Short fist, long fist

[Shane]

long fist, short fist

 

its all the same just hit them hard with your fist and they will get the point.

[Zhong Gau]

lots of styles use the "long fist" stigma to attach themselves to a tradition of shaolin incepted training. Many chinese practicioners of hung gar, hung fot and wah lum *equate* long fist with choy li fut.

[InsaneTigerCrane]

drunken monkey is right.

i studied yang jwing ming institute northern long fist.

i was told that it was partially developed to have long range tactics for the northern people of china who supposedly are generally taller and therefore have longer limbs than most people from southern china. i'm kinda iffy on the truth behind that, but it sounds cool.

[SevenStar]

I've heard that also. another thing I heard was that in the south, it is swampy, and they needed the low stances and kicks to maintain balance. the ground is more firm up north, so they were able ti kick high and perform jumping techniques easier.

[ovine king]

now this is purely me thinking logically so DON'T take it as fact.....

i) the 'short fist/bridge styles' tend to be based around the southern part of the country, in particular around canton (don't forget that hung gar and choy li fut both have short bridge principles in them....).

ii) the styles that are most associated with 'long fist/bridge' are typically, the older styles.

iii) the newer styles tend to have a connection with the anti ching movement.

iv) the anti ching movement was based (in the later years) mainly in the canton region of china.

it seems to me, that the 'short fist' styles are likely to have come about because it is like a natural progression of the older styles and in part due to the anti ching movement (which had to deal with older fighting styles).

anyone add/subtract from this line of thinking?

[Infrazael]

Umm. . . . I do Choy Lay Fut, and it's definitely a Southern Longfist style.

[ovine king]

yes.... but it is longfist in 'style'.

it does have short bridge principles in it's framework.

i have trained with choy li fut guys before (trained with, not trained in) and i remember having an attack come in towards me, then it twisting and turning into an under bridge type strike.

the long swing was to create the bridge and once contact was made he pressed in and turned the punch.

it was almost like a very quick and very temporary trap before strike; trapping being a classic sign of short-bridge work.

i have seen similar things in hung kuen where you have a long lunging type strike used as a bridging technique then once that bridge is made, you close the gap using whatever stance and then turn to elbows and whatever to break balance and structures, again, typical of short bridge work.

[Infrazael]

Yep, we do have bridging. Swinging fists with bridging creates a very devastating style, different from both Hung Kuen and Northern Longfist.