Hello, I'm a little new to this site and was wondering how to select a kung fu school. I have a huge interest in Southern Mantis and Bagua, but am also interested in Choy Li Fut, Tai Chi, Yi quan, Northern Mantis, and Dragon and Tiger Styles. From what I can gather from the posts that I have seen and read, there is a ridiculous amount of "fake" kung fu out there to the point that I have heard some people say that authentic kung fu doesn't exist, or that certain styles are alive in name only ( I hear this about Bagua and northern styles a lot). I have very little experience with kung fu and was wondering if there are tell-tale signs/good ways to determine if a school is legitimate or not. I am not looking to do kung fu as just a health exercise or fore performance, but am legitimately interested in the fighting applications of these arts. I want to learn these arts as they were meant to be taught. I also am looking for schools throughout my area (south central Virginia/ North Carolina triangle and triad areas) and would love recommendations if anyone could give me any.
How to spot a good kung fu school?
- Thread starter pacman
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Since your interest is in combat, look for a school that spars hard often, with plenty of young (16-40 year old) fit male students. Sit in for a class. Do they punch things? Is the instructor in decent shape? Are the senior students in decent shape? Are they talented? Do they spar hard?
It is EXTREMLY difficult to find a Bagua, Yi Quan, or Tai Chi school with a combat emphasis. I was lucky to have found a Tai Chi sifu and a Shaolin and Wing Chun sifu that emphasize combat over everything.
Choi Lee Fut is an amazing combat style that is very applicable in the real world and in the ring. If you're interested in Kung Fu Combat, you can't go wrong with Choi Lee Fut. Once again though, look at the instructors and Sifu, are they talented? Do you like them? Do they spar hard?
Authentic combat oriented Kung Fu is very hard to find, most instructors are garbage, look wisely and be alert. Let me know if you find anything.
It is EXTREMLY difficult to find a Bagua, Yi Quan, or Tai Chi school with a combat emphasis. I was lucky to have found a Tai Chi sifu and a Shaolin and Wing Chun sifu that emphasize combat over everything.
Choi Lee Fut is an amazing combat style that is very applicable in the real world and in the ring. If you're interested in Kung Fu Combat, you can't go wrong with Choi Lee Fut. Once again though, look at the instructors and Sifu, are they talented? Do you like them? Do they spar hard?
Authentic combat oriented Kung Fu is very hard to find, most instructors are garbage, look wisely and be alert. Let me know if you find anything.
- Thread Starter
- #3
Thanks. I guess my biggest problem is I'm not sure how to tell if somone is good or talented. I mean I might see a guy do a bagua form, and tell me about a few applications, but I'm not sure if he is executing it correctly or not. I don't know how to tell if he understands the internal principles either. Are you buy any chance training in VA or NC?
I will ask the following questions:
How to
- set up this move?
- execute this move?
- develop this move?
- test this move?
- enhance this move?
- polish this move?
- counter this move?
- counter the counters of this move?
- ...
Martial D
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A lot of what makes something "effective" is the technique(s) itself, and whether or not this or that CMA style has effective technique is something that has been and will be debated until the end of time.
On the other hand, in my opinion and experience, the most important thing is how these techniques are trained, and the level of intensity with which you train your body. Most traditional kung fu schools tend not to train in such a way that is geared towards producing fighters(anymore?), and therein lay the problem with modern CMA. If you can find a CMA school that focuses on physical training and sparring(does the club have a rack with gloves and headgear? focus mitts and kick pads? Are there mats on the ground for sparring, grappling and throw training?), then you might be in luck. Otherwise, you will probably have to supplement your CMA with something that does do these things to make it workable.
Just my 2c
jobo
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Follow the rocking horse droppings, and right next to the shop selling hens teeth and powered red unicorn horn is the only good kung fu school outside China
drop bear
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You can't tell unless you see them fight.
I'd put more weight in seeing their students.
Seeing a person fight only shows how good/talented that person is at fighting, imo it shows nothing toward how good or bad they are at teaching...
- Thread Starter
- #9
From what I understand, when it comes to kung fu, and especially internal styles kung fu, there are a lot of intricacies that deal with things such as subtle alignments, extremely specific weight distribution, using your connective tissue instead of your muscles in order to issue power, using your whole body to issue power, structural force, and how to issue different types of power (chi jin, fa jin, shen jin, etc). Again, I know very little about this and am basing most of what I know on what I have read and interviews I have seen, as well as a couple people I have met that have had internal training but not locally. One person I met trains in Pittsburg under one of Wang Peisheng's students in Wu style tai chi and Yin style Bagua. He told me that when he first met his instructor, his instructor told him to take his hand and put him into any lock that he wanted. He started to put him in a lock and then found himself 4 feet in the air, looking face up at the ceiling, unable to explain how he got there. He said that his teacher wasn’t even doing reversals to joint locks but was able to knock him over or send him flying. I asked him how to find a good internal teacher and he told me that a good teacher is going to scare me with what he can do. I also did find a local Tachi, Bagua, and Xingyi teacher who used one hand to push be back quite a ways. He said that an internal martial artist should be able to push you back about 10 feet doing that. He did send me pretty far back but I’m untrained and he is quite a bit bigger than me so I don’t know if it was a good example of internal power or not. I have seen in videos like this
Martial D
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I would say that's probably a whole lot of woo.
The problem with all of these second hand accounts of these Kung Fu masters doing extrodinary things is that they never seem to be reproducible under pressure.
And I say that as a long time (25 years or so) Kung Fu guy.
Yes this is my problem so far. I live in Philly and there are a lot of CMA around here. My interest is combat oriented because that’s my interest. All the schools I visited so far are not combat oriented / focused and don’t spar. Many years ago I practiced Bagua with a teacher who was combat oriented. We sparred a lot and sparred against boxers. He went to the west coast and haven’t found a school or teacher that teaches in a combat oriented real life scenarios way.
Flying Crane
Sr. Grandmaster
Part of the issue could be simply that your notion of what it means to be “combat focused” and how to train for the goal of developing useful skills, may differ from others. That does not make either you or them right or wrong. It is just that everyone has their own view of how to best approach things, and there are many different approaches that can all yield good results. I do not believe it is possible to objectively rate one as the best over the others. A lot of it depends on finding a method that you believe in, that makes sense to you, that you enjoy and will pursue passionately. When you find that, that is what you should do. But at the same time, others will feel just as passionately about other approaches.
You have made a number of posts here where you refer to boxers and their methods as being highly effective. I have observed your comments in the “wing chun boxing” thread as well, and your comments are consistent in that thread too. It seems to me that you ought to train boxing. It appears that boxing speaks to you, you respect the methods, and it likely would be a good match for you. That is what you ought to do. I think perhaps a traditional kung Fu method would not be a good match for you, and you should not do it.
I think you view the traditional methods, including those that you are likely to find in a wing chun school, as deficient, and as long as you feel that way, you will never be satisfied with that training. So my advice is: don’t waste your time with that. Instead, spend your time on something that you believe in.
The day that you have learned boxing, MT, Judo, or wrestling, the day that you may start to question the traditional MA training method. You then realize that you don't have to start from solo form training. You can start from application training instead. Which training method is better? In AI, there are 3 different searching methods.
1. forward search - from root to leaf.
2. backward search - from leaf to root.
3. bi-directional search - start from both root and leaf and then meet in the middle.
In AI, 3 > 2 > 1
The reason is simple. There is only 1 root, there are many leaves. If you start from a root, it may take you a long time to reach to the leaf that you are looking for. If you start from the leaf and trace backward, since that path is unique, it doesn't take you much time to reach to your root. If you start from both ends, you may cut your time in half.
Most traditional MA school use method 1, the forward search. You start from foundation and reach to application. Since when you develop your foundation, you don't know what your goal (application) may be, you may feel boring. By using 2, or 3, you can see your goal. It will give you stronger motivation.
In wrestling, you will learn this during day 1.
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To be honest you're better off training in Muay Thai / Boxing and BJJ / Wrestling if you want to learn to fight. Traditional Martial Arts take longer to learn to apply, and it's very difficult to find a school that will be capable of teaching you how to fight.
Martial D
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I really hate to admit it, but this is correct. This is the shortest road to the goal. I say this as a CMA guy that now trains bjj and kickboxing.
I still truely believe that a strong TMA game can and will help you be better, but TMA alone is a long hard road, often with questionable results(as it pertains to alive combat)
drop bear
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I train in traditional but oriented and modified for combat:
-Wing Chun
-Shaolin
-Tai Chi
And modern and combat effective:
-Sanda
-Wrestling
Could I fight using only Wing Chun, or only Shaolin? Yes, but if would be a lot easier if I were to use all my skills from training in multiple styles. Sanda is a great synthesis of traditional styles modified for modern combat.
Maybe I’m using the wrong word. What I mean is self defense / protection not combat. The way I see combat is you have intention of fighting either competitively or not. Not like ‘let’s meet after work and handle this...’.
With that being said I visited a Krav Maga school yesterday and was pretty impressed.
