Grappling & Kung-Fu--Myth & Reality

[Kaitain]

Good luck with that Anthony. I have nothing invested in trying to get you to see things otherwise.

[Charles David]

Thanks for the gift.


Still,
Sidai,

[Darryl]

How to be a Grandmaster?

how do you get to be grandmaster of a JJ system?

Inspired by the apparent ease with which someone can be called a Grandmaster, I decided to do some checking before printing out the business cards ..

In Kungfu culture, one can be called a grandmaster in three ways (and if at first, I don't succeed ..).

1) His student has become a Sifu or master. His student's students will call him Grandmaster.

I like this one and am currently working very hard on it . When one of my students has students of their own -- no pressure, you lowly dogs -- they will call me Grandmaster (although some doubting thomas may call me "the ginger-haired guy from Shaolin Wahnam whose counters against shoots are useless").

2) If he is the head of a kungfu style, he is also called a grandmaster.

Hmm .. maybe in with a chance here, but not a big one. If I successfully create Ginger-Haired Monkey Kungfu, then I'm in!

3) When a practitioner is widely accepted as an authority in his art, he is called a grandmaster.

Ah .. right .. hmmm ... 1 or 2 it is then.

I wonder what my students are doing ...

So - I am not a Grandmaster, but what about TaiSihing Kai? He needs to qualify in only one of these three areas to be called a Grandmaster, irrespectively of whether he can provide the names of opponents he has defeated in more than a hundred sparring competitions. But Kai qualifies in all three areas. His students have long been masters in their own right. He is the head of the Budocan system with many students. His ability and knowledge have been acknowledged widely as an authority, and this has been confirmed by being honoured in the Martial Art Hall of Fame, although you may consider it a 'ten-cent a piece' organization.

[grammatoncleric]

I was quite suprised by your stance towards Sipak Kai.

The IMB have a high regard in the martial arts community, Richard Bustillo's skill and teaching are supposed to be excellent.

You seem to dismis Sipak Kai's high endorsement by the IMB (thursday) as nothing worth noting.

What are your reasons for doing so?

[Darryl]

Skills vs Techniques

Now that we've got 'How to be a Grandmaster' out of the way, we come back to the real issue - skills vs techniques.

For now, the question is not 'Would this work' or even 'Does this work'. It could be 'How would this work' or 'Can I make that work?' or the common statement "I've never seen anyone try that before"

Since misinterpretation can easily render the rest of the discussion pointless, I'd first like to establish where everyone is coming from. Everyone in this case is Paul (advocating the sprawl) and the general Shaolin Wahnam approach (as shown in the video counters).

Obviously there are then counters to the sprawl, and counters to the counter, but my experience is that this first movement is the best response to an attempted shoot

No disagreement with the first part, only the second - that the sprawl is the best response.

So, in summary - we both agree that a chosen technique (the form) without adequate skill (the person) is not going to work. We also agree that if you have the skill you would want the technique(s) that brings you the most benefit. The points we disagree on are 1) what those techinques are and 2) how effective they would be.

A fair summary so far?

[Kaitain]

Hi Darryl,

I think that's a fair summary. I think there are a few caveats that we went over:

1) we need to differentiate between a full sprawl where the body is near parallel to the floor, and a check where the legs are cleared back and pressure is applied to the opponents head/neck/shoulders to force him down. The latter is generally what I'm talking about. Some Wahnam guys spoke about a similar method.

2) we are talking about the shoot coming from a good setup - the defender's energy has been forced upwards (by a strike for instance) and so striking potential is limited (when compared to being set and waiting)

3) the shoot is a sound one - the attacker is not bent forward, his front foot is between the defender's feet, his momentum is continuing through the defender. I'm not saying he has to be Matt Hughes, but the basics should be present.

4) we are all agreed that the ideal scenario is to control the fight in such a way that a shoot never comes. However, since we rarely get our own way in these things, it makes sense to discuss the "what if" scenario.

Agreed?

Paul

[Charles David]

Lohan Strikes Drum

Hello everyone,

I just thought that I would mention that this thread has prompted me to start training against (imagined) shoots. Can't wait to get a full time sparring partner!


With Shaolin Salute,

[Darryl]

Forum Tennis

Hi Paul,

A good summary of the various caveats

1) & 3) - yep, agree fully.

2) - we agree on the 1st part (that something must be done first, either a strike, a lure or the shooter having an opportunity to come in), but we differ on the second part (striking potential being limited)

4) - Agree and disagree. Agree that, as a standup, we don't want to be rolling around on the group grappling with each other. Disagree - we might choose to tempt our partner/opponent to try for a shoot, allowing us to get/be in a better position.

So far, we have two points of disagreements/discussion - striking potential vs a well set up shoot, and the shoot: threat or golden opportunity?

I like how we're doing this, so I'll map out my reply and we can see where we disagree.

Striking Potential, developed from

Stances - solid yet agile, not a 'please grab my leg' senario
Internal Force - which is usually as far as a discussion gets
Guard/Defence - one arm being enough to cover the whole upper torso, leaving an arm free to counter mid/low if required

Shoot: threat or golden opportunity?

Using an opponents force against them - either tempt them to shoot (when you are sure of your counter) or, as you say, redirect their force

[Kaitain]

Hi Darryl,

Striking potential - my question here is, can you hit as hard and as accurately from a set position as you can when your energy has been forced up? I know the usual answer here is "Internal Force" says we can, but I can only go with my own experience, which says that I can't. It would seem to make sense that we discount Internal Force from the discussion for now, as it isnt something we can usefully debate (since I havent experienced what you guys say you can do). It is very hard to knock someone out with a single hit, and my argument is always "why risk it?" - by going to check I have neutralised the shoot and am in a strong position to strike as I like. If I try to land a hit as the shoot comes in, and I miss or dont hit well enough, then I'm going to be taken down.

Shoot - I think it's important to note that I said "make sure the shoot never comes". That doesn't mean it isn't attempted, just that before it's started the opportunity has been taken. I wouldn't invite the shoot on the basis that my shoot defence would work - if it is someone who can wrestle, then the shoot is often just their method for getting contact and they have a lot of follow-on techniques that make it difficult to maintain position against them.

What I mean is - I'd invite the idea of the shoot, but that's all I would aim to let someone have. Generally my strategy is to run someone down - I'm not a passive fighter, once the opportunity is given I will aim to close and finish there. This is more of an attributes thing - I'm 6'4'' and 18 stone so if I stand off I tend to get picked off. Some of my students are 10 stone when wet, so I teach them to pick their moments more.

As an aside, this was something that came up in conversation yesterday. I think the reason that the check/sprawl is vital to my strategy is that my size tends to invite the shoot - it's easy for someone to get low enough to take my legs and hips. I rarely shoot in on people even when doing pure grappling - it's a long way for me to travel and consequently it telegraphs badly. I also considered that one advantage of the lower stance is that the hips are concurrently lower as well, making the shooter have to come in lower. However, the compromise in using a lower stance is a (comparitive) loss of manoeuvreing ability and also the presentation of an easier target. My experience (having played with lower stances this week to see what I thought) is that the lower stance also leaves a vulenrability to being ankle picked. Anyway - low stance = bad for me, I know you guys see it differently.

So if you want to train in the hardest conditions possible, get someone who can shoot to a competent degree that is also 6 inches shorter than you

Paul

[MoMoJuice]

Nice thread everyone, I'm enjoying reading it

Respectfully,

[Darryl]

Hi Paul,

It would be quite awkward to debate strikes without mentioning Internal Force, mainly because Force Training is emphasised very early on in our training. We freely admit that, without using Force, Kungfu is not nearly as effective. For convenience - and to avoid bogging down the debate - I'll follow your request to minimise my uses of any "Internal Force" type answers where possible.

Your comments on the Bow and Arrow stance are very interesting though. Your observation that the lower starting position is advantageous, but the potentially static nature is a liability allows us to discuss skills vs techniques. If the stance is just a technique, then what really matters is a persons skillful ability to move/respond from/in their stance.

It's one of the amusing ironies of this thread - visitors comment on how bad our shoots are, usually without considering why we respond the way we do. Since we train stances and not shooting (both just techniques), successful application always comes down to the relevant skill(s). Accordingly, we believe that our counters to grappling takedowns and shoots are actually very skillful. If we can't apply them, it would be down to two things - technique (we need more practice) or skill in application (either ours or the shooter).

I think this is where the debate is, hopefully we can avoid futile conversations

[Kaitain]

Hi again - I respectfully suggest that the veracity of a particular technique is more telling than the skill or ability of the person applying it. If you teach someone to punch with a cocked wrist, they may well build up an ability not to break their own wrist when punching someone, but it would be better to teach them the benefits of a straight wrist when punching.

The internal force request is more to get an acknowledgement from both sides of the debate that it is futile to discuss it. I don't mind someone saying "with internal force, I can achieve x result", as long as they dont expect it to be taken as gospel by me This leads into my next question.

I read on another thread that sparring is done with no contact. Could you explain what is meant by this? I mean are you guys sparring with contact at any level? It confuses me how defences (especially strike based defences) against something like a shoot can be validated without testing them in a sparring environment. You don't have to lamp someone to work out if something works or not, but if no contact is made at all then it seems unlikely to be a good testing method.

Cheers

Paul

[Grimlock]

I read on another thread that sparring is done with no contact. Could you explain what is meant by this? I mean are you guys sparring with contact at any level?

You're probably talking about a comment I made recently. "No contact" is a bit of a misnomer. There is definitely contact. We just stop our strikes short so that if we get through our partner's defenses, we won't actually hit them, so that part of it is a sort of exercise in control. When I say that we stop our strikes short, I don't mean that we stand several meters away throwing punches and saying, "I would have gotten you with that!" I mean that we throw our techniques and if we get through our partner's defense, we stop it a few centimeters short, but our spacing is such that if we chose to, we could execute the pattern to completion. After all, why would you need to defend something if it can't reach you?

Actually, when I've sparred in Wahnam, I've found that in some ways, there's more contact than when I sparred in some of the previous martial arts I practiced where we wore pads and actually kicked and punched each other. And I'll take superficial bruises on my forearms over damage to my head and torso anyday. I guess I should say that most of the contact I've experienced in kung fu sparring is just to the hands and forearms as I've defended attacks and had my attacks defended. But as I'm a beginner, I have only sparred kung fu with hand techniques.

I personally have not worked on grappling yet (there's a reason I've stayed out of this thread! ), but from what I've heard this is trained with contact, too. How could it not be?

Hopefully, my seniors can clear up any further confusion, so I'll step aside and let this interesting thread continue.

[Antonius]

Good summary, Chris (Grimlock).

By the way, at higher levels, we increase or change the threat level in sparring. For example, instead of stopping a White Snake just short of the throat, you can pierce past the throat, but to the side.

[Kaitain]

thanks for the clarification