Wu Gongyi vs. Chen Kefu

[hopgarsansau]

ya i read it, but it still doesnt say much. no reasonings on who or why a hit was being called. well it WAS cheng tin hung....not surprised he pissed some people off pretty badly

[Yuen-Ming]

Personally, I find this the most interesting and relevant remark on this whole thread. The 1928 Nanjing national Leitai championship .

This will come out, and when people have a chance to view the films publicly, myths will be busted and legends will dissolve. It will be like the elderly Japanese gentleman and the younger MMA fighter in this clip, which we've all seen before:

Yes Tom.
Actually various things must be taken into consideration when looking at the video.

Also, what would one think of Muhammed Ali if he was to judge him on the basis of his performance here ?



YM

[Andy_S]

I agree that there are clearly recognizable Crane technqiues from Chen, but IMO, Wu has the better of it. I also agree with Hopgarsansau that the article was pro-Wu, but even so:
Wu seemed to score the best facers;
It is Chen who gets the nosebleed (the fact taht the fight was stopped over this shows how clearly the Chinese public at the tiem were unfamiliar with full contact fighting)
Chen lost the use of his right arm at one point, and himself later showed reporters the bruises on his arms from Wu's "light strikes."

Finally, there is the issue of Wu's age.I give him major respect for getting up, putting his rep on the line and doing his thing in public. Albeit, his techniques did not look like Taijiquan.

As for combative Taiji: There seem to be two camps.
(1) Those (like Docherty's group) who train and fight, and whose fighting does not particularly look like 'clean' Taiji;
(2) Those who train but don't fight, and who criticize those who do fight as:
- Low level
- Not "real" Taiji
- Doing kickboxing or wrestling and calling it Taiji

Regretably, those in the second camp seem unable to prove their contentions, as there are no films of Taiji being used they way they would like to see it being used...

IMHO, Taiji is a fighting method. There is way too much mystique surrounding it.

[Ian]

Yes Tom.
Actually various things must be taken into consideration when looking at the video.

Also, what would one think of Muhammed Ali if he was to judge him on the basis of his performance here ?



YM

Not a good comparison. Ali wouldn't have had a strategy against a grappler, but those two Chinese gents were both trained in stand-up styles.

[Andy_S]

Ian:

That's a very fair comment.

Everyone else:

WAS it a terrible fight? Given the lack of experience of sportive fighting at the time, would say it is not too awful.

There were some clear WC techniques from Chen (though his distancing and timing was off) and we have Chen's demonstration to reporters afterwards that the Wu's light strikes caused serious bruises (and indeed, Chen lost his right arm for a while...as someone who never had much luck with guntings in sparring, I know how difficult it is to deaden a moving arm).

I think CMA was the victim of its own rep. People thought it was so deadly one might migth have died, etc, etc, but in fact, both Taiji and WC are just fighting styles, and most empty hand combats are not:
(1) Mortal
(2) Spectacular
(3) Athletic

I think with sanda and MMA we have much longer, wider expereince of full contact MA in the sportive environment than they did. These guys had little or none, bar perhaps having seen a couple of leitai matches by village-level boxers. Today, we look at the way guys were wiped out in the early UFCs and laugh at their naivette...there is something of the same happenning now. This is 2008. That was 1954.

[kreese]

Exactly, Andy. Lack of experience. There is much more of a fighting "scene" now, so everyone's game will be up to a certain standard. I think we can assume that the best fighters emerge when there is a the largest amount of fighting activity going on, be it private challenges or public competitions. I don't know enough about Chinese history to know what was going on, but it seems that the most famous fighters came about at the end of the 1800s and the early 1900s. This also seems to be a time when people were reworking traditional styles/knowledge into something that they felt better reflected their needs. There is obviously something of value at the core of traditional systems, but the outer surface may need to evolve based on the needs of the day. Perhaps this is the real meaning of an internal system, that the principles hold true while the shapes and expressions are mutable as required. There are certainly those out there (Mr. Cartmell as one of the better known people) that are able to adapt their understanding of internal principles to the needs of modern fighting without feeling like they are abandoning an orthodox religion or some such betrayal of tradition.

[Leishen]

Andy hi.
IMO, there is not only black and white when it comes to Taiji training for fighting. DD's way or other's that train and don't fight way. There are other ways too. DD has his perspective how a training should be for using the art. Nice. Others have other perspectives and training methodology. That there is no video out there doesn't mean there are not other methods.
However, if Taiji comes to be seen as a boxing or kickboxing from the most of the..."fighting groups" out there,I would rather prefered to take boxing lessons and Mhuai Tai instead, other than trying to practice Taijiquan for the most time.
I don't believe that Taiji was made for making someone capable of fighting like some poor boxer, or some hooligan in a football much, or like two kids who fight in the school. For me there are other views of the art's usage, otherwise I would have to hit a boxing bag 1000 times a day, sparring with friends along with running and push ups and that whould be all.

As for the Leitai in Nanjing.....oh my God, who knows what we are going to see (if we are going to see it anyway).....

[Formosa Neijia]

I don't really like the "fight" but one has to really put everything in perspective to be able to get a more balanced opinion.

A few years ago they found the original video of the Nanjing first Leitai championship, which were supposed to be lost forever. I had tried my best to get a hold of them for some time but I failed.
A person I know had the chance to see the films and he told me that "any sanda junior guy of today would destroy them in a minute".

YM

Personally, I find this the most interesting and relevant remark on this whole thread. The 1928 Nanjing national Leitai championship .

This will come out, and when people have a chance to view the films publicly, myths will be busted and legends will dissolve.

Why wait?

Let's take a look at "completely inferior, totally worthless" Western martial arts from 100 years ago for comparison:





Lots of technique, general level of competence quite high, light-years beyond the Wu taiji vs. crane "fight."

Gee whiz...might training against resistance have something to do with it?

So Tom, are you saying there's film of the 1928 tourney out there?

Dave C.

[stephen yan]

Stephen:

Graham was not being serious - he is "taking the piss" out of Ed, just a mocking joke between friends (they have both been on this forum for years).

What do you think of the fight? I just re-watched and while you COULD see some White Crance combos from Chen, I could see little Taiji from Wu. The only two points that impressed me at all were
(1) Chen sidesteps and swipes, and Wu goes through the ropes; and
(2) Wu takes out Chen's right arm. (Chen later showed reporters the bruises on his arms from Wu's "light" strikes)

Dear Andy,

this could be my last time for me joining discussions on this net forum , i need to spend the time for getting things ready for my big trip to china.

i seemed mistaking Gramm's joke , thought he insults my friend equals insulting me, i apologise to Gramm , after all english is my 2nd language .last 20 years living in nz , i didn't put energy into improving my english or any computer skills.


as to the way i saw about wu and chen's fight , i remembered that i wrote some comments somewhere on this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=569

1st , the fight was not a great fight . as master ma y l said : wu g y should do much better . as he lived in HK, he no longer practised as hard , also by his age then he no longer practise combating taiji like when he was at younger age (by then his son wu da kui was still doing combating taiji , his son wanted to take the chanllenge vs chen , but was not accepted by chen and was also worried that wu d k might kill chen as he was famouse for damaging his opponent)

so if a person stop practising hard and stop practising combating taiji for years , then it is hard to imagine he could maintaining a level that he used to.

then what level wu g y used to have? let me put onr example : among wu jian quan's disciples , there are other famouse fighters like :wu tong (吴桐）,a muslim whom did one kick on his opponent's head ,and took one big skin off the skull and killed the opponent in NANJIN leitai; wnag xing wu(王新午）；wang run sheng王润生 etc.wang run sheng was regarded as quanwang(king of fist) in japan when he was in the university in japan, he defeated many japanese martial arts chanllengers. but when he PH with wu gong yi , he still lost all the time .

i found that people neglect the enviromemt's compact on the fighters which sometimes more important than their actual skills .i remembered in the early years when i first took a real challenge from other kung fu practioner , my body didn't listen to me any more ,i couldn't remember what i did , later people at site told me that i fought like never learned kung fu. ten years ago when i 1st took my students to the ring fight , i was shocked that the ones fighted very well in the class didn't even use one tenth of their technics in that shouting enviroment (some student even couldn't do a form demonstrion under public eyes ) , so phsycology training is just as important as technics training. otherwise even a master can fight very well in private challenges , not necessary fight well in ring where sorounded by a many people . this was what happened in NANJIN leitai in 1920s , as the news papers said that most famouse cma masters fight like they never learned kung fu, and the students from govt. cma schools did much better than folk masters as they at least practise combating in the classes while in the folk cma teaching , very seldom doing combating practising apart from shua jiao(wrestling or PH). so the students from govt. schools had better traning phsycologicaly in combating situation . this is one of the key shortcomings i found in traditonal cma's teaching .it happened same way in Ian's post on above caige fighting , the guy was knocked out was too nervouse , when the kick comes , he not only didn't move his steps and shift his body , but also bended his head (most likely he closed his eyes as well), his body become a kicking bag . it was much worse that the fight of wu vs chen.

in wu vs chen , the begining of 1st and 2nd rounds , wu g y did very well : he used the cai jin( 采 劲）on chen's punchs and made him lose balances and fall forwards(it happened very short,not many fights i saw that could do that :before strike back ,to make opponent lose balance and couldn't get out it ) and got hit one the norse twice by wu g y's banlan chui from fast from. that made chen no longer dare to move in . but unfortunately , wu g y didn't maintain his calmness , and stared to some wrong things ..(chen was also a well known boxer).

after all , if wu g y kept on training hard and training combating taiji as well , and had lots of ring experiences , then the result would be very defferent . but his braveness at that age and in that enviroment to take the challenge was no other taiji style's master ever did or able to do .

[Chris McKinley]

Now that we've given more coverage, discussion and thought to this "fight" than it ever possibly deserved, can we please put it to rest once and for all? This horrible footage has had way too much mileage on EF.

[Andy_S]

Good post Stephen. Good luck with your China trip and hope you will be back on EF.

Interesting that the Nanjing academy peeps did better than the folk masters in the famous 1928 leitei event. Of course, they were full time MA students learning from le creme de la creme, but I wonder if their success in competitive fighting was because their practice inclued boxing and kendo - both strong sparring disciplines - as well as CMAs?

Still, would like to see the film of the guy kicking part of the other chap's skull off! Never heard of that happening, and I have not heard of any fatalities in the event, either...do you have a reliable source for this?

[stephen yan]

Good post Stephen. Good luck with your China trip and hope you will be back on EF.

Interesting that the Nanjing academy peeps did better than the folk masters in the famous 1928 leitei event. Of course, they were full time MA students learning from le creme de la creme, but I wonder if their success in competitive fighting was because their practice inclued boxing and kendo - both strong sparring disciplines - as well as CMAs?

Still, would like to see the film of the guy kicking part of the other chap's skull off! Never heard of that happening, and I have not heard of any fatalities in the event, either...do you have a reliable source for this?

another wu tai ji good fighter was master WU TONG( 吴桐）。wu tong(1889-1963)was GREAT MASTER WU JIAN QUAN'S disciple , he was a HUI minority.in late 1920's , he went to nanjing to participate 1st china national kung fu competition.when he fight with a kung fu master , he led the guy forward and kicked his heel on the guy's top of the head , took a big piece of skin off the guy's skull, the guy was passed out , few days later died . wu tong worried the guy's family and martial arts brothers would take revenge, so he escaped to mongulia , otherwise if he stayed to end of competition , he could be one of the top winners.

master ma told me that he was on the site when wu tong fought the opponent . wu tong's son wu jin xian is still alive in bao tou of inner mongulia.

not all the folk masters couldn't keep their calm , some even got more excited when crowds watching . like shan xiu li（尚学礼）of xylhq fought a famouse monkey style master at age 72, on leitai in kai fong, only one strike( knee strike) , killed the opponent(whom was flyed upby the strike and landed on the ground outside of leitai.) another luo yang xylhq master shun da lai (孙大來）fought last qing emperor's grandma ci xi 's body guide , also one strike with "wang mei zhan"望眉斩，killed the guy instantly ; cheng bo jun of zhao bao tai ji only learned taiji for less than two years also won the leitai fight in henan....

thanks for your support and thanks to Ed and other friends , goodbye.

[CaliG]

Thanks for your feedback Stephen.

[edededed]

Good luck in your travels in China! Hope you find the lihualiuheqiang to your pleasing.

[cdobe]

Now that we've given more coverage, discussion and thought to this "fight" than it ever possibly deserved, can we please put it to rest once and for all? This horrible footage has had way too much mileage on EF.

It's quite simple: Don't read it if you're tired of it. Others may have an interest in discussing it.
I personally don't like threads were someone plays the schoolmaster to begin with, telling people about their supposed shortcomings. So I ignore those threads.

CD