The other day I was asking my teacher about the fighting competitions in Hong Kong, and he told me that when he left HK around 5 years ago there weren’t really any; Because roughly 30 years ago some kid (about 17 years old, who did crane style), fought in a huge competition in HK, and got kicked in the neck, and died there in the ring in front of thousands of people, and the competitions were banned. Before then however, these competitions were really popular, and everyone was doing kung fu (in hk and china), and they usually did the “effective” style, witch was the one that was doing well in the competitions at the time. But after these competitions stopped kung fu lost its popularity, and the people that did start doing kung had no way of really knowing witch style was BS, and witch was the real thing.
no. i am the reason for the decline in the quality of kung fu.
You want to stop the decline?
Just train ten times harder than your Sifu!..It should do!
One other possible reason is that modern lifestyle makes the practise of seemingly repetitive and formless martial arts seem like waste of precious time, hence the level of mastery is reduced to how many forms you know.
I second what prana said. In addition, point fighting has contributed to the decline because some schools, as they spar with point rules and always minimal contact, which gets them in the habit of fighting that way, which will get them killed on the street.
I went to a pretty big tournament in HK in 1982. There were people from US, UK, Australia and all over SE Asia there.
The rules were basically anything goes except eye and groin attacks. A favorite tactic was the dropping elbow to the back of the neck (might as well get measured for that wheelchair before the fight to save time, huh?). The only hand protection was very thin gloves, lighter than your average bag glove.
People were getting damaged left right and centre. This might have even have been the tournament CBA is talking about, someone died at it or one very shortly thereafter. Most matches were won by brawling aggression rather than anything remotely approaching crisp technique. One guy did some lovely stuff with low stances and spectacular footwork but lost to a much rawer dude who just about took his head off, and severely damaged his eye, with a right cross.
I understand the tournament was never held again because the attrition rate scared all the sponsors off. Being associated with a bloodbath doesn’t bring the customers in.
Rick Spain and Joe Moahengi of Traditional Wing Chun won their respective weight divisions, the former with a broken hand he suffered in an earlier bout, due mainly to those crap gloves. I mention this only to annoy those who contend that WC people can’t fight.
All in all, it sounds to me like the death of these sort of tournaments is for the best.Damaging someone for life, or being damaged, in a sporting contest, is not something I’d want to have as one of my KF memories when I’m 85.
Sounds like Old School San Da from the stories I’ve heard. Time frame sounds about right as well.
Ya, i think he might’ve said 20, not 30. Is there any where, where i can order a video of this “blood bath”?
Ha sounds dangerous but thats what Kungfu is about(if your purpose is fighting or competition) If that kind of thing went on all the time nobody would question kungfu’s effectiveness. Anyway I think these fights were the begining of the lei tei fights we have now. I would like to see sanda with a little less rules. Fighting used to be a serious endevor not somthing a guy enters for a hobby. Being a fighter used to be a way of life now that’s only true for the top professionals. I like hearing about the old brutal stuff and if they brought it back that would be great, after all if you can’t stand the heat stay out of the kitchen.
I find it vaguely ironic that when I suggest that MMA type training and fighting is a phenomenally useful gauge of fighting ability, and a good place to test skills I get called a troll trying to stir up trouble, but in HK, tournaments of this sort (not exactly the same, I know) were taking place, and deemed important to the development/maintainence of good KF.
Sorry… not trying to sound bitter 
Well I guess it depends on the purpose of the tournament. And to tell the truth allot of kungfu fighters want to fight other Kungfu fighters. It’s the same in MMA, you don’t hear them saying they want to fight sifu x they usually want to fight another MMA competitor. The only people who care so much about kungfu in NHB is trolls on these boards.
Merry is right on that i think.
I’d love to spar nhb style too.
If your purpose is truly to learn combat effective stuff you should endevor to work within one of the many combat related industries in our societies.Then the reality of volience might become apparent.I don’t know how many of you regularly go overseas but if you are that hard core there are plenty of countries (that don’t have access to internet) that are in a lot of turmoil and you can get plentry of kill time up.
whatever whenever
have a nice day:)
I heard a similar story but in the story I heard it was a Baji guy punching a Bak Mei guy in the neck and killing him. I never heard of it banning fight comps though. I don’t know. Maybe it was banned.
ka,
Combat and MA aren’t the same thing any more. Close quarters combat is de-emphasized in an era of long range weapons. If the enemy is so close that you have to resort to H2H, you did something wrong (or they did something right)
Actually, Shaolindynasty, that’s not true at all. Maybe KF guys are only interested in fighting other KF guys, but NHB types don’t care who steps in the ring, KF, Muay Thai, wrestler, Shotokan… don’t care. Test against as many styles and ways of doing things as possible.
The martial arts are not in decline. They are evolving to meet the needs of contemporary society.
that’s an interesting point.
what, in your opinion, are the needs for martial arts in a modern society?
personal combat is a rarity. when it occurs, it’s not necessarily what you’d call a ‘fair fight.’
so what do you think are our needs today, and how have martial arts ‘evolved’ to meet them?
cheers.
stuart
Two Words:
“Tae Bo.”
Two more words:
“Jiminey Kickit”
One’s designed for a workout, the other is an MA daycare operation. You figure it out.
that’s exactly what i was thinking.
the needs of modern society lean more toward fitness, entertainment, self-fulfillment, etc. and there’s plenty of evidence to support the notion that martial arts have changed to fill that need. whether or not that’s an ‘evolution’ is another question entirely.
thankfully, there’s always the counterculture. for every tae bo class that opens up (not that i’ve got a real problem with tae bo), there will be people that then work that much harder to keep the real deal alive on some level. that might be our saving grace.
stuart b.
What I think is really happening is that people interested in martial arts now have a real choice as to how they train.
The very nature of the martial arts as a vehicle for the discovery of self dictates that everyone will have their own vision. Figuring out what kind of martial artist you are is a big part of that, and somewhere out there there is a school for you.
Sorting through the bad to get to the good is something every MAist has to face. But I don’t think it represents a decline in the overall quality. Just an overblown increase in access, coupled with the idea “success” as a measure of value (your own school! the american dream! you did it!).
But it is within the martial arts themselves that we can find our own personal solutions to this problem…making it a non-issue for those who seek the truth.