If everything else looks cool, but a teacher says that the closest his students get to sparring is fast-moving two-man drills, when they’re advanced – is that a bad sign?
Not really, you can do the sparring on your own when you are ready.
Either that, or go find a good figting school.
What style do you do, and how long have you been in the arts?
I’m totally new. But this school looked really interesting.
Looks like he was a student of Liu Yun Chaio. That is a really good lineage.
I actually have some of his Qi Gong video’s. Good stuff.
Generally, yeah, unless you’re not particularly interested in application. Did he give any reasoning for not sparring?
Sparring can be done on one’s own, but an instructor accelerates the learning process immensely. Of course, if the instructor never sparred/fought himself, he probably couldn’t teach you much on the subject.
Sounds like it could be an insurance/liability issue. That’s why there’s no ‘sparring’ just fast paced 2-man drills, wink wink nudge nudge.
I didn’t ask why because I didn’t want to seem rude. Here’s a guess … At another school I was told the same thing, and the reason was that they didn’t have insurance. But they said people did it on their own outside of class.
For this school I didn’t talk to the sifu, I talked to I guess one of his high level students, who seemed to imply that the different arts were being taught by different instructors at the school. I would be able to start with mantis or taichi (I would want to do mantis), but that the art that drew me in (pachi is not given until the sifu deems the student ready.)
Aside from the sparring thing it sounded good, and the sifu seems like the real deal, but what do I know …
Without sparring it is not kung fu. Without actually training real time against resisting opponents it is not a martial art. That is my opinion. If you are learning an art you need to learn to fight with it.
I would say that is not a great choice and that you should go somewhere else. That said, two man drills, not long sequences but self-defense scenarios are very good but I really feel that nothing compares to free sparring.
unfortunately, yao sing is right
I wouldnt worry about it if his teaching is good, actually I would worry if sparring is emphasized too heavily right away, because if you havent learned anything about the art, its impossible to spar effectively without breaking “the rules.” Two man drills are good, they teach reaction, timing, speed, and power (to an extent). Once you get good at the forms, two man drills, and you understand the principles behind what you’re doing, then you are ready to spar…
However, it would be better if your teacher was there when you were ready to spar
Peace
PW
Well this guy’s right next to my office. What about him? http://www.wutehtaiji.com/martial.html
No sparring is always a bad sign- unless you just want to learn forms and get some exercise.
Sparring “on your own” isn’t any better. Can’t ever imagine going to a boxing gym and the trainer tells you that you have to spar outside of the gym on your own.
Well this guy’s right next to my office. What about him?
Doesn’t sound any better.
“Private office visits in business attire to insure discretion.”
Probably won’t get much sparring done with that.
I’ll have to agree that no sparring is a bad thing.
Not that two man drills is a bad thing, in concert with sparring after a few weeks. It doesn’t take that long to get rudimentary skills.
If its an insurance or liability issue, then get better insurance. Its just a bit more money. If he wants to be Mr. Cheapy McScrooge about it, then he should have a fighting location outside the premises.
once you know your stuff, then spar away.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB6rKkeIQ5w&mode=related&search=
[QUOTE=Yao Sing;726041]Sounds like it could be an insurance/liability issue. That’s why there’s no ‘sparring’ just fast paced 2-man drills, wink wink nudge nudge.[/QUOTE]
The liability is a good point. It’s not an insurmountable hurdle for those instructors that really want to spar, but it’s a deterrent to those that don’t want to put forth the effort. My first sifu had a sparring class that eventually died out because not enough people were actually interested in, you know, fighting with their kung fu. Every time we tried to start it up again, the whole liability thing came up. As the instructors, we could get some “off-the-record” instruction and would spar outside the scheduled class hours, but implementing a sparring program in class was too much work for such little interest. Sure, people want to do it at first, but the first time they go to work with a cut under their eye they realize it’s not as easy as doing sets. The ones who offer only token interest in sparring don’t tend to last long.
Most people seemed happiest when learning sets… they felt as if learning a few new moves in the sequence was something almost tangible, a representation of what their money had bought. I suppose many CMA teachers caught on and taught what most people wanted to learn rather than appease the minority that wanted to spar. A self-perpetuating problem, since the more people that schools educate with forms only, the more they propagate the idea that forms are all you need. Those instructors that never really wanted to teach - or follow the tradition of offering no instruction unless you really want it - won’t go out of their way to make sure you spar.
Especially among CMA teachers that get older, the drive to teach people to fight and pressure them to spar seems to dwindle. They have to really enjoy teaching and take pride in producing fighters if they are going to continue to push it even as their own interest in fighting has left them.
To survive as a valid martial art, CMA would do well to adapt and bring in modern methods to augment our existing knowledge… the de-emphasis on sparring and realistic application is a step in the wrong direction, even if it is “for liability reasons.”
As always, this is only my humble perspective.
some bag work before sparring.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2657554897880532898&q=choy+fut
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2628488129802139000&q=choy+fut
spar away
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3827141606209521110&q=choy+fut
some san shou or san da fights.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_vPOciU5xg&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzIegyvLGiI&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MavaopFG1-Q&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBIVkPJQdLg&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HiukKvm8cQ&mode=related&search=
All good info. Thanks.
Well if I’m in NYC, then what are some schools I might check out that have kind of the best worlds – plenty of sparring, but not artless kickboxing either? Where there’s a bit of personal attention and kind of a team, camraderie thing going on too (don’t laugh).
This may be idealistic, but I think it’d be better to have a teacher who, rather than having a pre-set time block for sparring each week, had sparring spontaneously when he thought it was appropriate for that particular class in that particular session…
Here’s the problem as I see it. With the caveat that I am talking about traditional Chinese skills, not modern skills, sport skills, or any one of a hundred of other kinds of martial skills.
People lament the death of Traditional skills, yet they give lip service to traditional training, and put their efforts into generic kickboxing, and call it “Real life training against resisting opponents”.
You fight how you train. So, if you want to fight using your traditional techniques, you have to work towards that objective, not towards the objective of satisfying the agressive tendencies of adolescent male testosterone, however much fun that might be, I might add.
So, how do you train to spar with traditional techniques, without reverting to “gweilo kune?” The $64 question.
It is probably one of the biggest puzzles facing the traditional arts these days, and not to their profit. Its why MMA is in the ascendency. In the old days, you just went out looking for practice and found it wherever you could provoke it. Not quite like that anymore.
First you have to break the old habits. One reason any master worth his wiskers likes a young disicple. Can you say blank slate?
So, you train forms, than you train combinations, than you train controlled live interactions, than you train less controlled live interactions.
So, like with so many things in this world, TCMA is no different. Anybody that says they are the be all and end all with all the answers is most assuredly not. Anybody that promises to teach you what you what to learn is most probabably NOT teaching you what you really want to learn.
So, sparring in TCMA, and I am only talking about TCMA, is not a simple proposition. The “Cure” is just as often the “Poison”.
Nyc
So, again,
What are some legit places to get the full kung-fu treatment?
I know there’s yee’s but I’d like something other than hung ga I think.
In regards to sparring, sparring really isn’t really that useful, honestly.
To those who just do basic kickboxing and grappling, yes, sparring might be a good drill.
But the problem with sparring for martial artists who don’t just do basic kickboxing and grappling is that there is a big chance of injury if your opponent moves in an unexpected way.
For example, I was showing a technique to a friend of mine the other day, and used a basic chinese move whereby the practitioner grabs the opponent’s leg upon a round kick. If I hadn’t of let go at exactly the right time, he would have wound up on his head. But if I hadn’t have grabbed, he wouldn’t have known the usefulness.
Trying to pull that off in sparring without breaking his head or neck would have been really difficult.
Judo and kickboxing and grappling were designed specifically not to injure the opponent greatly in a sport environment. And even so, accidents happen that seriously injure people.