Teaching the student how to fight
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Hanzou
Grandmaster
Honest question; Would someone become a better fighter more quickly if you removed form training and focused entirely on the striking, blocking, footwork, etc, and instituted heavy sparring practice? Like take the techniques of Wing Chun and apply them to a Boxing or Muay Thai approach.
I think you don't necessarily have to throw out form.
Even boxing has "forms" practice in the way of shadow boxing, combination practice, etc.
The better approach is to attack this on multiple fronts....forms practice for development of generalized structure, sparring/ lat sau for using these learned structures and applying them against a resisting opponent, and chi sau to refine tactile responses from close in fighting.
Kind of a three legged stool...each one is needed.
Hanzou
Grandmaster
To be fair, Shadowboxing and combination practice isn't a pre-arranged pattern where your movements are heavily scrutinized like a dance form. Shadowboxing and combination practice helps you develop your own sense of timing and rhythm, and you can pretty much do whatever you want.
Are you talking about WC class only?
The form can be replaced by partner drills. Every day, you punch me 1,000 times, I use Tan Shou to block your punch 1,000 time.
You and I then get into the ring. You can only use straight punch on me. I can only use Tan Shou to block your punch. In 1 minute round, if your punch land on my body, you win that round. Otherwise, I win that round. Test this 15 round daily. I should have good Tan Shou skill after 3 months.
I then use Bong Shou to deal with your straight punch in the next 3 months. The WC training then continue ...
I agree, but it's still a method of developing your technique away from the induced stress of a live opponent.
Mostly...
IMO, the footwork should be taught on day one. Old Chinese saying said, "You may not find any opportunity to attack. As long as you keep moving, soon or later you will find that opportunity to attack".
So keep moving is the key.
So keep moving is the key.
The only part I disagree with here is where you say forms can be replaced.
I understand that people who train MMA, boxing, MT, etc. don't practice forms in the strictest sense of the word, but they're a valuable component that gives the practitioner a place to go to refine skills.
Also, WC forms are not forms in the typical sense...while the movements are arranged for practice purposes, they are not fighting sequences.
We practice the movements in form but apply them freely.
Footwork should be taught on Beginning day until Day you can't walk. Things become so much easier and more effective with good footwork. Good footwork comes in handy especially when someone is quicker than you.
Graywalker
Brown Belt
We have 13 forms to BB, 1 form is taught per month. Monday is form night, with 2 man forms and applications, Thursday is combat night, with focus mitts, training on the 8 combos, various drills and semi full Contact sparring focusing on the combinations and applications from whatever form they are learning.
We have, 8 blocks, 8 strikes and 8 kicks
Example: Down block, straight punch, front kick. Both sides, we always do both sides.
Our blocks are really taught as strikes as there are no blocks in Kwon Bup.
There are 8 of these basic combos and sometimes they are mixed to be, along the lines of, combo 1 right side, Combo 2 left side.
The only padding used are your basic style of fingerless, kenpo gloves, most call them ufc gloves. If you choose to spar, you will most likely get bruised and achey. But if you are worried about getting hurt my students have a humorous saying, "this isn't ballet, but there's a dance school down the street."
Every other week we focus on 40 takedown techniques and what we call 9 sticks (basically escrima) and ground escapes..but our motto is why, wrestle when you can strike your way off the ground. They are also encouraged to spar people from other styles and to bring them too the school.
We try to cover all of this within a 13 month - 24 month period, depending on the students ability.
But to be fair, I only take on 2-3 students at a time and the two I currently have, are almost done. I am not really sure what the other instructors do in Kwon Bup, all schools have a basic structure for training but, are independent.
We have, 8 blocks, 8 strikes and 8 kicks
Example: Down block, straight punch, front kick. Both sides, we always do both sides.
Our blocks are really taught as strikes as there are no blocks in Kwon Bup.
There are 8 of these basic combos and sometimes they are mixed to be, along the lines of, combo 1 right side, Combo 2 left side.
The only padding used are your basic style of fingerless, kenpo gloves, most call them ufc gloves. If you choose to spar, you will most likely get bruised and achey. But if you are worried about getting hurt my students have a humorous saying, "this isn't ballet, but there's a dance school down the street."
Every other week we focus on 40 takedown techniques and what we call 9 sticks (basically escrima) and ground escapes..but our motto is why, wrestle when you can strike your way off the ground. They are also encouraged to spar people from other styles and to bring them too the school.
We try to cover all of this within a 13 month - 24 month period, depending on the students ability.
But to be fair, I only take on 2-3 students at a time and the two I currently have, are almost done. I am not really sure what the other instructors do in Kwon Bup, all schools have a basic structure for training but, are independent.
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I think fighting sequences are important. I just don't think that they should be inflexible. If I have a 4 hit combo then I should be able to use part or all of the sequences in that combo as need. For example, I train and use a 4 hit combo and a 5 hit combo. Those two combo sets can be combined to create a fighting sequence. But they are also flexible enough where I can do part of the 4 combo and part of the 5 combo. and still come out good. Sometimes people don't move in the direction you need them to move and when that happens you'll need to be able to flow into something else.
For me I know certain strikes will trigger a known behavior. Sometimes it triggers only one behavior and other times it may trigger a series of behaviors. Some are reliable triggers that happen with the majority of people, such as when something comes towards your face your body wants to close the eyes, because that's a natural response in an effort to protect the eyes. Others are more specific to the individual person you are fighting against. When you detect patterns of reactions you can ten create sequences. If I punch high then your guard goes high.
Here's what I do for the first year. At least once a week.
Note the only breaks that I give are 1 minute breaks for Cardio drills and 1 minute sparring rounds (round robin) where one person stays in and fights and gets a new opponent every minute. 5 people at the most if you have more than five then you'll need need to run multiple sparring areas at the same time.
Footwork is treated as part of a warm up. then intensifies into fighting footwork. Meaning that feet move at the pace that you'll move in a real fight. Once the heart is beating add multiple rounds of shadow boxing, kicks only shadow boxing, punch only shadow boxing, and then mix the 2. The combos should be simple for the first couple of months until you can bring it up to fighting speed. Once you nail that then add a few more. After the first hour of that stuff. Sparring time. Start the round robin. At this poit everyone should be juiced out this forces people to focus on technique more and forces them to dig deep. Sparring should always be about learning and not winning. The intensity should be light enough so you can take risks Follow this and increase the intesity every 6 months.
There's more to it than that, but that's about it in a nut shell. By the end of month 6, you should have some really dependable techniques that you can use, and you would have been hit enough to know how to deploy it correctly.
I wouldn't do more than 2 days of sparring a week. The body needs time to heal. If you are pusshing yourself then the 1 day a week will be more than enough.
Hanzou
Grandmaster
Sure, but the difference is that many schools spend so much time perfecting forms, it takes away from the students perfecting their natural fighting ability. In reality, their natural fighting style is what should be developed. That's what shadowboxing and combination training does in Boxing.
But would you say that they are absolutely necessary for the development of fighting ability?
Hanzou
Grandmaster
Sure, but it often isn't. If you're shadowboxing, you're practicing YOUR unique boxing style, unless your coach says otherwise. Even then, its never some crusty codified movement sets from hundreds of years ago, it's your coach telling you to drill a certain set of techniques while he/she watches.
I'll throw away (or replace) all those moves that don't have direct fighting application.
For example, in the WC Biu Jee form, there are moves that one freezes his body and arm, he just moves his palm up and down, or horizontally (at 0.11 - 0.30 in the following clip). I just don't see any value to train those moves.
Also I don't understand why during the 3rd WC form training stage, one still does "muscle group isolation", freeze the body, freeze the arm, and only move the palm. It violates the CMA "body unification/coordinate" principle.
Nice body unification/coordination can be seen at 1.31 - 1.35 (hand coordinate with foot, elbow coordinate with knee, shoulder coordinate with hip).
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Agree! Get fighting ability first. Map it into form later if you want to (for self polishing purpose).
