sei ping dai ma:
I understand where you are coming from. However, we all practice Kung Fu for different reasons. If you are looking for self defense, a traditional perspective may not be in your interest. I think that if you start sparring early, you may bypass the self-restraint needed to spar. But just because one doesn’t spar doesn’t mean he or she can handle himself in a confrontation. I believe sparring is the part of training used to practice the applications of your techniques against someone else who is just as or nearly as experience as you are in Kung Fu. Sparring is teaching you to break down a fight systematically. Being aware of gaps in your defense as well as your opponent’s. Practicing the form, power and lastly speed of your techniques in a fighting situation. That is what sparring is. If you spar at the same time you begin to learn forms and whatnot, I think it is too much to teach at once because I believe in focusing one’s energy on a few aspects of training and adding more as one progresses. Forms are taught and should be practiced by the following theory: Focus first on form and technique, then on power, and finally on speed. In sparring, you are trying to get it all done at once and you may not stay focused. I think forms are enough to prepare one for fighting because you are learning techniques that can defend yourself against an attacker. If you are worried about distance, use a punching bag (Wavemaster, Everlast, ect); this will also help power and speed at the same time.
You should never go into sparring too early. you need at least 1 year of training before you can control yourself good enough (temper and technique). unexperienced guys usually can’t control the pace in their sparring. it get’s faster and faster, the blows get harder and harder. then it gets nasty.
I have experience about this myself. I was just out of the beginner’s course and we had some sparring in our class. I had no experience at all. I started to spar with my si chen (big sister. a girl. yes.) and ended up braking her nose. this happened because I couldn’t control my self. it was supposed to be friendly-and-not-too-hard-contact-sparring.
HuangKaiVun: Good insight, gives me something to think about. I guess that other poster was unaware about the warior monks of
Shaolin fought with soldiers against invaders of China. (No disrespect intended kenpoman )
Amifree: You’re preaching to the choir, but IMHO Kung Fu is great and a superior way of fighting. But, it takes to darn long to learn how to use effectively. I really feel that sometimes you have to go with what you have and sparring often will sharpen what little a beginner has so that he/she will have the confidence and the competence to do something if an unfortunate situation develops. In the world we live in today, I feel we all don’t have the opportunity to train truly old school in our Kung fu with jobs, school and other distractions. It takes a lot longer to develop good Traditional CMA in our modern times. And hitting a bag desn’t help timing and distancing at all when faced with a live moving, punching and kicking opponent. Believe me, I agree with you, I just don’t think it’s something that is feasable to put into practice.
Premier: I know just what you’re talking about. I always fear for my life when sparring with a neophyte, they are very dangerous because they lack control. At the kwoon we always put seniors in place to supervise the new guys when they spar. And usually seniors will spar with the new guys so at least one of the participants will have control.
How many schools have specific levels of
speed/contact. We will start students
sparring after 4-5 months but at a very
low speed/contact level. I will use the terms 1/4,1/2, etc in describing the speed/contact that they should spar at.
We also train them on bags telling them to
hit it as fast as they can then to try and
move 1/2 that speed then 1/4 then as slow
as they can; the same for power. This way
they can figure out what their control levels
are. We keep all students below 2 years down
below 1/2 speed and 1/4 contact with lots of
pushups for breaking the control level.
We also put gloves (and other prot) on the newbies and then after a couple of years
progress move to no gloves so that we can utilize specific hand techniques.
It can be very hard to stay ‘in style’ in
sparring. I can only agree with most of what
has been said already. It is easier to stay
in style in a fight though, mostly due to
the commited attacks of a truly aggressive
opponent. It’s amazing what you can really do
to a strongly thrown roundhouse/haymaker type
street punch.
I am curious about the control level question.
Matt Melton
“It may be better to be a live jackal than a dead lion, but it is better still to be a live lion. And usually easier.” -R.A.H
In my admittedly minimal teaching experience, I have found that some people have zero control no matter how hard they try while some people have fantastic control from the get go.
I’ve sparred a lot against both, but I honestly can’t say one’s harder than the other.
I’d say that the uncontrolled opponent is more dangerous against an UNskilled martial artist, but not necessarily more so against a skilled and experienced one.
)