Cheng Man Ching Tai Chi Chuan and Swimming

[kamahlthedruid]

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Edited April 8, 2014 by kamahlthedruid

[Toptomcat]

The kind of tai chi that's ideally suited for physical therapy and injury rehabilitation isn't exactly the same kind of tai chi that's good for fighting. There's some overlap, but not a great deal.

[DWx]

I studied Yang style for a couple of years. Was a lot of older people doing it for gentle exercise and rehab but since I was more interested in the martial side my teacher always made sure she taught that for me. Whatever style of Tai Chi you do, make sure you find someone who does teach the combat side of things.

Chen style generally focuses more on the combat/MA side of things. Chen might be more rigorous than the other styles but even so its not that rigorous as such compared to other forms of MA. Look around YouTube if you want examples:

I heard Sun style is fairly gentle and doesn't do a lot of leaping/jumping and deep stances that you'll find in the other styles so that might be good for rehab.

The kind of tai chi that's ideally suited for physical therapy and injury rehabilitation isn't exactly the same kind of tai chi that's good for fighting. There's some overlap, but not a great deal.

Have you ever studied it? My experience of it there has always been a huge overlap. First and foremost the movements are combative but in doing them it would be great physical therapy.

[kamahlthedruid]

i've done cheng man ching tai chi and all i did was redirect force and learned how to make my hand heavy on someone's shoulders. I only took a few classes and I really enjoyed it.

[Toptomcat]

I think it may just be that I have unusually high standards for 'good for fighting', namely able to produce people who can perform in their area of martial focus- in Tai Chi's case, standing grappling- at or better than the ability of the typical judo school to do the same, in the same time period of study for the student. I've only ever seen one or two such schools that fit that definition, and their training was not what I would recommend for someone rehabilitating a sprain.