It’s true San Antonio doesn’t have a lot to offer as far as kung fu.
However I think one of the best options in S.A. is Sal de la Rosa’s Chen Taijiquan class. His beginner’s class is Monday evenings at 6:15 at NorthRidge Park (near Austin Hwy & Alamo Heights area). He also has a Saturday morning ‘open’ class at 8 am. I train with Sal and also travel to Wimberly to train with Dr Gary Stier (Yang Taiji, Bagua, Xingyi). I also have a friend who lives in Austin who is a TST Xingyi guy and he comes to SA periodically with his wife to see her folks; I train with him when I can. There is kung fu here, but you really have to know where to look (I’d be interested in checking out that ‘Tex’ guy btw).
The other interesting thing about San Antonio is that it is growing like crazy right now because a lot of Californians are cashing out, selling their high priced homes and moving here and paying cash for everything. At the rate this city is growing, I predict some good martial arts schools will be opening up within the next year or so. The first few that open up will do very well, because right now this city is a kung fu desert. Mark my words, we’ll have some good schools soon.
[QUOTE=chud;785251] At the rate this city is growing, I predict some good martial arts schools will be opening up within the next year or so. [/QUOTE]
There arleady are. There’s Olympic level Judo, Black Belt BJJ, a **** fine Muay Thai school and a few good boxing gyms. I’ve also seen 2 Wing Chun guys who impressed me, dunno where they come from though.
Yeah I knew about the Judo, BJJ, and of course there’s lots of Wing Chun.
I am also hoping that some other good CMA schools will open up soon (Bagua and Xingyi for example, and maybe some shaolin or other CMA). The future definitely looks bright; I am seeing so much development around here, the slow down in the real estate market has not really affected SA because lots of people are still moving here.
[QUOTE=chud;785251]It’s true San Antonio doesn’t have a lot to offer as far as kung fu.
The other interesting thing about San Antonio is that it is growing like crazy right now because a lot of Californians are cashing out, selling their high priced homes and moving here and paying cash for everything. At the rate this city is growing, I predict some good martial arts schools will be opening up within the next year or so. The first few that open up will do very well, because right now this city is a kung fu desert. Mark my words, we’ll have some good schools soon.[/QUOTE]
Chud,
That is exactly what I am seeing here too. Everything here is much less expensive including the rents. My realtor said something like 30-40% of homebuyers in San Antonio are coming from California. California has a good number of Shaolin and wushu schools. Hopefully as a result of the California migration, the Shaolin Desert here is going to bloom into a Shaolin Oasis. Or so I hope. Loads of Wing Chun here and I don’t know why. I’m not that into Wing Chun though.
Very interesting, I hadn’t heard of your group. Glad to see some good kung fu coming to town though. How long have you been teaching in S.A.? Just curious because I hadn’t heard of y’all before. It’s too bad I have so much going on already (Chen, Yang, Xingyi), because I’ve always thought Praying Mantis was cool stuff. The wife will disown me if I start up with another class though.
Btw, the site says classes are at ‘Medical Center Park’, do you mean the big track over in the medical center area?
[QUOTE=chud;785764]Very interesting, I hadn’t heard of your group. Glad to see some good kung fu coming to town though. How long have you been teaching in S.A.? Just curious because I hadn’t heard of y’all before. It’s too bad I have so much going on already (Chen, Yang, Xingyi), because I’ve always thought Praying Mantis was cool stuff. The wife will disown me if I start up with another class though.
Btw, the site says classes are at ‘Medical Center Park’, do you mean the big track over in the medical center area?[/QUOTE]
I just moved to San Antonio. Today will be my first class at the Medical Center. I met with some students earlier this week at Orsinger park and they recommended we switch to the park at the Medical Center. Once I figure out exactly where we are going I will update the web site. Maybe even with a map.
[QUOTE=Iman01;785804]I just moved to San Antonio. Today will be my first class at the Medical Center. I met with some students earlier this week at Orsinger park and they recommended we switch to the park at the Medical Center. Once I figure out exactly where we are going I will update the web site. Maybe even with a map.
Real[/QUOTE]
Iman01,
Are you a student at the Dental School there? Supposed to be one of the best dental schools in the US. And your kungfu class is outside, in the Medical Center Park? Blazing hot in San Antonio alright.
chud,
I am sorry I wasted your time Friday. Around 5:30pm I got word that none of the others were going to be able to make it to the park. I would have gone anyway but I just got a house last week and have a million things to do, unpack etc. They have reassured me that they will be there Monday, so will I.
zhugeliang,
I am not a student at the medical center. The classes are outside until I find a better location. I want to buy a building to teach out of but I have some other things I need to sort out before I can make that happen.
Aside from teaching in San Antonio I am working with a school in Boerne to get some floor time there. In a month or so I should offer some classes there too.
The ONLY gung fu orientated instructor that I know can actually fight and teach you to fight–is from the Boztepe wing chun group. He is located on Broadway near the Austin hwy intersection. Nico Lahood.
There are only two legititate groups of wing chun (if you care about lineage) and that is the LT on Austin hwy and the Boztepe on Broadway (mentioned above).
Gilbert Leal from what I understand is very good–and came away from the group on Austin hwy many years ago.
NO traditional shoalin orientated places that I can recall, not unless you count shaolin-do karate a martial art (ack!).
There’s lots of fighting arts here though–as stated there’s judo, jj, a few muay thai places, the boztepe wing chun school. If they train hard and actually spar–you probably won’t go wrong no matter where you go.
Also–I knew Brett when he was practicing Capoeira for a while and then tried out Jingang Quan Gung Fu (where I was cross training with a gentleman named Bob Melius). He then migrated to where I was also training in Muay Thai over at Phet Phonsavane’s when Phet just had the store and was only training a few guys.
After that I went into the military and was only able to pop in once in a while. I saw him a couple years back teach shaolin all of a sudden as a sifu at Phet’s latest place on Bab**** and Hillcrest. So in my mind I’m like WTF?! He said he’d moved to Houston for a while and learned Shaolin.
How someone learns wushu for a couple years through seminars and then becomes good enough to teach it is beyond me…but whatever.
I’m very big on quality–and quality of a martial art is it’s effectiveness in fighting and the teacher’s effectiveness in creating fighters. After all–it is a MARTIAL art…isn’t it?
[QUOTE=Vankuen;786315]Also–I knew Brett when he was practicing Capoeira for a while and then tried out Jingang Quan Gung Fu (where I was cross training with a gentleman named Bob Melius). He then migrated to where I was also training in Muay Thai over at Phet Phonsavane’s when Phet just had the store and was only training a few guys.
After that I went into the military and was only able to pop in once in a while. I saw him a couple years back teach shaolin all of a sudden as a sifu at Phet’s latest place on Bab**** and Hillcrest. So in my mind I’m like WTF?! He said he’d moved to Houston for a while and learned Shaolin.
How someone learns wushu for a couple years through seminars and then becomes good enough to teach it is beyond me…but whatever.
I’m very big on quality–and quality of a martial art is it’s effectiveness in fighting and the teacher’s effectiveness in creating fighters. After all–it is a MARTIAL art…isn’t it?[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Iman01;786291]chud,
I am sorry I wasted your time Friday. Around 5:30pm I got word that none of the others were going to be able to make it to the park. [/QUOTE]
No problem, I figured something came up.
[QUOTE=Vankuen;786312]The ONLY gung fu orientated instructor that I know can actually fight and teach you to fight–is from the Boztepe wing chun group. He is located on Broadway near the Austin hwy intersection. Nico Lahood.
[/QUOTE]
I remember Nico from the days before the LT/Boztepe split, when we were all training at the LT school on Austin Hwy; he was definitely good. His kung fu brother Mauricio Blake was good too. I dropped out right before Boztepe split with Leung Ting, and Nico & Mauricio jumped ship and started their own school under his org. They’re good guys. I always meant to look them up but life got in the way, and then I decided to pursue training something other than Wing Chun.
[QUOTE=zhugeliang;786439]Did Leung Ting actually live in San Antonio at some point? I think Gilbert Leal trained with Leung Ting originally.[/QUOTE]
No, but Leung Ting came to San Antonio many times for seminars; I went to a couple of them back in the day. From what I heard Gilbert Leal and William Parker were two of Leung Ting’s high-ranking students in this region of the US. Gilbert chose to leave the organization, and Parker stayed in.
[QUOTE=Vankuen;786454]Good for you. I’m glad you see through the B.S.[/QUOTE]
Any authentic Shaolin fan can see Shaolin-do is not authentic Shaolin. Then again I should not start yet another anti- Shaolin-do thread here or Gene is gonna be after my wazoo.
