Wing-Chun

Chum kiu

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When ever you first learn a form, its simply a stage of memorization, sifu does this, I copy it, and eventually with practice you memorize it just like you remember your name and address… but only in the later stages do you really get to benefit and truly understand the importance of the form and how it helps you in your development.  So, what I’d like to do is share some of my experiences regarding the chum Kiu form with you.
As you know the 1st section in all the forms, holds the most important of all development and specifically, i’m talking about in chum kiu, the lan sau section with the 3 turns. It took me years to not only develop this concept, but actually, get it at a proficient level.  Believe me, its a frustrating development but necessary in every ways, in order to reach higher levels of wing chun.  SLT focus on you controlling your center, but CK’s emphasis is no making you do it in motion.  Often times, I would disregard the entire form, and only practice this section of it over and over again…. and when I felt good about it, Sifu would check it out, and then depression, prozac, and crying game shower scene back in the corner, and back to the drawing board.  But, time and time again, that center in spinning motion, at full speed and controlling it is difficult to master.  You then come to understand how difficult is it to not only hold you center in stillness, but then the next level in motion is really a step up.    I can honestly tell you that there were times, during the day, where chum kiu would be in my head, and then in the middle of the room, all of a sudden, next thing you know i’m doing about 50 turns over and over again, just to see if i can hold that center in motion.
Now as you know the intro of CK, is all the first experience to motion as well, as your intro to kicks.  And, if your a windy city wing chun student, other then phil T. who actually enjoyed the kick training process,  I’ve come to know that you never pre-mention that your gonna have a kick class in advance, otherwise no one is going to show up…. As much kicking experience i had in the past with my tae kwon do, kicking in wing chun, was night and day.  And, still kicks continue to be the pain in the ass…. literally for students when it comes to doing side kick of course .  Its hard to sorta motivate the student for kicks.  In one hand, wing chun is filled with many kicks and can use it at such a complex level that you’d think he was a tae kwon do guy.  On the other hand though, the reality is that kicks being thrown in a real fight is about .01%.  And, from historical knowledge with all the fights sifu has gotten to and won, he never once threw a kick .  But, as often stated, to know the complete art you have to know it all, and you never know when you have to go into your tool box even if you rarely use that particular tool.  In Ck you are exposed to 3 kicks, and these 3 kicks .. you have basically front kick, side kick, and jut gur.. with the variations of regular and circle front and circle side.   As you all know, I’ve said it before, you just have to get over the hump of balance. The basic drill is jing dok lop ma, if you can hold this position in stillness at wasit level, then you got it.  People ask me to do the kick, it maybe a year since the last time I’ve done it, but since I have the balance, I simply lift my leg and there you go.   I wish I could find an easier way around this development, but the reality is, you have to just do it.  I honestly believe if you did this  leg exercise for a mere 5 minutes each day both sides, regardless of age, shape and size, you can get this within a month.
The next important lesson that you finally start to pick up on CK is that the body does everything and the hands, really are just for attacking… In other words, if you use your hands to block instead of the body, you’ll be doing 2 motions instead of one.  If you simply just allow the hands to cover the center and let the body change the positioning and line of the hands, you can not only generate more force effortless with this but also cover areas of openess so much quicker.  Now what does this look like.. .from, the ultimate demonstration, watch from 26seconds – 44 seconds, and sifu demonstrates chum kiu process so brilliantlly

Notice, that his hands simply maintain a triangle, at all times, never chasing to block, but simply aimed at the individual’s centerline, and then he lets the body simply rotate from one side to another to block everything that is thrown at him… Its done to perfection, and when you can start blocking with your body, you’ll begin to look like this when you start chi saoing with other individuals.
The tip in training, is simple in all that we do….. People are so concerned with looking good, that they fail to understand that you need to go through the ugly process before you can get to the next stage.  In training, its okay to make mistakes, its okay to be frustrated, its okay to look goofy, coz in the end your training to make yourself feel better.  Often times, people asked me how did i improve so fast, and I tell them one simple thing, i never stop letting sifu be sifu and demanded criticism.   Its funny when i see people work with him, and they want to be so perfect and try to attempt to hide mistakes… you want him to correct you, you demand perfection without expecting it.. and when you come to understand that you’ll become a better person in all that you do.  Well, that’s a brief look into chum kiu, with some simple thoughts and experience.

Written by Sifu Ed Cruz
http://www.windycitywingchun.com

Often times I suggest to students the formula to develop skill in wing chun is, find 1 of the 6
attacks to master and spend the majority of the time, practicing your blocking.   Now, if you stick
with that simple formula which i often suggest, your skills will definitely raise up significantly.  But
when it comes to working on your blocking skills, there is one technique that you need to work on,
above and beyond the others that can’t be compared… The mastery of the bong sau motion.

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Over the years from teaching,and observing individuals what separates the good from the great, is how well has one developed the bong sau. Clearly the most difficult of the moves to master, due to the fact that the motion leads to
injury if done incorrectly as opposed to any other hand technique.  So, where to begin, and as always  with everything
in wing chun, you start from origin…how well can you do the motion.

You’ve got to perfect the bong sau motion and know exactly how to do it to the T just like in the form. And this takes, constant and constant practice from not only knowing how the motion is shot out but also, making sure your covering your center and often times not raising your shoulder when doing the motion. How do you know its correct.  If you
know the placement of bong sau and the motion, imagine i ask you just put your bong sau out and hold it in place, and
feel what it feels like just to hold it in stillness. Listen to the amount of muscle being used at that time and where everything else is.  Now, I ask you shot out that bong sau at full speed and tell me, at the end of driving that bong sau
out at 80-mph, does it feel like the bong  when you hold it in stillness.  See, this alone time is a must… often people complain, i don’t have a partner…if you can’t do bong sau by yourself correctly, ain’t not chance in heck that your
gonna do it right with a partner… so that’s the first goal….

There are allot of drills that help you develop the bong sau from the simple to the more difficult… You could say the
most difficult of the drill is taking an onslaught of fun sau attacks and how well one can neutralize the pull of the lop sau and maintain the structure… here are some of the most common problems that ones sees if you do bong sau when you roll with people….

1) giving up on the bong sau block, often times, a certain block should be dealt with bong sau, but students give up on
the block and us wu sau or other secondary blocks immediately… remember there are levels to the triangle, and you
want your opponent to go through progressions before you have to go to emergency mode blocking

2) don’t push out with the bong sau, once you get the block out, don’t keep pushing it further out… you ’ll definitely feel kick back in the shoulder

3) don’t raise the shoulder….. that’s a no no… it should be sunk just like when you do the punch.

4) bong sau does not collapses beyond 135 degrees, you have to know how to hold the structure without using muscle.. your just gonna have to fail at this over and over again…..knowing the motion and holding structure are 2 different things… just keep failing and figuring out what works and what doesn’t

5) cover your center when doing the bong sau… the wrist has to be generally in your center line… if its too much  or too little that bong sau will still collapse and won’t be supported by your structure

6) neutralize, neutralize, and neutralize the force on the bong sau.. probably one of the hardest things to do.. if you can’t neutralize force on bong sau..then one you don’t have a bong sau, 2 you won’t be able to roll out of motions, etc, etc…..remember there are 3 blocks that i’ve seen time and time again that people can’t block…… fun sau, low lop chop and por jeong……..

In the end, start recognizing when the bong sau needs to be used… sometimes you might have a little force in there, but your gonna have to experiment… but you have to develop the bong sau

Written by Sifu Ed Cruz

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6) Where’s my center?

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I’m sure everyone has done this before. Have someone do a bong sau and place it perfectly into the correct position, and then press against his bong sau. What you’ll notice is how much force that the bong sau can take, with the guy/gal putting very little effort in dealing with the force. Now offset that bong by either moving it slightly left or right, let’s just say about 1% of the center line. And see the huge difference. Notice how easily it is to collapse his bong sau with very little pressure at all. Well, in chi sao its key to be aware of the centerline for everything that you do. Thus, if your in inside gate, you need to make
sure both your tan and bong are in the proper position, if your just slightly of, just like in the example above, your opponent can take advantage of this.

7) Fok sau woes and painful bongs
Probably the most difficult thing in the beginning to deal with is that of fok sau.  The most difficult thing is maintaining forward pressure upon the roll, and the most common mistake is pressing downward with the fok sau. Notice the Siu Lim Tao is the blue print for the motions of all the moves, and if you do 3 fok sau’s in SLT, you’ll notice that this is the CORRECT motion that you do when chi saoing as well. The best way to deal with the downward press, is to adjust the elbow. Remember, that elbow leads the motion, thus if the elbow is raised and is almost on equal level of the wrist, the downward pressure will occur, if you sink the elbow, this will fix the problem.  As for the bong sau woes this occurs because of poor structure as well as tension being placed at the point of contact.  Thus, if the opponent pushes against
your bong and you end up pushing back, you’ll immediately feel it at the shoulder, and if you maintain that for a couple minutes, you’ll see the usual, I need to take a break coz my shoulder is killing me.  Its true that fok saus are difficult to understand, but at the same time bong sau might be tougher since it’s a lot easier to injure oneself when you do an correct bong.

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Have you ever seen this happen. Your chi saoing with someone and he gets a good hit on you. So your ego’s all bruised and you ‘re like, bitch I’m going to force a hit no matter what next thing you know you have 2 idiots using muscle, zero structure, and just hitting each other back and forth. What’s this called? It is called a waste of time.  In the end what you are developing is bad habits. Remember, chi sao helps you to develop so many things, from timing, to energy, understanding the distance, to learning how to stick. If you break the rules of chi sao and fail to learn from it, your wasting time. The reason you got hit, is because your structure sucked, eat the humble pie, and work with your partner to recreate the scenario again, and learn how to deal with the oncoming force.  Learn to control your ego and while you may lose in the beginning if your partner uses muscle, you’ll eventually over take him when you develop the skill to deal with the force without muscle.  Often times in training, you’ll need to take steps back in order to progress forward.  Once you come to understand that you’ll have the mental toughness to push forward.

9) More defense

Any idiot can attack, every art has deadly moves. All to often you see the martial art practioners, just doing chain punch after chain punch while their dummy partner goes along with it.  If you practice like that you’ll be in for a rude awakening if you ever have to actually use it on a partner that’s unwilling to bend over for you.  But the test of your true skill is how good your defense is. Allot of times when I practice, I literally just allow the opponent to attack one after the other. It truly is a test of skill to be able to take whatever he throws at you and redirect it constantly.  Remember, attacking is a simple skill that doesn’t take that long to develop, on the other hand defense is something that really can impress others. Spend more time working on your defense when chi saoing.

10) Control

Man, there’s nothing like getting a good solid hit on your partner, right? The fact is your partner is your best friend, and without a partner you can never get better in this martial art. Thus, if you decide your ego needs a boosting by smacking him down, what your displaying is such a low level of this martial art.  The fact is, every attack you do when chi saoing should be controlled.  When you end up looking like the everyday joe, and tap, or smack each other at full force, you won’t be able to control that force in the heat of the battle.  More than anything, you’ll end up going for the home run and hoping that lady luck is on your side
and that the hit connects.  If it connects lucky you, if you miss, your toast.  There’s nothing more impressive, than going full speed with an attack and stopping just inches away from your opponent.  That my friend is skill.  This martial art is all about control, if you can control yourself, then you can control others.

Go back to the first five tips from here

Written by sifu Ed Cruz
http://www.windycitywingchun.com

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1) Your hands are only as good as your stance

. Let’s start of with probably the most important thing before you get into chi sao. If you want to improve  your chi sao significantly then make sure you’ve got a solid YGKYM.  All to often, I see people jumping into chi sao, when they can’t even find their own center of balance. Thus, imagine one of those huge red wood trees, in Return of the Jedi, how strong would that tree be, if its roots were decaying? Obviously, it wouldn’t take that much force to knock it over. There are several ways to test your YGKYM stance. The first being just sitting in your stance for about 5 – 15 minutes, if you can last at least 10 minutes without any aches or pains anywhere, then you’ll know you’ve found you center. The 2nd way is have a partner push against your chest slightly and see whether or not you can actually root against the force. If you can’t handle a light push, then you aren’t going to be able to handle the oncoming force with your stance during chi sao. 2) Recipe for tan, bong, fok?

Tan, bong, fok sau oh my.  These are the main ingredients when doing chi sao, thus it is key to know how to do these moves correctly, and to understand how they are put together structurally. Now, I’m not going to dive into detail about each one, coz that would be an entire article on its own.  But keep in mind some simple rules.  Tan sau should be flat, do the test for yourself and see if you can feel the difference between a flat tan and one that isn’t. Imagine a tan being a bridge between you and an opponent, can a bridge connect 2 points being up. Of course not! Bong sau, key thing is make sure your elbow is higher than your wrist and make sure that the hands/fingers continue in the direction of your forearm. Finally fok sau, probably the most difficult one of the 3, be aware of the point of contact.  In addition to all that make sure you know when these 3 structures are off your centerline, in time this will play a vital role when chi saoing. Why is it important for you to know the structure of each of these moves? Imagine them to be your TV antenna, if the antenna is just slightly off, your reception won’t be that good. If you tan isn’t in the right position, then that will decrease your level of sensitivity.

3) I’m ready to fight? Ah, jumping ahead of ourselves once again.  Before you get into those prodigal son battles,  make sure first and foremost, that your roll is decent. While chi sao may seem like 2 guys facing each other working a steering wheel, it is in fact a constant forward motion, instead of what appears to be a circular movement What’s the difference? If you have a circular movement and force is pushed slightly against it, if you remove the force, your hand will remain in the same position and continue its circular movement. On the other hand, imagine your hand as a spring, waiting for the pressure to be removed. Once the pressure is no longer there, the hand will automatically move forward. Thus, you won’t even have to think when to attack. Key note though, is that the forward pressure doesn’t need to be initiated by you, if your structure is correct for tan, bong, and fok, the structure along will maintain that forward pressure.  All to often people, either have no forward motion or over emphasize it too much.  Remember chi sao is a drill to developing fighting skills, if you end up fighting during this drill you lose all the development that you want to get.  If you need to fight, then go just spar and get it out of your system and leave the chi sao to developing some real skill. 4) Equality for both sides In the beginning when doing chi sao, picture it as if you were doing push ups against the wall. Notice in order to keep your body square you need to push equally on both sides of your arms. Well, when you start doing chi sao its sorta like the same thing. You want to be able to maintain equal energies on both sides when your rolling. Literally, regardless of what position you are in: inside gate – bong sau and tan sau
outside gate – double fok sau
chi sao – tan sau and fok sau or bong sau and fok sau – thus being in both inside and outside when rolling The wrist for the most part are lined up with each other for both arms. The importance of equal energy, well it is because of the inequalities of the forward drill when doing chi sao, that your opponent can use that to his advantage.  And remember your doing a drill motion, and in order to do that you need both sides to be equal and aimed at the opponents center. 5) Tension vs. Energy Mommy, what’s the difference between tension and energy? One of the most recurring problems when doing chi sao, is differentiating between tension and energy. When you use tension it involves muscle, which reduces your sensitivity significantly. Thus, have you ever rolled with someone who was really tense, then all of a sudden just pulled your arm away from his. You’ll notice when its tension the hand just stays there doing nothing at all. But if it was energy, the hand automatically shoots out towards you. That’s the difference between the 2, and how you can tell one from another.  Tension is uncontrolled, while proper structure lets the energy run through your motion.

The other 5 tip to improving your chi sao here

Written by Sifu Ed Cruz http://www.windycitywingchun.com