Difference between a Karate punch, and a Gung Fu punch

[dippedappe]

Quoted from a screentest with Bruce Lee for The Green Hornet.

Lee said I quote "Well...a Karate punch is like an ironbar, whaaam! A Gung Fu punch is like an ironchain with an ironball attached to it, and it go WHAAAM! And it hurts on the inside."

What would you say is the general difference?

[tufrthanu]

Well seeing as how bruce lee was very anti japanese and anti karate I can't say I really trust his judgement on the difference. Furthermore was he referring to wing chun kung fu or kung fu in general? I'm sure there are styles of kung fu that are much more hard line than wing chun.

[Fairfax_Uechi]

Well, it's all real relative. In a style like Uechi that is based on S. China Kung Fu they're much more similar than some of the Japaneese styles of karate. (more fluild aka a Hard AND Soft style vs one or the other)

So, is Uechi Karate or Kung Fu? Or does it really matter? I guess if you want to get into all sorts of debates folks can make all kinds of arguements. My personal opion is that what matters most is knowing your art, and how to apply it.

In my case as a beginner I was very stiff. As I progress, I'm working to be more relaxed until the point of impact. Very similar to what Bruce Lee was talking about.

And a last point. Keep in mind that what he was saying was said a long long time ago. Things have changed and there is much more information out there, so more people know about many more styles. He may have been generalizing for the time period of the interview. (FYI, I think I've seen the film clip that you're reffering to, and think that this was the case, but not being there, I can be mistaken)

[KempoTiger]

Bruce Lee was referring to the benefits of Gung-Fu fluidity giving the martial artist more torque, accompanied by small nearly unnoticeable pops of the arms and wrist to make the arm strike in more of a whipping motion rather than a straight strike.

The Japanese focused more on linear power, going along with philosophy of, "The shortest distance between two points etc....."

I personally believe that the Gung-Fu (gung-Fu in a generalized term, not any specific style) theory leads one to striking with more power obviously, BUT this does not mean that Chinese martial arts are superior to Japanese Martial arts, for with linear theory the Japanese stylist would theoretically hit the Chinese martial artist first, and that iron bar can still do some hurt, trust me

This is why I like Kempo...best of both worlds

[ovine king]

also, don't forget that at the time, martial arts in the west was generally only known as karate. Bruce was just putting his own slant on things in order to seel his product and mark a is being different as karate. Anyone with an ounce of experience in anything would know that a typical basic karate punch isn't that far off from a typical basic kung fu and more ironically, a wing chun punch.

what's the difference?

just the name.

[yamesu]

If you look at a japanese style punch, youll notice it also has a small pop/twist of the wrist to enduce torque upon impact.

I agree with ovine king, only differences are in peoples opinions of the punches, not the punches themselves.

[ovine king]

If you look at a japanese style punch, youll notice it also has a small pop/twist of the wrist to enduce torque upon impact.

shh, it's the little things like the wrist movements that mark out people who have actually trained in something and the people who just read books. Haven't you noticed that books hardly ever talk about wrist movements in basic movements?

and before anyone gets narky;

 

i'm kidding....

[Enviroman]

If you look at a japanese style punch, youll notice it also has a small pop/twist of the wrist to enduce torque upon impact.

shh, it's the little things like the wrist movements that mark out people who have actually trained in something and the people who just read books. Haven't you noticed that books hardly ever talk about wrist movements in basic movements?

and before anyone gets narky;

 

i'm kidding....

Kidding or not you're right.

[y2_sub]

Well seeing as how bruce lee was very anti japanese and anti karate

Bruce lee was indeed anti japanese and anti karate , and therefore , a rasist .

[ovine king]

was he?

so how does that account for taky kimura?

there is a difference between having resentment for another country (and things related to it) and being racist. Did he have predjudices? probably, as did a lot of (hong kong) chinese but that doesn't automatically make him racist.