Snake vs Crane Wing Chun



Wing Chun: The Science of In-Fighting

Movie Fights: Jackie Chan vs Benny “the Jet” Urquidez

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In his interview in The Incredibly Strange Film Show, Jackie Chan complained  that the Hollywood stuntmen (pre-2000s) weren’t used to the speed of Hong Kong fighting, so their reactions were too slow.  Jackie would hit them three times and they would only react once.  Maybe this is why he enlisted actual fighters like Benny “the Jet” Urquidez for some of his best movie fights.

Benny Urquidez was one of the early fighters in the crazy American kickboxing/Full-contact Karate scene, along with Bill “Superfoot” Wallace and Chuck Norris.  Those early attempts to incorporate other forms of martials arts into professional matches were a Wild West of vague rules and wildly different fighting styles.  Despite these hurdles, Urdiquez had a record of   49–1–1 (win-loss-draw) with 35 knockouts.  And those draws and losses were probably wins, and more due to problems with the fight promoters (his “loss” was supposed to be an exhibition, not a scored match).

The movie Meals on Wheels was one of the sillier entries starring the three kung fu brothers who had grown up together in one of Hong Kong’s Peking Opera schools, Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao, and Jackie Chan (they made at least four movies as a trio).  Yet it had one of the best (and most realistic, in its way) fight scenes of Jackie’s long career.  Half way through the fight (which he is losing), Jackie decides to pretend it is just a training bout, to take the pressure off.  He switches to a looser approach (reminiscent of Bruce Lee’s bout fight with Chuck Norris in The Chinese Connection).

Sifu Gary Lam on Pulling

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“Then fly away.”

Sifu Gary Lam

Crane Productions has just posted a nice demo from Sifu Gary Lam on pulling in Wing Chun.  In Sifu Lam’s Five Elements analysis of the system, this is one of the five (crossing hands, closing, footwork, pushing, and pulling).  When you approach mastery, these all flow together seamlessly as the opportunities present themselves (“let your opponent show you how to hit them”).  Pulling is a “second action,” that is to say, we are always trying to hit, but sometimes, we find ourselves in the (rare) position relative to the energy of the opponent when the opportunity to pull makes more sense than to hit.  When everything aligns in this way, then the power is surprising, as your pulling energy coincides with their pushing energy.  You are adding your force (mainly your body weight as you sink, connect to them through the arm, and step back).  And of course, the technique allows us to ideally guide the opponent’s head into a wall or a car or whatever.  Then, we say the hit is on the “other end.”

Philip Bayer: Make the Punch Count

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…it all becomes useless if you do not have sufficient punching power.

Philipp Bayer, Wing Chun Illustrated

Wing Chun Illustrated makes some of its articles available on its site and this article from 2016 is a must-read.  In it, Sifu Philipp Bayer makes the fundamental (and really, it should be obvious) point that without punching power, you have nothing.  You can be amazing at Chi Sao, but ultimately, Chi Sao is about learning to get through obstacles in order to hit.  But if your punches have no power, what good is it to get past obstacles.  Chi Sao is not teaching you to evade getting hit — its teaching you how to get past the opponent’s defenses  (instinctively, thus at high speed) so you can knock them out or otherwise incapacitate them.

I think Bayer is one of the clearest and most to-the-point writers on Wing Chun.  This is somewhat ironic since he’s German and English is his second language.  However, I lived in Germany for two years and I found most Germans speak excellent English, since they all learn it in school from an early age.  But Mayer’s clarity comes more from his mastery of the language and more from his mastery of the fighting technology and his no BS approach to trying to communicate its secrets.

Many thanks to Wing Chun Illustrated for making this article available. 

Make the Punch Count: Power Development (Part 1)