercise with MMA drills in their old age? Both MMA and TMA each serve their own purpose, and they're both very good at what they do.
no question that mma is better..in the ring ofc....
@@fazaresIn the streets as well, stop coping
I wish when Qi La La retires to become a master and professionally train Effective Wing Chun with the discarded techniques that don't work,...actually it's better to call it *Qi La La's Wing Chun* because they are techniques working for HIM.
Imagine a martial arts school that teaches qi la la lineage wingchun/xingyi. It would be worth the trip to Taiwan alone
He's smart, a lot of practitioners of Chinese Martial Arts remain close minded, in the sense that they'll stick to using it alone.
To be effective in competitive fighting you need to watch and learn from all styles, because all of them useful things and useless things.
So yeah you can use Chinese martial arts to fight, but you'd need to know how to grapple and get around the other fighting styles as well.
He has a while to go yet, but for sure he is doing what I have been wanting/trying after 7 years of wing Chun and now I train may Thai and mma.
@@dosidicusgigas1376 I don’t know about that “a lot”.
I mean, if that’s what you think he should call his school, sorry to burst your bubble. Chinese people like to give “cool” names even to effective dojos. Like Dragon Claw MMA or something. It’s all about market appeal.
This is true, my teacher told me once, one must have 2 things to be a complete warrior, the knowledge of routines and also have fights, the two must complement each other, If you are only good at routines but you do not have fights it is useless, and if you have many fights but you do not do routines, you have no history, you cannot say that you make an art if you do not know what you do, that is why both things must be combined, both routines and sparring, there is also some truth and that is that sports competitions have too many rules, you can't hit the eyes and throat and neither the genitals, the traditional martial arts are very limited, not only the Chinese speak of all the traditional arts, and sports combat occupies most of the time only basic techniques, As straight punches, hooks, uppercuts, crossed, and kicks since the most basic ones that are circular, thigh, twist and instep kicks, nothing very complex I suppose that for make the fight more dynamic and not so boring, I agree with the man who said, that MMA fighters come to do traditional martial arts, and that the traditional arts sparring, everything must have its balance.
Love your content bro cause this is so true. I came up boxing and fighting irl so had to learn new shit mainly kicking after getting beat sometimes and realized what works and what doesn't via applying that. there are so many schools out there that have idiots with fake ranks that have never been tested. the best fight technique people fail to mention is knowing when to hit the Escape button.
Escape button is so important. Man, I’ve gotten out of so many situations because I bailed. Man. I could tell you stories.
Bravo for Taiwan people who love freedom!
"Freeeeeeeeeedooooooooommmm!"
*head gets chopped off*
Hell yeah! From Taiwan myself
@@AroundElvesWatchUrselves96 Yes freedom is not free and there will always be psychos who want to control others.
Taiwan, the real China
Freedom a scream to justify doing some bullshit . People who are truly free don’t need to request it.
Just subscribed to Qi La La’s channel! I agree on your points regarding what makes something a *martial* art & which views to take when looking at old concepts. If something isn’t working, its time to move on!
Definitely give him all your support. He's almost at 1000 subscribers!
@@FightCommentary He's great, he even sings in some of his videos! :)
The dude at 12:25 was spot on.
This is the only reasonable way forward, rather than these guys sporadically getting the shit kicked out of them and winding up the government.
I dont agree: I have spent most of my time in western competition orientated sports programs like boxing or being a trainer for semi professional wrestlers at the verge of becoming international full professional wrestlers. I spent some month in china. Went to Shaolin. It didnt took me six month to realize that Kung Fu styles are not worthless, but inferior to the western systems. In the west it is about what works and makes you successful in competition. In the east its what tradition and the authority of a master tells you.
@@scheisstag yeah... Right...
@@scheisstag that"s sounds about right.....in china, that below average MMA guy is making all these master's look really bad....and he's not even that good of a fighter (said by himself).....we could probably send a group of western MMA guy's (with maybe 1 yr of training) and am thinking they would mop the floor with most of these masters.....
@@spanishh20011000% there's 17-18 year olds at the gym I go to that would really hurt these dudes and have so much more agression.
I'm glad SOMEBODY finally made a video essay on this. You've earned a 31-year practitioner of Kung-Fu as a new subscriber.
12:00 I agree 100% with this man. If Kung-Fu had no combative value, then Anderson Silva and other MMA fighters wouldn't bother training in Wing-Chub style & add it to their arsenal
“Absorb what is useful, discard what is useless and add what is specifically your own.”
-Bruce Lee
Wisest words when it comes to any form.
Love what you do brother...Well informed, precise and consistent.. Greatly appreciated!
You know now that I think of it... It's a really weird feeling when I learned the most about how to apply Wing Chun while training Sanda. I didn't learn shit while fully training Wing Chun, but after training Sanda for a couple months... I suddenly just got how a fucking Bongsau worked.
Yep. Someone that spars will grow so much from one spar session than six months of just practicing in the air.
Same lol. I did Wing Chun as a kid and as I got older I thought it was pure BS. Picked up Muay Thai much later, and during a clinching/hand-fighting spar I finally understood how to apply Chisau.
Halfway through I realised how weak my partner's framing was, and how his lack of "forward pressure" (as my Shifu would constantly talk about) left him open for me to just walk in and intitiate a hold.
I'm not amazing at MT by any means, but it's sad to think there are all these useful techniques locked away behind an unwillingness to spar.
@@foursix32 Yes! This exactly! I didn't get too deep into Wing Chun so it was really the more basic stuff that clicked. But Chisau helped tremendously in clinch-fighting, added a whole new dimension. Instead of positioning for quick throws in the clinch with orthodox hand fighting, I kinda figured how to trap and position for short strikes before throwing. Very cool stuff!
Same here bruv. I did sanda for 4 years, did no gi for a few months and learnt some wing chun moves from my friend. Bong sau. Pak sau works. But i could never get the tan sau. Imo tan sau will not work against a non telegraphic hook or a tight hook. I would just block like how we usually do or roll under. Huen sau defitnetly work while rolling for sure
@@yip2454 Yep! Paksau and Bongsau are part of my bread and butter now. As for the Tansau, I have the exact same problems. I've heard people say that it shouldn't be used as a block but more as a proactive bridge. Not entirely sure how that works.
Agree with Qi La La. In my experience: I've been practicing Taiji Quan and Xingyi Quan for a year and a half now, but I entered into two gyms to train MMA.
I'll be clear, to get your sparring done, and done well is a life saving activity. After that experience I talked with my wushu teacher, and he told me there is a an aspect about getting the most out of wushu it's to: read the theory, practice the forms and getting your sparring done.
That means that in order to learn how to use each tool in TMA, you should get your hands into the action or you'll never become a competent fighter.
Yeah, certain things are like that. I learned better head movement after getting jabbed in the face a few times. Getting hit (safely) is a necessary part of training MARTIAL arts. Too many arts forget about the martial part. That's why BJJ is so effective. You're constantly testing techniques on other people and yourself.
I just LOVE all of your TMA/TCMA content!
I studied Wing Tsun for 10 years. After 2 -3 years I found out for myself, your Sifu teach you a Concept. You have to find out how it works best for you.
It depends on your Physical strenght, your Body, your Speed, so much details to look for. Most Ppl never understand this and just try to copy Techniques shown by the Sifu.
Also you need Combat experience in Sparing and real Fights. I lived 8 Years in Thailand and I went into a few ugly Situations, my Wing Tsun never let me down.
Just my 2 Pence
That's exactly what I thought, I never thought just practicing wing chun makes you a beast at fighting, it's a concept you can apply but you need to test it in order to improve it and your own skill, it makes me sad that wing chun is becoming kind of a joke due to these so called masters
'All martial arts look the same because we all have two arms and two legs,' is what my teacher would say. The main difference was the base philosiphy
Pretty sure that is a Bruce Lee quote
@@boxingjacks I've heard a lot of people say that at this point
Yeah this video gots a lot of logic love you videos man
This was by far your best comments. Normally for the most part I like the videos but this like your comments.
The ancestors be turning in in their graves knowing what had became of the arts they left behind. Was used to protect their ppl,way of life and honor.
lol
Bruce Ludlow very true. The effectiveness of things like modern Shaolin Kungfu should be questioned. I think the history should be questioned as well, like, how did a martial art that was used in war and actually fought alongside armies become this shadow that is used for entertainment on talent shows and tourist attractions.
@@yanyanzhang5813 i believe in one of his videos, the wing chun guy qi lala or someone explain it very well. There was a time in China when the dynasty forbid any practice of martial arts. Ppl still practiced though, but changed it more into a health thing than combat. That way if they get question they just say, im not practicing martial arts, im just exercising. Things n arts got lost over time.
Another thing to consider is, there are many great masters out there. Every master seeks a worthy student to pass the art n secret onto. If no student of such comes around, the master rather have the art n secrets die with them than leave it in the hands of someone who would shame n dishonor the master's name n art.
When you reach the stage when your hands n feet react by themselves; by the time u noticed, ur limbs already go. This is the secret behind Bruce's "don't think, feel". Many, if not all the ppl on videos are thinking too much. They stop and thinking "what to do, what the oppo gonna do, what should i do?" A river flows, never stopping to think which way it should go or turn next, cuz there's no time. The water just keeps going, bending at every obstacle. That is another secrect to Bruce's "be like water". There's no time to think in a fight, fist n kicks become a blur.
Great example of limbs moving by themselves before u realize is Michael jai white's interview where he tells story of him accidently punching a guy for checking his watch in subway station.
[Mr.][Asian][Guy] [Plays][Video][Games] that was during the Qing Dynasty, where martial arts was basically outlawed. However if I do remember correctly, the Shaolin temple is not under direct jurisdiction of the Emperor. I may have remembered wrong though. China has always been different from European cultures since Europeans have this God before Royalty idea such as the Pope having more power than Monarchs while it is the opposite in China since Emperors will always have more power than a monk. So I could’ve remembered wrong when I said that Shaolin was not under the Emperor, but for now, I stand by what I said. Also combat sports was banned for a few years around the time post WWII and the unison of China under Mao.
@@yanyanzhang5813 Shaolin Martial Arts doesn't actually exist - There is not a SYSTEM of Shaolin exclusive martial arts, Martial Arts MASTERS come from everywhere to practise in the Shaolin temple.
Some martial arts arose from PURE BS and delusionality like Crane Style
The puzzling thing about TCMA is that up until about the first few decades of the 20th century, there was a tradition of "open platform" fights where the TCMA did actually do fairly brutal fighting with all sorts of styles mixing it up with hardly any rules, more or less like the early UFC. That's actually how Tai Chi and some of the other well-known styles became famous in the 19th century.
Looking at the broader picture, we're sort of lucky (East Asia and the world generally, just from an antiquarian perspective) that guns became widespread relatively later in East Asia than in Europe - it meant there was still a bit of a hangover of unarmed/melee styles and schools that had been combat tested in the real world for centuries. Compare and contrast with the Western MA, which pretty much either disappeared completely or were subsumed into dueling or sport forms by about the 18th century or so - so much so that it was more or less a surprise when (over the past few decades) people started taking a closer look at the mediaeval "fight books" (first scholars, then MA enthusiasts) and discovered that Western MA had at one time been fully as sophisticated in terms of what one might call weird techniques as the East Asian stuff (e.g. with wrestling moves closely integrated with melee weapons, etc., etc.). And here it's also important to note that the unarmed forms in EA MA were generally considered as just a kind of basic training and fallback - the real meat of a "style" was with melee weapons, the whole point was training towards that. (And you can still see a bit of a remnant of that in some of the TMA which have lots of different weapons forms too.)
So what changed? Surely Communism had something to do with it - the ditching of a lot of tradition, the forbidding of the practice of traditional things during the Cultural Revolution, etc. If you zoom in on the base style of Tai Chi (Chen style, which was a clan village style), the continuity of that in the latter half of the 20th century hung on the very thin thread of a few clan guys who defied the authorities by continuing to train the younger generation, even sometime having to do it in secret (one of them was even imprisoned for it IIRC).
Another consideration might be the twin factors of the romanticization of the TCMA in wuxia novels in the early 20th century and their glorification as national treasures in the nationalist period. That's probably the originating cause of a lot of the fakery around. Closely related, there's the factor that there's a continuous "half life" phenomenon with the "reality" of combat sports - again and again, you have the phenomenon where a form of competition starts off with a quest for authenticity, and then eventually the combat sport becomes commercialized, and the participants choose a quiet life with less likelihood of injury, so everything becomes a work, and then the quest for authenticity starts up again. This has happened many times in the West, certainly (e.g. early pro Wrestling to WWF, early UFC now transitioned to something more staged - although MMA does seem to be holding onto authenticity a bit longer than similar phases in the past, probably on account of pressure from below because of the vast number of amateurs into MMA who are too knowledgeable to be easily fooled.). Similar "waves" of transition from authenticity to commercialization and fakery have no doubt occurred in East Asia too.
I think part of the problem is also that there was always a certain secretiveness about the various clan styles, etc. - which was perfectly understandable of course, in a context where a) surprise is a huge element in combat effectiveness, and b) historically, combat actually did mean life or death. But where lines of transmission were broken because of the upheavals through the fall of empire, nationalism and then communism, that secrecy meant a kind of fragmentation. (And to understand the reasons for secrecy even better, look at it from the other point of view, consider what's happened to the Gracies: at one time, when BJJ was a surprise to the world, they ruled the roost, but eventually everyone and their mother learned BJJ, and the family itself lost that "edge". No big deal in the modern context, one might say - compensated for by financial gain, etc. But consider a comparable scenario right up to the, say, the 19th century, when the EA combat arts weren't sports and did mean life or death.)
And this leads to the other point: if you look at the ancient styles of combat, there's a lot to do with breathing (prana in India, qi in China, ki in Japan - but there are even vague hints about "spirit" here and there in ancient and mediaeval Western lore), which suggests that fascia conditioning was much more important, probably as important as muscle conditioning. But that's pretty recondite stuff, that, again, would have been closely guarded - so if lines of transmission were broken, you'd end up with a situation where you have a lot of forms where the techniques were empty, or one might say, had lost their engine.
There's also a logistical point that in order to train live you need partners - and again, that's a problem if lines of transmission are broken and scattered.
What this all means, I think, is that the fat lady hasn't yet sung on the TCMA. There probably is a "real thing" but it's probably as rare as hens' teeth, tucked away in obscure villages here and there, where a) there had been some continuity of training from the early 20th century to the present, and b) there was a sufficient pool of people who could do live training. It may take a while yet before those kinds of things come more into the light, get sportified, etc. Or to put it another way, China perhaps needs to go through a similar phase to what Jigoro Kano did with old jujitsu forms, or how Muay Thai was codified and consolidated as a national sport.
If you are learning Kung Fu there is definitely hidden knowledge. and there should be. There are certain things that just need to wait until the skill level is high enough. Adding Mysticism just makes it fun, and a lot of people are learning KF for that reason... its escapism, it keeps their interest and members will stay around longer. Sparing can be confronting and uncomfortable and a deterrent.
But you're right, its about balance and relevance. a progressive school that always bring their traditional learning into practical applications is a good school, but Im guessing most cant do that.
The Sifus at my school are all hardened from the days of full contact fighting. My SiGung was the Australian full contact champion and that experience flavours everything we learn.
if its called a martial arts, then someone spending years of their life/money should be able to effectively defend themselves ......Sparing can be confronting and uncomfortable and a deterrent....interesting statement .....so can someone punching you in the face with bad intentions......at least sparring is done in a controlled setting, where students will learn what it feels like to be in a uncomfortable situations......this mentality is what is killing off traditional martial arts.....especially wing chun....where most teaches don't spar because the techniques are too dangerous .......right......
spanishh2001 martial arts is for anyone, if you want to learn to fight you can. If you just like the way it looks and feels you can do that too. Horses for courses. Horses can be confronting too.
@M T you are correct...you can take any martial art you like ....even if its known not be effective at keeping you alive in a real fight ...not a problem....just don't call it self defense....call a form of dance.... meditation etc.... because if getting punched in the face, is too uncomfortable for many ...which is understandable....don't try to sell it to people as a form of self defense because ....rename it for what it is Bushido....I know alot of people don't like for wing Chun to be called out for being a joke ....which it is, to me anyway...don't try and sell it as a form of self defense...it will get you killed in a real situation ...with someone who isn't your friend or paid to take a dive .....and please do t mention to me all these secrets contained within most traditional arts which take 30 yrs of practice to be discovered .....then to get your jaw or leg broken by some kid with 6 months of MMA ....I've seen this happen more then once ....am mainly talking about wing Chun and Kung Fu arts....yes I have seen some very good karate and Korean fighters ...but for some reason I've yet to see any good Chinese fighters ...without the usual can't use the technique because it's too dangerous and that finger strike will paralyze me and lead to sudden death .....😁😁😁
We knew this for years since the UFC 1... The reason to practice traditional martial arts is like practicing yoga and immersing in Chinese culture. You get a nice insight studying the evolution of fighting which I looked from trying Japanese Ju jitsu to judo to doing bjj or look at old boxing/pugilism to modern boxing. You see how the needs change an art significantly but sparring is a great driving force for simplicity and efficiency. You must note in the context of old martial arts they worked during their times which are not our times being much more skilled in hand to hand vs in the old days weapons ruled all (thinking of my knowledge of HEMA). We need to train modern arts for self defence but we shouldn’t hate each other but understand each arts flaws like BJJ sucking at striking etc... Still MMA is prob the best right now though I’m more of a BJJ guy in terms of martial arts as it fits in to modern context the best as we’re not allowed guns and knives in the UK and many countries.
mma is the best for ring fighting.....
Very interesting video, Jerry. Thank you.
If you do not write, you cannot claim to be a writer, no matter how many pens you own.
If you do not paint, you cannot claim to be a painter, no matter how many brushes you own.
If you do not fight, you cannot claim to be a fighter, no matter how many forms you know.
TCMA came down from people who had to use them to fight for their lives, so the *arts* work but what we have is generations of *people* who do not know how to *make them work*. Just as we no longer know how to make Greek Fire. So, in many schools, the fighting art is dead.
How did this come about?
Speaking for the lineage of Wǔzǔquán (五祖拳) that I come from, the master who founded our branch (Chee Kim Thong) fought and killed Japanese soldiers hand-to-hand. But he was the last of our lineage who needed to use his art as a killing art. He killed so many people that he was sick of fighting and often said (at least the few times that I met him), that fighting was not as important as health. I agree with Jerry that if you practise your art only for health, it is no longer a Quán (拳). Of course, Master Chee was in his 70s when I heard him say that health was more important. I have noticed this change in elderly TCMA teachers (including myself). Their focus changes from teaching about fighting to teaching about health as their own mortality looms. I have also seen teachers change their focus from teaching about fighting to preserving the body of knowledge. So, their students end up spending most of their time practising 30, 40, 50 or more forms (which was fine if you were a monk with nothing else to do in the 17th Century) and less time *pressure-testing*.
One of my bugbears in TCMA is using 2,500-year-old language to describe phenomena that can be clearly explained using modern terms, e.g.: "Sinking your Qì (氣)"; "Directing your Jìn (勁)". This, combined with an absence of pressure-testing, creates an unnecessary aura of mysticism which attracts those who want to defraud the naïve, as well as the naïve themselves, and deters practical-minded people who could benefit from some excellent arts. There are too many so-called "Masters" who wear silk brocade and speak in serene tones about "energy", and too many people who desperately need everything to be made of rainbows.
I feel some who practise MMA have decided for themselves that it is the standard against which *all* fighting should be measured; if your art doesn't work in the MMA cage, then it doesn't work. But put a sword in the hand of an MMA champion and put him up against someone who has been doing HEMA for a year and he'll be soundly beaten. HEMA fighting is no less "real" than MMA fighting, in my opinion. They are both one-on-one contests in artificial circumstances: a perfectly flat and relatively soft surface, a constrained area, a referee, rules. This "artificiality" gives many TCMA people the (lame) excuse that their art is for "real" fighting, not combat sports. But then they don't do "real" fighting either, unlike their predecessors. How could they? The "real" circumstances under which TCMA flourished no longer exist, thankfully. They often say: "My art is for self-defence only". But you cannot test self-defence unless you live in a part of town where you are *constantly* being attacked in the street. And if you cannot test it, how can you teach it?
One of the best lessons I ever learned was when I was 20. In fact, it was two lessons. I was not yet a black sash in an Americanised form of CMA and I entered a Kyokushinkai full-contact competition. I came up against a Kyokushinkai green-belt. I immediately whacked him with three uppercuts to the ribs in quick succession. Zero effect. Lesson One: you don't know whether your stuff works or not until you try it out. I was shocked and didn't know what to do. He took advantage and roundhouse kicked me in the neck. I staggered back. He then hit me with an uppercut that cracked a rib and front-kicked me off the mat. I was unconscious before I hit the floor. Lesson Two: what it feels like to get hit hard. The fight lasted about 30 seconds. I say "fight", but it was quite one-sided. I would say almost no TCMA practitioners today have ever learned those two *invaluable* lessons. As an aside, I switched to a TCMA school under a Chinese instructor not long after that fight and, within six months, my uppercuts were knocking the wind out of people who held the heavy-bag for me.
I will turn 59 soon and, like many ageing TCMA practitioners before me, have little interest in fighting now. But if I were to start teaching classes again, I would pressure-test my students from Day 1. I wouldn't have them do MMA competition - but I wouldn't prevent them either - because A) I do not have the experience of that world to be able to coach them and B) I do not *want* to coach people for the constraints of combat sports. But I would insist that they spar and encourage them to spar people from as many fighting styles as they can.
I have a couple of related videos on my channel. I won't provide links here but if anyone is interested, they are called "What is Mastery?" and "If you practise traditional Chinese martial arts, you're probably not a fighter."
Kind regards.
Declan Chellar
Yeas ago, I saw some old black and white movies of Tai Ch practitioners sparring. It was very circular and fast! I felt it might be functional when done that way.
Excellent video (I am too old but trained under Chuck Norris legacy in the day) and wish MMA was around back then. Back then an athlete trained a bit in fighting and boxing destroyed untrained folks. Though I wish I spent more time at the HG combat courses before I got old.
Dude just found your channel like now and I totally agree with you. Many martial arts came from how human imitate certain animal to defend themselves, but as time goes on, they met another style and tried each other on and the style will be revised again and again by each generation. Unfortunately, some master of certain martial arts sadly sunk in arrogance to keep their style "original" then after couples of generations they even forgot to spar against each other while still overshadowed by the tale of their great great great grandmaster. People mistook traditional martial arts as fake martial arts. Well, maybe the "quality" is already deteriorated, but the martial art itself is real.
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I learnt tae kwon do (a year) and silat (5yrs). For silat, the same as my previous paragraph, the practitioner travelled to many places and sometimes spar then the technique is being developed. Now, we can see that many silat covers the pretty same movement, this shows either that silat was born from the same root or they develop together and exchange their technique.
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Sadly, as for silat, I see many "fake" are style still going. I'm not telling their style name, but I can say their style covers lots of weird step who shows your back towards the enemy.
Damn i really learned a lot from this video. Thank you
Yeah, this is one of my favorite videos on this channel.
>"if you go to business school, how would you know about business if you don't do business"
Great analogy, people think that if you study business you will be a good businessman and the funny thing is that most successful business people didn't even touch an university.
Practice and theory must go together, but in the end, between a pure theorist vs a pure pragmatist, the pragmatist will win.
For a second i thought that's my room 🤣🤣
My room's dirtier.
As someone who studied karate and Hung Gar Gar, and who lucky that my school did sparring , and it looked like Kick boxing when we sparred. The lack of sparring with all the mysticism have made TCMA a joke. . Hopefully it changes. Most traditional Martial arts have the same techniques punching, kicking, Throws, elbows, knees...it is just the application, the mind set that makes a huge difference.
MMA literally dismissed the fantasy of most martial arts.
MMA is basically a combination of White Western boxing and wrestling with a little Brazilian jiu jitsu thrown in. I know some will say I'm wrong but the majority of western MMA fighters use these styles because they work in real combat.
Here is a old Western video of a Boxer vs Karate master
ruclips.net/video/YakX27RHTRI/видео.html
@@PirateTubeTV that link is gold! That was a pure style Vs style fight!
@@PirateTubeTV about that MMA thing...would never take away from Boxing, but seems that BJJ seems to be the common base to all these MMA guys. For eg..for punching- some train Boxing, some American Kickboxing, some Muay Thai.
For takedowns, some guys Wrestle, some do Judo..
But for the ground they all BJJ. Either train in it or train to defend against it.
that was the mindset, a few are incorparating useful parts of broader disciplines more recently, taking what works and discarding the rest, instead of ignoring the whole out of hand & never really looking to see if any value's there
Thanks for the video bro I practice wing chun a lot and I got an idea of practicing wing chun with other martial arts like Muay Thai and filipino martial arts 😁
Thailand is ahead. since 1970's Thai fighters have always known Kungfu was just entertainment. Our golden era fighters have fought against every style.
@Audio 9999 and that is the reason, here u r talking about an artist not a fighter.
I'm glad I chance upon your video when i did (after I watched videos that debunk TCMA and reading comments and watching videos that defend it as well). You've brought a middle ground to the arguement, as well as showcasing people that actually have a mature mindset from the TCMA side that accepts the limitations of TCMA, respecting the combat effectiveness from MMA practices. On the other hand, also trying to evolve their combat style while preserving tradition. I agree that as long as there is this group of TCMA practitioners that are realistic in their approach of evolving their combat style and willing to put it to the test, we can reach an appreciation of TCMA for its own values of discipline and effectiveness while casting out the mysticism to reach a more wholesome view of the subject
Thank you for saying how Chinese folks are starting to react to some of these fake "Masters" because I have been curious about that too. Living in Dongguan I don't really see too many people using different Kung Fu styles except for mostly Taiichi in the park (and those are mostly older folks) as Taekwondo is more popular here, but it is good to hear that more people are seeing the flaws. I hope that in seeing them they can be willing to adjust and learn how "traditional" Martial Arts can change and grow.
How is Dongguan?
@@FightCommentary Not bad honestly. We are considered to be in a low risk area, so school is pretty much back to normal, however there are still no interschool sports competitions planned for this year just in case. And still when taking the taxi, subway, or DD you still are required to used a mask. Other than that things are pretty good. How are things were you are?
Man your channel is very entertaining and I'm glad that there is some criticism and not just religiously believing in just one style and don't use anything, just like I was thought in wing chun class, but I was always critical about that. I want to share my opinion about this too. We all have to understand that Martial Arts like everything else in the world evolves, some people still live in the past. I mean yeah maybe in the past wing chun could work against some styles because long time ago there were barely some practitioners who mixed some other style in their basic fighting style and that's why one simple wing chun had some success, maybe not all the time but, lets say it had some success. Now days there is a MMA thanks to bruce lee and joe lewis who broke that fighting style religion of not mixing other styles, that's why MMA this days is the best type of fighting style, because you have punching, kicking, grappling and everything mixed and now that is modern type of fighthing style, also you have lots of guys who weight lift and can get bigger and stronger, just like Xu Xiaodong is. I know that wing chun is still old type of style now days, not because of the same practice method, but because most of wing chun practitioners don't do sparring and also its very important like the sparring is the endurance type of training that is must now days. I think you can see the lack of endurance in Qi La La, idk if you have noticed, that when he fight the first round he is more explosive and energetic to win, but when the second round comes he is so exhausted and that's why I think he lost the most of those fights he had.
Bro, You forgot a key aspect. 80% of the attacks and blocks in Wushu are made to end a combat quickly and with a lot of damage. There are hits to the groin area, the knees, elbows,neck, throat,eyes and other soft points. If you want to do a combat sport train sanda/sanshou
Pin this guy's ^ post..now!!!!
Ramsey Dewey does a great explanation about this idea, if someone throws a head kick or and elbow its “must Thai” or if someone chokes someone while on their back it’s “Brazilian jujitsu”
Striking only has a small amount of proven effective strikes for any level of experience fighter. Same as grappling. The four world’s most popular fighting styles are boxing/muay Thai for striking and freestyle wrestling/Brazilian jujitsu for grappling. Nobody realizes there are many other forms of fighting since those are the most popular and assume when they see a similar move in a fight they assume they must practice one of those arts instead of the art they have actual background in.
BTW, talking about BJJ, I launched a new channel focused on grappling: ruclips.net/channel/UCQfBeZEQXbiGfgR_BEySSPQ Would love to have you as a subscriber!
repeat with me: proven effective strikes for ring fighting...repeat with me xD
It's really not a Chinese martial arts problem but a problem with what commonly *passes for* Chinese martial arts today.
People from my Bagua/Taiji school have won the large majority of their fights in boxing, sanda, and kickboxing tournaments. Just these last couple of years they've brought home maybe 10 golds.
Note that these people are pure Chinese martial artists conditioned using Bagua/Taiji methods, primarily zhanzhuang, and employing kungfu techniques in the ring. And yes of course we spar.
It's simply not possible that we are the only CMA school with effective training methods - other styles of Chinese martial arts *must* have them too. In fact, I have seen a lot of very good stuff from other legit schools; but what gets eyeballs are the circus acts. Though to be fair the good schools do seem to be outnumbered by the bad ones.
Interesting video thank you :). When you were talking about someone who'd learnt everything but is still untested it reminded of that great expression: No plan survives contact with the enemy
The ending made me laugh so much :) Thanks for your translation
Fantastic channel always learn ALOT :)
I visited most of the Wing Chun schools in Hong Kong about 10 years ago. There is a huge variation in style of teaching. Some is absolutely deluded bullshido. Some masters teach the 'soft force' and how it overcomes hard energy. I could have filmed all the woo woo masters and ridiculed Wing Chun, dismissed the whole style. But I also met some masters that were absolutely authentic, hard as nails and with lots of real fighting experience. Just one example - Wan Kam Leung (student of Wong Shun Leung) who has terrible scars on his arms (from knife fighting) to prove it. The bit everyone misses with Wing Chun is hardness. The style simply won't work without hand conditioning. Anyone who misses this out will find it ineffective. The whole style is based around it and yes wearing gloves takes this advantage away. Power is sacrificed for speed, hardness causes the pain and damage. Wan Kam Leung wasn't muscle bound he is all conditioned sinew and bone and has hands and arms of iron. He hits hard and heavy without effort and he was much older than me. Look him up. Watch his videos. But you won't get it until you feel his hands on you. He'd be your worst nightmare in a real fight.
I can't believe in something I'm not allowed to question. Asking is the purifier of our thoughts and it helps us stay on the ground. Throughout history, man is prone to delusion and I'm not just referring to religion but more things than that like gender. The moment people stop asking questions, that's the end of our freedom.
I love yozr channel! Showing more underground fights, shiwing the truth, shoing people who really want to mame their traditionnel art effective.
Dude.
Clean your room ;)
My roommate saw this and cleaned his room. Glad we inspired him ;)
@@FightCommentary I think it's your room, Jerryl
When I lived in NYC I studied tui shou under a genuine and skilled master who daily and routinely tossed men from all walks of life around like rag dolls and he himself was a combat veteran in WW2. But, at one point there was a crowd of men gathering who tried to goad me into seeing if I could throw and land a one step punch. I didn’t want to do it because of my background but my teacher and others insisted. I stepped in quickly an caught his lip. He seemed happy and slightly surprised, but even with my competitive judo background I had trouble moving him when we wrestled. I feel that the easy answer for the general public is to pick a side MMA v Traditional without any real investment. I loved my training in catch wrestling , wrestling , judo, MMA, BJJ, Muy Thai, boxing, etc., but I also enjoyed Tui Shou, kali, Silat, HEMA, JKD, Krav Maga, even some of the Aikido and wing chun, etc., I would just say to people who are interested in martial arts not to forget to pressure test, randori, free fight, etc., and to have fun with these systems. Enjoy life, and don’t forget that there are other hobbies out there besides martial arts that can enhance the quality of life as well, like playing musical instruments, woodworking, making ceramics,traveling, tennis, etc. life is short. One minute you’re planning your future and the next minute you are thinking about your past.
I wonder if it’s kinda like accents in a single language. When speaking, the accents are distinct, when singing the distinct accents become less noticeable. The closer martial arts come to real combat application, the closer they will resemble each other or lose their accents.
Very cool analogy!
@6:45: I've been saying this for years. Thanks bro. I personally think they're all congruent, if not alike in movement. Just have different names. I'm over 20yrs in Kenpo and I realized this late '90's as I was going over "BJJ" basics. Good vid. I totally agree!
I went 4 times to China to train taichi and kungfu. Been training Chinese martial arts for 15 years, mainly taichi in fact. Tremendous benefits to all facets of my health. Never thought it taught my to fight though, it really didn't. I figured defending myself against stress and stuff that attacks your system everyday was a better way to spend my time. Couple years back I started bjj and a mix of muai thai and kick boxing. I know with solid basics, at 6'4 220lbs lean I can defend myself against most people, not looking to become a champ. Lots of people who practise Chinese martial arts think they're badass even though they actually have no clue what fighting really feels like.
Also, god damn man clean your room lmao
I’ve been doing Gung Fu for many years. I’ve had many opportunities to fight a variety of styles (karate, kempo, TKD, MT, bjj, etc) I was appreciative because I found that my experiences in class were limited. As I fought various styles I tried my best to implement techniques and I would analyze the fights to see if I had an issue with timing, speed, concepts, or BS techniques. What wound up happening is that I found timing to be too difficult for complex techniques. So I simplified. But the concepts remained relatively in tact. Simplification and maintaining certain concepts seemed to do well for me. But it wasn’t until my son started wrestling and doing judo that I saw how other techniques applied. I understand controlling space and position, leverage and physics. But I also feel subtle movements with my son because of many years of sticky hands. So I do sticky hands with him as we explore the things I know and it might benefit him. Constant sparring, analyzing, and truthfulness.
You know what's very effective?, parkour, no fighting just getting away from the situation and be done with it..
Actually that's what kung fu was for as well. It was not just a set of fighting skills, it was also survival skills.
Kung fu practitioners didn't just train to fight, they trained to transform the way their minds and bodies dealt with various situations, including the exact situations in which you'd apply parkour skills today.
Unfortunately, this versatility gets lost in translation, and people nowadays expect kung fu to be either all about fighting or, if if can't be that,"it must be useless", which is honestly ridiculous when you think deeply about it.
@@tranquil_dude But the thing is, most people including me didn't learn parkour trough Kung Fu, Parkour itself is a *non combative martial arts* practice. (Even though i´m not here discrediting your argument).
Parkour was primarily more a practice for freedom of movement and body exercise based on natural elements instead of the gym..
I don´t do parkour anymore but the feel and excitement is definitely something i miss.
@@Zoza15 gong fu (功夫) didn't exactly mean combative martial arts either. It means a fine skill acquired through hard work, usually with transformative effects on mind and body.
That means in China, it's perfectly acceptable to say, "You have impressive Parkour gong fu !".
On the other hand, gong fu has also been used so often as an euphemism for practices involving combative martial arts (both within and outside China) that there is confusion about what the purpose of doing gong fu is, especially for people outside China.
The Chinese term that can be most accurately translated as "martial art" is Wu Yi (武艺), which literally means "martial art". And it has slightly different connotations than gong fu. Whereas having gong fu implies some impressive skill (which can range from wrestling to Parkour), having wu yi implies specifically that you have the skills to fight in battle, subdue a criminal (i.e. as a policeman) or be a bodyguard etc.
( And yes, wu yi can be considered a type of gong fu. )
Unfortunately, as I've mentioned, in the modern world, there's some confusion between "impressive skill" and "martial", especially when it comes to things like traditional martial arts.
And even more unfortunately, this has gone beyond just a semantic problem. People *really* aren't clear about what the purpose of a particular (traditionally handed down) skill is. Which in turn means the skill doesn't get practiced properly and in the right context.
And that's why, for example, we have all these incidents of "traditional martial arts" supposedly being "proven useless".
@@tranquil_dude *gong fu (功夫) didn't exactly mean combative martial arts either. It means a fine skill acquired through hard work, usually with transformative effects on mind and body.
That means in China, it's perfectly acceptable to say, "You have impressive Parkour gong fu !*
Gong Fu?, ok 👍🏽.
Sorry dude, i dont speak Chinese (no offense), as i mentioned is that Parkour is defined as a *Non Combative Martial Arts* By its founders..
The arts and skill to freely move and jump and run wherever you want, with minor injuries hopefully.
I did Parkour for many years until i messed up my knee, but i can still run but now i have simply outgrown the desire to practice parkour daily but the skills i have learned over the years is still in me..
*Unfortunately, as I've mentioned, in the modern world, there's some confusion between "impressive skill" and "martial", especially when it comes to things like traditional martial arts.
And even more unfortunately, this has gone beyond just a semantic problem. People really aren't clear about what the purpose of a particular (traditionally handed down) skill is. Which in turn means the skill doesn't get practiced properly and in the right context.
And that's why, for example, we have all these incidents of "traditional martial arts" supposedly being "proven useless".*
The world is busy and full of traffic, most people these days are just trying to get by to make sure they have dinner on the table and a roof over their heads. Things could be different with a new mindset but in the modern day time is money and many people wouldn't care about traditional martial arts and the efforts and the philosophies behind it..
@Craig Taylor Running away not an option?, please elaborate..
This is VERY INFORMATIVE 👍👍. A COMMON SENSE APPROACH AND SPARRING is definitely the way to go.
Basically: Never mystify Martial Arts. Use what is effective (Same logic as MMA). And there is a possibility that both MMA and TMA can learn from each other. (IMO I think TMA can learn more from MMA ).
I saved you like 16 minutes of your life.
Yep sparring experience is everything, adapt to each of your opponent's attacks too so that you can counter it more effectively.
Yes, sparring is very very important. Its where you apply your knowledge and adjust to fight situation.
@7:20....the Wing Chun master forgot that they had two weapons. The single-headed long pole (descended from spear) and the twin butterfly swords. Two popular weapons among the Cantonese militia. It was for war. But even the people practicing these arts today forget this. They treat weaponry as “training tools” for strength training smh
Having trained both Wing Chun and Koryu, I doubt Wing Chun was used in war. It feels more like a civilian style. First of all, if it was for war, the weapon techniques would be thought first, unarmed combat would be last. Second the techniques would be focussed on weaknesses in armor. I also doubt Wing Chun long pole was derived from the spear. At least, it did not retain any spear specific elements. It lacks the corkscrew motion and shortening and lengthening of the spear. It is a very typical long pole style. Finally, the double knives in Wing Chun are more chopping instruments, while all historical southern double knives, which were used by militia are very much designed for stabbing.
Based on current times, not very many if any would be carrying around long poles and butterfly knives for self defense these days.
Dimitron ....the simplicity of the system being suitable for mass training, along with the prominent thrusting techniques, in addition the pole being traditionally long + tapered in my opinion lends credibility that it is related if not came from spear technique. (Honestly I try to practice it shortened to mid-grip too sometimes for closer fighting but that’s just me...it’s certainly possible with the techniques). It’s also entirely possible that the weapons and unarmed techniques developed separately and then brought together at some point. We have to understand the alot of the styles that survived to this day, the unarmed portion at least were very much a “modern” development. Back then in real battle (not fistfights) between villages, weaponry was used, not barefists. As times progressed and society “modernized”, the focus moved to unarmed fighting instead of weaponry. The weaponry portion of any of the kung fu styles, flowery or diluted they may be (depending on the school or style) were likely older and were for battle at some point in the past.
Dimitron ...it’s well-recorded that gentry (yes civilian) have led and trained local militia for self-defense, in support of the state, fight bandits, or attack other villages, etc. This is still warfare, no? By Qing period which WC and many other surviving Chinese styles are formulated during, armor has become very rare. From what I understand a stab and a chop is enough from a simple spear or sabre. Specialized armor-breaking weapons like maces, iron whips, halberds, are long out of fashion with the armor.
No doubt the antique double knives are longer back then, and there seems to some serious debate whether the flipping of knives for reverse grip is considered “orthodox”. Regardless of what weapon and the techniques with it, is it not thought of for killing or maiming (whether war or self-defense)? It can’t be possible that all the various masters in the past thought “let’s bring in a bunch of weaponry and make up a bunch of movements to strength-train or sell our arts in the marketplace?”
Dimitron ...but I do agree with you WC is very much a “civilian” style. But judging how turbulent that era was in the Pearl River Delta (Opium Wars, Red Turban Revolt, Punti-Hakka wars, the rampant banditry and piracy, etc) I wouldn’t be surprised that the progenitors/practitioners of Wing Chun, Hung Gar, Bak Mei, etc have seen at least some action up to the Republican era.
Excellent video, your best to date in my view.
you should show the video where Jet Li comes to America to the kung fu school.
The Movie called The Master, right?
I agree with everything said in this video.
If I can add something which may be of interest, and represents my point of view on TCMA:
I've been practicing K1-style Kickboxing as my main martial art for 8 years, and then Taekwondo for 2 years and a half. Those two disciplines came at different times for different purposes: from Kickboxing I learned what it meant to spar, to take a punch, and to give one. That, along with basic punches, kicks, knees, and sweeps. Then with Taekwondo, I've refined what I felt lacked in my previous training: kicks and agility.
Now I've moved to traditional Kung fu, and what I notice is that once again the focus of the practice is different: Kung Fu, in my experience, is based on movement mechanics - not techniques.
What that means is that in a Kung Fu form what matters the most is the body handling which then generates the movements: for example, when you throw a punch, does the force travel cleanly from your foot to the hand which expresses the technique? Are you tense? Are you really transferring your movement from foot to hand (so that the foot generates the punch, not the arm) or are you just coordinating the legs with the body while your shoulder's doing the work? What is your spine doing while you punch? Is it active or is it just a "thing" attached to the shoulders and hips?
Small details which are game-changing when you put them together: a punch may look like one "thrown from the arm" but behind it the body's acting in a completely different way which makes the result look the same, but much more stable, stronger, heavier.
When practicing a form that's what I focus on, not the single applications. Those come later on, once the body handling skills have become predominant, you put those movements (which are again, movements, not techniques) into actual techniques, so that whatever technique you're using (palm strikes, punches, throws, deflections) are fueled by the mechanics you learned before. Then comes pressure testing, then comes sparring (it must be present!).
All those things should have a place and be used in a correct manner, it's like a cooking recipe: you can't obtain the intended result if you don't use each ingredient the way it's meant to be used.
So, in my experience, if you use a Kung Fu form just to replicate the movements without handling the body in the way it's meant to be handled, you end up with an "empty dance". Your techniques are just half correct, the shape is correct but what's inside is not what it's meant to be.
Once you have an understanding you have to apply it too, otherwise, there is once again just half of the work.
The effectiveness of something comes in great part from the way it is used: not just in sparring, also before that phase of the training comes correct use. Again: if you learn forms but move through those forms without using correct body handling, you're replicating a shape. That's why it's better to practice one form in the correct way rather than 10 forms with just the external shell being present. Techniques are contingent and situational, body handling skills are not, they should be the foundation of your movements.
I hope this can be of help to someone, this was a great interview to watch! :)
If only Bruce Lee didnt die so young and share his ideas. And help everyone.
Yeah
@@FightCommentary I don't think he's agreeing with you. Well I'm not anyway
@@chunkz3163 care to explain, nothing personal. Just want to hear your opinion.
I think the greatest gift TCMA has to offer modern combat sports is the emphasis on physical health and conditioning. Those giys you see training traditional shaolin kungfu may not have the most economical techniques but they sure are tough. Alot of that emphasis on cultivating strength and overall fortitude has been diminished or forgotten all together.
I been missing a lot of Amazon packages. Now I know where it went.
Search up Nature's Wild Berry. You'll see what those packages are about ;)
@@FightCommentaryGrappling Nah... You won't have any use of my packages... Mostly Trojan Large Condom.... So... good luck making water balloon...
Discard what is useless, apply what is useful. That sums up the problem addressed in this video
Nice throat singing!
No, great analysis though. I’ve been in both setting of sparring and non-sparrring traditional martial arts and left some communities because of their opinions and lack of respect for each other. Could not agree more.
Southern Chinese styles’ practitioners have often said to me they think the northern styles are too flowery and not “effective” but
they don’t spar in their school.
I say to myself “ at least wushu guys know they’re dancing.”
Yeah, and the Northern styles always criticize Southern styles for not being pretty ;)
I think the point about application is definitely the key here. It’s not about TCMA vs MMA or style or anything like that. MMA practitioners have the advantage because they apply what they learn and know how to react to an opponent. If you could magically transport a top TCMA master from China’s most turbulent era, when martial arts were depended on for life and death self defense on a regular basis, I would bet that that the TCMA would destroy an equally skilled MMA fighter in a no holds barred, no rules fight. Why? Because MMA still has rules. The person who has more experience knowing how to not only react to the opponent but to their own mind in a life or death fight is going to win.
How many bullshito masters? not enough, we need more laughs.
Yeah, that's one silver lining to all these bullshido masters
In my opinion, some of the so call, BS master, it is lacking sparring. The truth is sparring isn't sufficient either.
There is a big difference between warrior training and martial art training. All warrior know martial art, but not all warrior are great martial artist. On the other hand some martial artist are great warrior while others are crappy warrior.
Warrior training and martial art training are different, but sometime they overlap. Think of it this way, in math, there are calculation skills and application skills that you are train in. Application is e.g. a question that ask, Jack got 5 dollars and Tina got 2 dollars, how much money they got together? calculation is obvious 2+2 = ? and the student give an answer. Martial art training is like calculation, it is about teaching you a set of fighting skill, warrior training is about teaching you how to apply in actual combat situation.
The two got different focus, warrior training focus more on application and how to be effective in real world environment, but less training on fight skills, although such training do exist. Martial art training focus more on fighting skills, but not as much on how to deal with real world environment. In the ancient world, there was no dojo, there were warrior training academy and in those days, martial art skill was very important. But since then, the two start to split. However, martial art training still need some level of warrior training and that is especially in terms of sparring, this is because, most civilian that practice martial art are training for self defense, not for sport, so you need to provide them with a level of warrior training. Warrior training find they still need a set level of martial art training, in fact in term of police brutality in the US, a lot of criticism from former cops claim, the issue is, not sufficient martial art training, leading to cops been scared and when cops are scare they get very trigger happy. US army still consider martial art training to be very important, while British army consider it as none important, however, a lot of soldier still find it important and learn martial art in dojo.
In the ancient world, for example with the Samurai, Karate and Judo are both training that Samurai got, but Samurai are warriors, not martial artist. In that instance the Samurai are both great martial artist and warrior, today, people that train focus usually on only one of the two arenas. A lot of martial artist said, they been helping police to train in martial art, to increase their martial art standard, but going out on the field and fight like the cops do, they can't do it, while cops say, they might be able to fight better, but they don't have as much fighting skills.
Best end of video ever! No one can be ready for this!
Cool tree on the wall!
A lot of good stuff in there, and I can vouch for it.
I started with western boxing, and we'd learn a little bit, then get matched up in tournaments with others with a similar number of fights, experience, age group, and weight range, and we'd learn to apply it in the real world context: getting progressively better.
In the old days in China, exponents of Xing Yi, for example (because there were extensive numbers of tournaments) would usually kill, or at least maim, their opponents.
But that physical, real world application simply isn't there any more with traditional martial arts, so that aspect is dying, if it's not cremated already. Even with karate and their kumite setting, there are an extensive number of rules: no groin or head attacks, for example, which does the same thing. If you want to seriously hurt somebody, and that's the whole point of it all, that is exactly where you hit.
So, people train all their lives in some cases, to fight in a certain way, to make all their movements instinctive, and when they're placed into the kumite environment, they can no longer operate on the instinctive level, they have to stop and think. They act hesitantly for that reason and, believe me, if you're up against a halfway decent street fighter, and you have to think instead of operating on the reactive instinctive level, you are beaten before you even start.
On top of that, there are other factors that come into play. Many people take up a martial art out of fear, and that's natural enough. It's rapidly becoming a very alienating world. But, because of this aversion to violence, they then neuter everything they work toward by saying they don't want to learn the martial aspect, as they're just doing it for health.
If you're going to learn a martial art, learn all of it. Yes, there is definitely a mind/body and even spiritual aspect, but it's also a martial art, so learn that also. If you're going to learn it. learn it comprehensively. Then, practise the movements involved in a systematic way, by way of a practical form of movement. Then work them out on the bag. And then, if somebody picks you on the street, get stuck into them in a big way. Employ the situation. In the old days, Taiji practitioners would thank their attackers for the practice. It takes a lot of years - at least ten to become proficient in Taiji - but it's an excellent martial art. They weren't royal body guards because they looked pretty.
The last couple of demos I've seen with Taiji practitioners up against MMA fighters have deserved everything they got. The art they are representing definitely didn't. They have obviously, never practised their art. The opponents have. They haven't impressed me as being particularly good, but they have had the practical component, know what it feels like to get hit, have become conditioned to it, have match fitness (which is totally different to standard physical fitness) and have gained the required result.
Dude those bs martial arts in the background are hilarious 😂
Yep ;) You can find them here: ruclips.net/p/PLtdbPxlsaM_mrpN75fQtCa3lUO5DM4Py5
It feels like it's such a common trope in movies that the hero will learn a Martial Art through drilling and never actually use it until it's needed and even the hero is surprised at how effective it is. Then you have the Dojos, Dojangs, Gyms, whatever that really want to teach and retain students, but don't want people to get hurt and quit.
I was very impressed with ma baoguo tai chi style.. there came a lot of lightnings ...hahahah
Bagus buat bayarin bil letrik :v
This was a super cool video :)
Oh my god that’s so funny (at 5:00) 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
We featured that in one of our bullshido video analyses 🤣
@@FightCommentary so sad because that dude could probably invent a seriously cool hiphop dance
@@i3rucei3ruce a lot of martial artists could totally be great dancers.
Bro, you make so much sense! My brother in law was a top guy in his art. One day I said to him, “I can beat you easily!” I stand 5’ 7””, I weigh 82 kilos. In a street fight I would be killed, I’m no fighter! He took my challenge. He got ready, I stood there. He moved in. I stood there. Then I pulled a water pistol from my back pocket, and soaked him! He stood there horrified! I said, “no man no matter how good or how fast can’t dodge a bullet.” I won the point. He didn’t talk to me for six months! He no longer practices his art!
HAHAHA :) So you'd be the Wing Chun master's disciple ;) But in all seriousness. I've had a cousin pull a knife on me when I was showing him some Jiu Jitsu, so there's definitely more to fighting than many of the arts train for. The reality of fights are so much more crazy than the ring. That's probably what the Wing Chun Master was trying to say, but it all got lost in his emphasis on health and his Watermelon Knife analogy ;)
To be fair, if we are ever attacked by aliens flailing spaghetti arms, the traditional techniques could come in handy.
This is similar experience to me when I played command and conquer two weeks ago.
Back then i used to be very good at it so i went online and looked for an opponent thinking it would be a walk in the park since i know alot of tactics and tricks.
Got into a match but immediately my hand starts shaking and i got very nervous, i was getting irritated that i was not able to do things effectively the way how i thought i was able to execute the moves and tactics then i lost the match.
Just like martial arts. If you dont spar, you wont be able to know how to deliver those techniques against a resisting opponent.
Is a similar thing, even in videogames you train some brains routines, muscle memory (of the hands of course) real time strategies cause you're opponent thinks different from an AI
哥们儿 房间有点乱啊！
What are you saying? I can't understand.
@@chbjj I was joking that he lives in a messy room.
@@sitaoxie6475 hahah I gotcha!!
I ready enjoyed your comments. Thanks for sharing 👍
there's a reason it's called "MODERN" marital art, whatever fantasy it was in the past, things are generally improving
Yep
It's funny cause the modern wushu is what makes kung fu shit, traditional was practiced just like muay boran
@@juanantonio192 I don't think there is any form of modern Wushu, even Sanda is borrowed from Japan
@@LeonYuL sanda is practically kickboxing, is nothing compared to the lei tai were the people used the traditional systems like choy li fut, tai chi, bagua, etc. Now if you practice kung fu they doesn't teach you how to improve the movements and concepts to a fight, they teach you apart sanda
@@juanantonio192 I only see names, nothing system like is shown on the stage, maybe I haven't seen a lot, but I think I saw enough, it's hard to watch tbh
Great video man. Very thought provoking.
All I can say Bruce Lee already did this in his life time.
This is a great video.
I train Sanda and MMA, but I'd love to learn also the taolu (katas) part of the wushu :)
There's a secret art called gun-fu. To use the full power, you have to go to its "power center" called "gun shop" and pay some money. You also have to routinely train in "shooting range". A single hit from its technique can render your opponent incapacitated. However, it is not worth spending that much money on this art because (1) it's too dangerous to use in the ring and (2) MMA rules makes it impossible to unleash its full power in the ring.
I'll tell you the problem with many traditional martial arts ("TMA"): they didn't evolve. When wrestling and jiu jitsu, for example, became more prevalent, there was little effort from TMA practitioners to modernize their fighting skills to address/incorporate more modern methods of combat. Worse yet, due to pride, when confronted about this time and time again, the only response seems to be, "well, in a real fight, I'd bite your face off" or "I practice only street lethal techniques".
Pride gets in the way of growth.
Such a good honest explanation of why some of these masters are almost delusional.
A good example is animal styles that have a lot of grabbing, clawing, and open palms techniques if you don't train your hand on top of sparring those techniques are worthless because you don't have the hand conditioning to apply them.
Without getting into style wars one thing I would say in general is the Japanese traditional martial artists are more likely be more comprehensive because they usually do it all (kata) fighting conditioning, hardened their body, spar, incorporate philosophy and breathing techniques compared to Chinese traditional martial artist who mostly trains lots of forms and maybe some sticky, push hands
Go look at some of those older Karata Sensei compared to TCM Sifu's and you'll see what I'm talking about.
This is coming from someone who likes traditional Chinese martial arts and trained Hung gar for 10 years though I would say our school was really unique in that we sparred a lot had a lot of members who had done other martial arts and were used to sparring hard.
our Sifu was open to having visitors and other schools come around so we used to get a lot of different people coming through wanting to do some hard sparring.
At the same time, I got to spar with other schools who had great forms but when it came to fighting it was a joke, they had no timing and were afraid to take hits at all.
Great feature. There are a lot of Bulshido masters out there and I met a few. Saying that I trained in Choy li fut and found it to be very effective for fighting. We sparred regularly and that’s the time you test out techniques that you’ve learnt. One teacher told me that if all you do is come to class and train with the others you’re not going to learn much, you have to go away from class and pick out techniques from the forms and drill them, then go back to class and try them out in sparring, if they don’t work, bin them and try something else. This is what I did and it worked very well for me. Most people are naturally lazy and think they will become Bruce Lee just by turning up, then they battered and leave the class or whatever.
The way you speak is great
I would love to see you interview Qi La La
It'll happen soon.
love this channel also the engagement with the comments is great
Bring more Qi La La!!