Hi all.
In a thread on the VTAA forum, it was stated that students of Victor Kan perform a flat fook sau. When I asked what they meant, I didn’t get an answer 
so I thought I’d try here.
The fook we perform at VK’s kwoon has the finger tips touching to form a beak hand. The wrist is bent at ninety degrees (i.e. for the right arm the fingers would be pointing to the left) and the beak is in the same horizontal plane as the arm. The arm is horizontal, parallel to the ground and lies on or as near as possible to the centreline. The elbow is kept in.
Now I have my own opinions about all this but I’d like to know what you guys think. Is the VK fook a flat fook sau in your opinion? If so, why? If not, what then is a flat fook?
maybe they meant flat as in the top of the hand (from wrist to thumbknuckle or index finger knuckle) is parallel to the ground?
Re: Flat fook sau
Originally posted by e-Warrior
The fook we perform at VK’s kwoon has the finger tips touching to form a beak hand. The wrist is bent at ninety degrees (i.e. for the right arm the fingers would be pointing to the left) and the beak is in the same horizontal plane as the arm. The arm is horizontal, parallel to the ground and lies on or as near as possible to the centreline. The elbow is kept in.
Like you, I call this fuk sao when I am showing or performing it in the performance of Sil Lim Tao, but the hand is held that way only to stretch and strengthen the wrist. That hand/wrist combination is not in fact, fuk sao. Fuk has a particular meaning in Cantonese. Fuk sao is properly a hand held palmside down, essentially a turned over tan sao, fingers pointed forward.
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Now I have my own opinions about all this but I’d like to know what you guys think. Is the VK fook a flat fook sau in your opinion? If so, why? If not, what then is a flat fook?
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I think that folks are only quibbling about definitions. They are both called fuk sao, but only the flat one fits the Cantonese definition. If the first set is practiced only with the hand held flat, part of the conditioning aspect is lost.
Regards,
Re: Flat fook sau
Originally posted by e-Warrior
The fook we perform at VK’s kwoon has the finger tips touching to form a beak hand. The wrist is bent at ninety degrees (i.e. for the right arm the fingers would be pointing to the left) and the beak is in the same horizontal plane as the arm. The arm is horizontal, parallel to the ground and lies on or as near as possible to the centreline. The elbow is kept in.
I perform fook sao almost similar as you described, except for a few differences. These are:
a) The fingertips don’t touch in order to form a beak hand. Instead, the tip of the thumb is placed between the middle finger and ring finger.
b) The arm is not horizontal & parallel to the ground. Instead, the arm is angled slightly upwards.
Now I have my own opinions about all this but I’d like to know what you guys think. Is the VK fook a flat fook sau in your opinion? If so, why? If not, what then is a flat fook? [/QUOTE]
I also execute another fook sao with the hands pointing towards the opponent. I don’t know if this is what you mean by flat fook sao.
There is a previous thread about fook sao. It also discussed about bent wrist fook sao & flat fook sao.
I don’t know why people on the VTAA forum thought our fook is flat but I think they’re wrong. This is obvious from the posts made in this thread and the previous one mentioned by Wingman.
In my opinion, the hooked fook is a VERTICAL fook sau and the straight/fingers pointing forwards is FLAT. I think the terms refer to the alignment of the wrist, not the elevation of the arm or position of the hand as the VTAA guys thought. If you imagine a line running horizontally through the wrist, from one side to the other, then in the flat fook version, this line will be more or less horizontal. In the hook version, this line will be vertical, hence the term.
At VKCVT we prefer the hook version. As I see it the pros and cons of both versions are as follows:
FLAT
PROS - greater contact area hence easier to sense an in coming attack. Also you’re halfway to doing a block (usually Wu I think) hence faster in defence. And your hand is also in a better position to attack.
CONS - the above means you’ve more or less committed yourself to those techniques. If you need to do something else (tan say in response to a lower lau sau) you’re at a disadvantage.
VERTICAL
PROS - it’s “neutral”, ie you’re not attempting to preempt what to do. Thus no technique is favoured and they all take a similar amount of time to perform. From the previous thread (haven’t read it all yet) some people seem to be saying that the elbow in the flat version can stick out - in the vertical the elbow is kept in to act as another line of defence.
CONS - not so sensitive. Although the time to execute all techniques is now equal, this means your speed has been reduced to a common denominator.
It’s interesting that some people do both, depending on the circumstances. At Victor Kan’s we always do the hook version so it hadn’t occurred to me that guys might be switching from one to the other.
Hi
Hello E-Warrior,
Nice to see another Londoner on the forum. 
I would agree largely with John W’s post. Where I train, the Fook Sau in SNT has its ‘shape’ to strengthen and stretch the wrist. For the same reason our Huen Sau is slow in the form.
I train with Kamon (Covent Garden, Croydon and Crawley classes). If you click the link, and scroll down to the Poon Sau picture featuring Mike and Marcia, you can see how we use Fook Sau in Chi Sau.
http://www.kamonwingchun.com/KamonTraining.asp
Duncan
Hi black and blue
Thanks for the link to the Kamon site.
The fook looks similar to a VK one, i.e. it’s hooked. Do you guys always do it like that? I only ask 'cos John’s saying the hook version is only done in the form - the “real” fook is flat with the hand un-hooked and the palm held down, like an upside down tan sau.
Regards
More often than not, it is hooked. But Chi Sau’s a funny thing
Depending on my partner’s positioning and structure, it can, at times, look flatter. IMO stick, elbow positioning and path of movement and energy are more important than conforming to a hand position that corresponds directly to the Fook shape in SNT.
While we do practise Poon Sau and Chi Sau stationary (in YCKYM), we spend more time doing so with movement (footwork). This means positioning is ever altering. I guess I’m saying Fook Sau has many faces, but its general structure and path of energy remains the same.
Your profile says you’ve been training for seven years. I’ve only been training for two… I should be asking you the questions!
Well black and blue, I may have trained for 7 years but I may not be as far advanced in the system as you. For example, I haven’t done the second form yet. This is because I had a long break from training and two years of that 7 was spent revising. Only recently have I managed to go beyond where I left off. So you could say I’ve only trained for 5 years. However, I’m not too far from the end of the 6th grade so that second form (learnt in the seventh grade) is in sight…
Let it be known here and now…
… that I am not advanced in my Wing Chun - I think I actually have the ability to regress. I sometimes feel I get worse as time passes, LOL.
I’ve been taught the motions for CK, but in class when we’re doing the forms people at my level spend most time on SNT and a little on the first section (first third) of CK.
Does your Sifu ever give demos? As far as I know he’s the only Yip Man student teaching in the UK… would like to seem him do his thing some time.
I don’t think Sifu Kan does too many demos. He seems to be afraid of giving away the system which is a bit daft since people aren’t going to learn much from watching you demonstrate something. As you know, you have to be taught by someone to learn properly.
What I must say is that this forum is a much better experience than the VTAA. It looks better, the technology is better and faster, the people here know a thing or two and there ain’t no trolls.
just dont tense it!!
if your elbow is quality, and your wrist touches… then all is well, tense the forearm at all because of hooking the hand and no song.
i just thought of something while at work yesterday.
hold your hand out in a tan - thats fine palm up, relaxed.
now turn it over, if the palm faces downwards parrelel to the floor and the elbow is in then the twist on the forearm makes it tense, the only way for the forearm to be relaxed is if either:
- the elbow is out
- relax the wrist forming a light hook
if the hook is tense though then there is no change in the forearm tension.
try it.
Now I think of it, foolinthedeck, Sifu Kan’s fook might be classed as “flat” or at least a mixture of hooked and flat. When he does chi-sau his hands are flopping all over the place and it’s the same with the senior students too. Think the idea is they’ve mastered the so called correct version and now they can “get away” with being relaxed. I would somewhat agree with what you said in your first post by saying that it’s the contact points that are important in this things during application.
However, in the forms, our fook is always hooked. AND we tense the three blocks (tan, wu, fook) in the first section of the SNT. But now I’m drifting onto other subjects.
it may be slightly off topic e warrior,
but…
AND we tense the three blocks (tan, wu, fook) in the first section of the SNT
what do you mean blocks? tan fook and wu sau are not blocks. are they? i never ‘blocked’ anything with my fuk. and you tense them? in the first section of little idea?
is this because of what danny connor wrote? - apparently he mistranslated relaxed as tense and yip chun was not a happy bunny..
i agree the fuk in the form should be hooked, but not tensely, as for the seniors hands flopping all over the place, i would agree that this is a mark of having ‘mastered’ the fuk. it also serves to confuse tense opponents in chi sau.
what do you mean blocks? tan fook and wu sau are not blocks. are they? i never ‘blocked’ anything with my fuk. and you tense them? in the first section of little idea?
Perhaps I should have said “techniques” rather than blocks although I would say that wu and tan are blocks. But then you could say fook blocks because it controls the person’s arm. Depends what you mean by block I guess.
Remember that some schools tense the arm in the first section. Others don’t. We’re one of those that do. Don’t know how this particular difference come about. Perhaps it deserves a thread of its own.
ok but why do you tense?
i’ll tell you why i relax: because i’m training the elbow energy, and i must cultivate it like a gardener, using a stick to guide it is fine, but to tie string to the end of a plant and pull it in order to make it grow wont work. tension wont develop sensitivity, which seems to be pretty crucial to wing chun even if you feel that structure is more important. actually i dont tense in any part of my wing chun on purpose.
so why do you tense?
Strengthens the elbow joint, tricep and bicep tendons. It’s a qigong aspect.
pseudoswitch has the answer. The tension conditions the muscles and tendons around the joints. This gives rise to a relaxed “tension” ie springy resistance. If someone punches and you block with tan sau very quickly there is not much time to tense things but this exercise will mean there will still be some resistance and the block won’t collapse (hopefully!). It also means you can be sort of tense but still able to flow into other techniques.
I also have a little theory that it also builds chi. Basically, the tension causes energy to shut down in that side of the body, causing more to flow in the other side. Then you switch over.
I can see what you’re saying concerning relaxing and sensitivity. In my opinion I think people get a little over obsessed with being soft etc. all the time. Tension/hardness is not always bad. I believe it has its uses in the right context.
You can’t strengthen tendons, or condition them (if you mean changing their density). You’re probably right about the muscles though.
Not sure about you chi theory e-warrior (the improvement of the flow in one side through tensing the other side)… but there are some hard chigungsters who would say that you can develop chi through tensing itself.