Sick and tired of people putting down kung fu....

[Kajukenbopr]

your teacher doesnt have to teach you how to train for full contact sports if you can hold your own. yes, it can help in the street if you know how to handle mma competitions, but chinese full contact sparring(sanshou) should me more than enough.

1. not all cma schools teach san shou. Heck, not even all of them spar. And of the ones that do spar, the sparring is sometimes either point style or continuous. Neither of those are sufficient for full contact training and fighting.

2. there are nuances of the ring that need to be trained regardless of being able to "hold your own". In addition, you have to train for the fight - that includes everything from training for a specific opponent (if you know who he is) to training for the length of the rounds so that your timing doesn't get messed up. Notice that I am speaking about training for the ring, what a person thinks they can do in the street is irrelevant to my post.

it is not the the style it is the practitioner; like Iron Arahat mentioned, if your teacher doesnt know how to teach you correctly, that single practitioner leads the rest of his student to incorrectly train.

it's the training methods and the style. Then the practitioner. The person that teach you is teaching according to his style, no? whether he is good or bad, the practitioner is teaching you a style. Everything you are doing is based on that style.

But actually, we can classify it two different ways.

for the ring:

training methods

style

pracitioner

for the street:

training methods

practitioner

style

IMO, anyway.

In China they do teach sanshou or Sanda, depending on the style. IF they CHOSE not to teach it like that in the US or Europe, that is their problem.

at the very least, the styles have 2 man drills which develop fighting ability.

The teacher tells you how to train, even if he was taught differently.

[Sir Gerbil]

I am so sick and tired of people putting down kung fu... I hear it all the time that it doesnt help in a real situation..... I am not sure about everyones elses school but everything we learn, we learn the combat application to it. Before we move to a different form we have to do it normal speed, tai chi speed(really slow but controlled), and combat speed. We also have to break every single move down in the form and explain the combat application of it. If you dont learn the combat application of a form or kata you just learned a dance. I know kung fu moves somtimes look silly but there is combat application to it. A lot of people dont know that the moves are hidden within the forms so other people cant just watch and learn them. You have to have someone that actually knows what the form means and its application or its pretty much just a dance with kicks and punchs, the same for any style for that matter. I mean pretty much every style has origins in kung fu. So when people put down kung fu they are putting down their own style. I dont know one move that is in any style that isnt taught eventually in kung fu.... I also read that kung fu doesnt teach any ground/grappling. Our school starts teaching it at brown belt and its pretty intense and effective...

say WHHHHAAATTT???? well, i for one, (im not saying this to offend anyone) think that Shao-lin kung fu is my favorite martial art, because the people who seriously practice it practice it 24 hours a day. i for one LOVE kung fu.

[nine_weapons]

In China they do teach sanshou or Sanda, depending on the style. IF they CHOSE not to teach it like that in the US or Europe, that is their problem.

at the very least, the styles have 2 man drills which develop fighting ability.

The teacher tells you how to train, even if he was taught differently.

In china... that's great for china. not so great for anyone outside of china, no? And even in china, not all schools teach it. I know a couple of people in chine training shuai chiao and taiji and said they were disappointed by a lot of what they were seeing over there...

two man sets are not spontaneous... you aren't really developing fighting skill there, just reacting in a 'dead' drill. that is only part of the equation. two man drilling is not sparring, and is not meant to teach you how to fight, nor is push hands - these are drills that sharpen attributes which are necessary in fighting.

[bushido_man96]

it's not the person, it's actually more of the style - you stated that yourself above in so many words... CMA does not train properly for the ring, as you said - that is a style issue, no? Even if a person did want to compete using kung fu, the first thing he would have to do is change his training methodology, which was directly influenced by the style he trains. That doesn't mean kung fu sucks, it just means they don't train properly for full contact venues.

I don't necessarily think that training methods and styles are related. I think that certain styles have just trained a certain way for so long, that they are now associated. Case in point, I practice TKD. Therefore, just about everyone that would encounter me in sparring, competition, or whatever, would probably assume that I would: a) kick a lot, and kick to the head; b) not punch to the head; c) have no knowledge of how to grapple (which, unfortunately, I don't, at this time).

However, I could alter my training methodologies to included these missing venues, and improve my fighting abilities. I could change the methods, but keep the style. It is just a matter of changing the way people view it.

[mantis.style]

but that would be you altering the training you do; it doesn't change what TKD has or doesn't have in its training. Bear in mind that when we talk about TKD we should really be talking in reference to what General Choi devised, not what it's adopted since then.

[nine_weapons]

it's not the person, it's actually more of the style - you stated that yourself above in so many words... CMA does not train properly for the ring, as you said - that is a style issue, no? Even if a person did want to compete using kung fu, the first thing he would have to do is change his training methodology, which was directly influenced by the style he trains. That doesn't mean kung fu sucks, it just means they don't train properly for full contact venues.

I don't necessarily think that training methods and styles are related. I think that certain styles have just trained a certain way for so long, that they are now associated. Case in point, I practice TKD. Therefore, just about everyone that would encounter me in sparring, competition, or whatever, would probably assume that I would: a) kick a lot, and kick to the head; b) not punch to the head; c) have no knowledge of how to grapple (which, unfortunately, I don't, at this time).

However, I could alter my training methodologies to included these missing venues, and improve my fighting abilities. I could change the methods, but keep the style. It is just a matter of changing the way people view it.

Of course you could. But it is not part of the style's built in training methodology, which is my point. sport styles have a training method already built in and designed to prepare you for said sport. kung fu, for example does not have the built in structure to gear you up for full contact fighting. If you look at many of the san shou clubs and how they train, they train like thai boxers. Some of these schools are san shou only - they don't teach a particular style of kung fu - either that or they offer seperate classes. the style has a HUGE influence on the training methods, though yes, you are free to change those training methods at any time.

[Kajukenbopr]

if what you say is true, then muay thai is a very incomplete style because it lacks grappling and ground techniques.

but surely you consider yourself a complete martial artist because you round it up with judo.

your style is deficient and you change your training( from muay thai to grappling) but it is not part of your original style. Then, YOU changed the way your martial arts trains in.

The practitioner determines how the martial art develops- either keep it in a pure form or modify it, but the style in itself in fact has worked for other people before, even if today you dont know how to use it.

[nine_weapons]

if what you say is true, then muay thai is a very incomplete style because it lacks grappling and ground techniques.

but surely you consider yourself a complete martial artist because you round it up with judo.

your style is deficient and you change your training( from muay thai to grappling) but it is not part of your original style. Then, YOU changed the way your martial arts trains in.

The practitioner determines how the martial art develops- either keep it in a pure form or modify it, but the style in itself in fact has worked for other people before, even if today you dont know how to use it.

I have never said that muay thai was complete. muay thai is great for muay thai matches. For mma, it is lacking. It has stand up grappling and takedowns, but no ground grappling. consequently, the training methods don't provide for a means of ground training - a training method issue by way of the style of muay thai. If style had nothing to do with it and it was all practitioner dependent, you would have seen far more successful tma guys in mma.

[bushido_man96]

if what you say is true, then muay thai is a very incomplete style because it lacks grappling and ground techniques.

but surely you consider yourself a complete martial artist because you round it up with judo.

your style is deficient and you change your training( from muay thai to grappling) but it is not part of your original style. Then, YOU changed the way your martial arts trains in.

The practitioner determines how the martial art develops- either keep it in a pure form or modify it, but the style in itself in fact has worked for other people before, even if today you dont know how to use it.

I have never said that muay thai was complete. muay thai is great for muay thai matches. For mma, it is lacking. It has stand up grappling and takedowns, but no ground grappling. consequently, the training methods don't provide for a means of ground training - a training method issue by way of the style of muay thai. If style had nothing to do with it and it was all practitioner dependent, you would have seen far more successful tma guys in mma.

I think that with the advent of MMA now, we can see what our style lacks, and more readily accept it, and can alter our training to make up for it in some way. Really, style is open to interpretation. However, I don't want to say that I train TKD, and then do 3 years of Muay Thai training, and say that I am still strictly a TKD type. I would be using elements of both. However, it may be tougher to tell, because most of the techniques of Muay Thai, save for the clinching, can be seen in TKD movements, with minor modifications. Now, that doesn't make them the same, but more of a hybrid. But, I could incorporate the training elements of Muay Thai into my TKD training, and still be considered a TKD guy, for the most part; I would also have Thai influences, I guess you could say.

After all of that, it can get confusing.

[Iron Arahat]

I don't think underestimation is the issue, it's demonstrated effectiveness -...but whenever you actually SEE kung fu, they are losing. (keep in mind that the mainstream public has no idea what san shou is, where there are cma winning)

I agree with this, but there is an understimation when it comes to kung-fu, based on what you refer to as "demonstrated effectiveness". Many people are unaware of Chi Sao/Chin na application, or even what it is, as I said I am fine with that.

Competition will weed out who is good and who is not as good. And many venues now keep records that you can look up online. many people today put their fights online also, so that you can actually see them fighting. competition is by no means everything, but is helpful in MANY ways.

There is a place for competition, but in many ways competition is also biased, and records are not tell alls about a person, instruction or style. Any sport has rules which can make a difference in a persons success based on style. I would have a hell of a time fighting in a Tae Kwon Do ruled match, pure pointfighting or even wrestling, does this make me a poor fighter? Does it make me less of an instructor? Will it weed me out as not as good? I would think no, it is the boundries set by the rules that work against me and my style, not the validity of what we do. Just like any of those styles may find difficulty in a San Shou ring, because there style is not suited to the system of rules.

That being said I believe competition can be a healthy component of any martial art regiment, but people need to understand that competition whether it be san shou, pint fighting, no-holds, ufc, shootifghting, wrestling, judo, boxing or otherwise is just that, competition, and is a far cry from reality.