Can Traditional Wing Chun Guys Fight

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Wing Chun
1

Why do some people portray Traditional Chinese Martial Artist or Kung fu people in general as not being interested in fighting or not having the ability to fight with their kung fu?

Back in the “old days” TCMA/Kung Fu people were not questioned about their ability to “really fight” using their kung fu. Did it have anything to do with the environment and the greater possibility that you might find yourself in a situation where your life depended on your kung fu?

Quick story:
Been a cop 7 yrs. Our department teaches grappling to every officer and in order to convince us that grappling is “superior” to all martial arts, they show us a video where a particular grappling family beats up martial artists from various styles with one being a so called “kung fu representative”. First of all I knew this kung fu guy couldn’t fight because he was wearing those old 70’s gym shorts with knee high tube socks and those kung fu slippers that everyone buys when they first start taking martial arts. That was the first clue. The second clue was obvious when the “kung fu representative” went into a “karate kid” crane stance as he and the grappler faced off. oh yeah don’t forget the sash he wore around his gym shorts, which qualified him as a kung fu fighter. Well, as you would imagine, the grappler punished the “kung fu representative” very quickly. Now I was extremely embarrassed watching this video in a room full of cops who know I study traditional kung fu. By the way if anyone knows this “kung fu representative” please slap him for the entire kung fu community (just kidding, I’m sure he’s a wonderful person ).

Are some of the people representing kung fu today responsible? What about SOME people who say that they are experienced TCMA, but when they fight they basically get “pimp slapped” by other styles of martial arts?

What about “kung fu Joe” (Hung Ga Sifu Joe Colvin) on the east coast? He actually got his name from the karate circuit guys, who respected him for kicking their a$$es with obvious kung fu techniques?

No disrespect to anyone, just trying to stir up discussion about this matter, which keeps popping up lately.

2

I think that most depends on the fighter (individual). Our natural skill/ability makes a huge difference in our fighting. I’m sure you could take some traditional kung fu practitioners and put them up against ground fighters, and the traditional guy would win. It all depends on who’s fighting. If Jet Li were using only traditional kung fu against a ground fighter in this forum, I would bet on Jet Li. SKILL LEVELS, SPEED, BALANCE, POWER, TIMING, AGILITY, NATUAL TALENT, all have to be considered. We are all different and capable of different things. Men/Women are not all created equal. So basically it all depends on the fighter in my opinion. There are great fighters in any/every art.

3

Back in the old days TCMA/Kung Fu people were not questioned about their ability to really fight using their kung fu

myths, legends, stories, tall tales, mystique, and secrecy surrounded them. the real fights were not on tv or available on video tape or DVD for the world to watch. most if not all these encounters looked more like kids fighting in a play ground with, to the average person, minimal martial arts techniques actually being executed. for the most part, an average person wouldn’t even know that more than one style was being represented as it all looked like the same mess.

with present day evolution, UFC, being the beginning of a martial arts revolution, the attitude is no longer acceptance of superiority but requesting proof before belief. this led to styles being pitted against each other and people against each other for the world to watch. traditional arts took a beating. therefore, traditional arts and those who practice them are being questioned more than in the past.

all the arts which developed a certain amount of respect and high degree of success came from refinement and evolving from previous “traditional” arts such as ju jitsu, and muay thai. boxing, grappling, and thai boxing are the three main staples of most successful fights in a controlled environment these days. all have continued to evolve and improve and are cross-trained by those who employ them successfully. traditional arts/artists have not done so. they have not been successful against those who have do/done so.

many would question the use of a 15-20 year old car compared to a 5-10 year old car, let alone a 500 year old car compared to a 5-10 year old car. I wouldn’t use a walkman made in the 1990s with the availability of more efficient and useful MP3 players nowadays. DVD is also replacing VHS the way CDs replaced cassettes. Same reasons why TMAs are always being questioned now. For the same price, and often a fraction of the time, you get most likely a better deal. At the worst, the same deal. But most likely not a worse deal. It’s all about “evidence”. TMA hasn’t proven itself to be deserving of the awe and respect it used to enjoy in the old days at present. and until they do, they will continue to be questioned. There are the odd execptions to this but the amount of successful showings gets overshadowed but the more prevalent unsuccessful showings.

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…yawn yawn yawn yawn yawn !:mad: this is getting really tiresome, and the whole debate can be wrapped up very simply:

  • are you training in wing chun to defend yourself against the idiot on the street?

  • …or are you into wearing lycra pants and rolling round a ring trying to prove youre a hard nut or something?

I certainly sit in the former camp, as i suspect most people do

Stuart:)

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…yawn yawn yawn yawn yawn ! :mad: this is getting really tiresome

this is smiliar to your (now missing) response to kung fu fighter’s thread on wong shun leung’s mantis challenge match where you said something along the lines of “who the hell cares” followed by many of those red angry faces, as well as in this thread

http://martial.best.vwh.net/forum/showthread.php?p=637713#post637713

where you say

Is anyone else bored rigid with these endless discussions on the ‘real’ (sic) wing chun, who taught who, whose is best, who taught joe bloggs, is it crane and snake or emei …

Is there any point? How will this discussion aid your training? Do you thik it can ever be resolved and what does it matter???

this is a forum for discussion. if individuals start threads it’s obviously because they wish to hear the opinions of others discussing the topic. members have a choice to reply or not, as do you. if certain threads bother you so much just don’t read them or reply to them. it’s really that simple. stop posting rude replies on threads if you don’t like them. what you can do, is start threads YOU deem worthy to be discussed instead. your opinion may no be reflective of how other members, or the majority, may feel.

every topic has been done to death and talked about to death. that is why this forum is alot slower than a couple of years ago. now it has picked up somewhat and that should be a good thing. there is nothing new to talk about that hasn’t been covered a billion times already. the odd time something new comes up, for example, kung fu fighter’s thread, you say who cares.

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Hey,

Read my previous contributions to decent threads, i have always contributed fairly and squarely, and have stated that its just an opinion. These other threads though are pretty much pointless, i dont know what people hope to gain from them:confused:

I’ll happily discuss training technique and approach all day mate:)

PS - ive never been rude, if you think so its your hyper-sensitivity im afraid. Do yourself a favour and have a look past the last two comments ive made and you’ll see ive been helpful and always anti-trolling.

Chill my friend…im off to start a coulpe of threads on:

  1. Which Yip Man students finishes the system…#
  2. Who knows the real knife form…
  3. did William Cheung learn a different version of…

ONLY KIDDING!!!:wink:

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well I admit I have looked over some of your other posts to see if you were a horrible troll type but you didn’t seem to be. I guess you just once in a while like to criticize threads by posting in them when you obviously think they’re a waste of time. I’m merely suggesting that the thread starters and the other repliers may think it’s something worth discussing (even if it’s been done to death) even if it bores/annoys you and that if you don’t like it, you can always avoid them.

I don’t think you’re a troll. The worst trolls of this forum seem to not be around any longer…and to confess, I’d never talk about it here since it’s such a touchy/political subject but the whole William Cheung thing will never cease to interest me…and yes, the knife form thing also…and the Leung Bik thing with the whole HK style differing from the Mainland style…and most recently, I wanna get to the bottom of the Yip Man being a pedophile thing too! I’m serious.

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Wow! those would be great topics to start

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“Wow! those would be great topics to start” (Sirus)

***AGAIN…WHAT OTHER POSSIBLE REASON could there be for such thread topics other than to TROLL ?

Here’s a helpful clue, Sirus. Whenever someone comes on here with only 1-2-3-5-10-15 posts to his “name”- and then almost immediately starts to attack someone like William Cheung (which you are intimating here and have openly done on another recently started thread by you) - it means that they are a TROLL…and almost always from the Detroit area.

Now let’s play a word game, shall we?

What do the words Samson, Death Touch, UNDERDOG, and Dave Mead mean to you? :cool: :cool: :cool:

10

Ultimatewingchun

maybe in the emin thread you had grounds for this but in this one don’t you think you may be jumping the gun/overreacting?

the guy didn’t even bring up william cheung, stuartm did! And of those thread topics listed, only 1 of 3 has anything to do with him. Sirus didn’t single william cheung out to begin with or in his reply to stuartm’s post…

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Did not mean to steer you in to a child like temper tantrum. I have done nothing to you are you the moderator or just a busy body. When you point the finger at others you have three more pointing at yourself. Wake up from your negative remarks and show some growth.

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he’s not the moderator but Victor tends to talk that way alot :slight_smile:

troll is his favorite word :smiley:

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[SIZE=“7”]***AGAIN…WHAT OTHER POSSIBLE REASON could there be for such thread topics other than to TROLL ?[/SIZE] Well sounds like you did the same thing and if you read longer on the origanal thread (man did the fecal fly)

Here’s a helpful clue, Sirus. Whenever someone comes on here with only 1-2-3-5-10-15 posts to his “name”- and then almost immediately starts to attack someone like William Cheung (which you are intimating here3 Points About TWC

  1. In my haste to defend my Sifu against those who try to convince the world (and themselves) that he’s lying about the TWC-Leung Bik-Yip Man-William Cheung connection, I’ve had to correct myself several times about names, dates, facts, etc…
    So yes, I will slow down and check everything more carefully before posting it;and in time you will see that my faults have had to do with speed and style…but not substance.

  2. I won’t be goaded into revisiting the Cheung/Boztepe
    event-that-proved-nothing again without first doing some serious reflection on what is to be gained by it (other than allowing others to try and deflect the subject at hand away from a path they can’t deal with).

  3. My position on the history/lineage issue needs to be put forward in an A to Z fashion so that it can be judged in toto and not picked apart piecemeal…the total argument is much more compelling when examined in this manner. So here it is:

A) The system I’ve been studying/teaching for the last almost 20 years with William Cheung is clearly a different system
than the one I studied previously for 8 years with Moy Yat…
The Central line theory, along with the sidestepping and other footwork that supports it; the Entry Technique to bridge the gap;
the fighting on the Blindside strategy; the use of the fighting on the horizontal centerline strategy AFTER gaining the superior position via the central line strategy…
these things did not exist back in the 1970’s-early 80’s within Moy Yat Ving Tsun…(For more details on TWC theory and why it virtually eliminates the possibility of your opponent outflanking you - see my post on the TO BE OR NOT BE thread which starts with the words: “Firstly…I’m not worried about any social engagements…”)
These things did not exist within what I saw and experienced when Victor Kan visited Moy Yat’s school; the same for Mak Po (a student of Yip Man who first introduced Moy Yat to Yip Man); nor did they exist within the video I have that was done by Wong Shun Leung (put out, if memory serves sometime around 1980)…with the single EXCEPTION of WSL turning his vertical middle-of-the-body centerline several times to face the point of contact while blocking some hook punches …a central line TWC concept…though WSL did not use the TWC footwork that usually supports such a move.
Nor does it exist on the Leung Ting video I have;
nor does it show up in the countless magazine articles containing photos I still have about wing chun since 1975, other than William Cheung’s. All of this is very suggestive - ie.- William Cheung’s TWC is substantially different than the rest of any Yip Man lineage wing chun I have ever seen over the last 28 (and I’ve seen quite a bit)- the minor exception being the aforementioned Wong Shun Leung video.
So after all these years I know that TWC is real; it’s not an illusion; it does exist; it’s too complicated to have been invented by William Cheung, and it’s very different.

B) Yip Chun’s account in the book entitled WING CHUN
MARTIAL ARTS (on page 100) includes the following:
…“Grandmaster Yip Man says there is some theory that seems to be untouchable in Wing Chun and when he was in his boyhood he was not able to catch the idea…”

How much more of a clue do you want to back up William Cheung’s claim that Chan Wah Shun didn’t get everything from Leung Jan? (ie.- the centraline theory and corresponding footwork). Yip Chun couldn’t possibly mean the horizontal and vertical centerlines…two of the most simple and basic of concepts.

C) Yip Chun goes on to say…“As for the theory of Wing Chun, Master Chan Wah Shun did not know much about it…when he studied Wing Chun with Leung Bik, Yip Man was much older and Leung Bik was quite experienced and with better understanding of Wing Chun. So Grandmaster Yip Man received the real knowledge of Wing Chun when he was an adult…”

INCREDIBLY SUGGESTIVE! Yip Chun again supports William Cheung’s claim that Yip Man learned the REAL (knowledge of) Wing Chun (with better understanding) from Leung Bik.

D) I’ve yet to hear anyone say that Yip Chun is lying about this…also very suggestive.

E) The Lee Man Restaurant Workers Union story that the Leung Bik-Yip Man connection was fabricated in order to bring Yip Man more publicity is clearly ITSELF a fabrication, since Yip Man already had a crowded school with nothing to be gained by having his name associated with someone (Leung Bik) who no one even knew of… evidence of a post- 1982 attempt to discredit William Cheung’s claims with a lie.

F) The existence of Garrett Gee and Hung Fa Yi…
which is a remarkably similar system to TWC (and I say this based upon the Garrett Gee flier and two different magazine articles (with photos) I have and conversations with my friend Sifu Miguel Hernandez (a student of Moy Yat)…who attended a Garrett Gee seminar…(many others have said the same thing)…

This suggests that TWC concepts, strategies, principles and technigues are not sui-generis to William Cheung ( ie.-he didn’t make it up…unless someone can prove that he did (hardly possible given it’s complexity)…and then taught it to Garrett Gee;
or the reverse - Gee invented it and taught it to Cheung…

But there is not one shred of evidence anywhere to support this.

G) Neither has any proofs (claims) surfaced that William Cheung learned TWC from someone other than Yip Man…
Where is this mystery man (that some have suggested) or his decendents over the last 21 years?

Each fact (A to G) is suggestive…Together they have a CUMULATIVE FORCE that is very powerful.

Conclusions: Leung Bik (TWC)- Yip Man - William Cheung.
With the strong possibility that there was somewhere along the line a TWC/HFY connection.

This is what I believe. This is the logic I’ve employed in reaching my conclusions. At this point I am content that neither myself, nor William Cheung, nor anyone else within the World Wing Chun Kung Fu Association has to prove anything more. If you don’t believe the story - it’s up to you to disprove it. LOL