the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Steve James wrote:So, you do stances and some will say this is not taichi. Some will spar and others will say that is not taichi.

All anyone has to do is compete if he wants to. He will adjust his practice to fit his goals, whatever style he practices.

Are there shuaijiao practitioners in mma? Do they just do shuijiao or do they strike and kick and grapple?

The

- 1st move of Chang Taiji is "open position stance (horse stance)".
- 2nd move of Chang Taiji is "diagonal fly (bow arrow stance)".

Of course you can teach Taiji form and teach stance along with it. Before I start to teach the Taiji form, I prefer to

- teach the stance first,
- transition between stances.

This is how a SC guy will fight in Sanda. A SC guy can use striking art from any MA system. Nobody will say that SC guy doesn't fight like SC.

Cool. Looks similar to the way a tcc guy might fight in sanda. There are plenty of kuoshou tournaments where tcc people participated. Well, some were leitai format, so a push out was as good as a throw. But, there were punches and kicks. My point was that if a shuai jiao guy wants to do mma, he'll have to adapt/augment his arsenal. I don't think a tcc person can just do form and expect to compete.

Ian wrote:

C.J.W. wrote:There are numerous viral clips in which he repeatedly insults Taiji practitioners and TCMAists using the f-word (while making references to their moms and the female genitalia ).

But what's wrong with disrespecting Chen Xiaowang et al? They scam their own students.

The main reason Xu has gotten such a bad rep in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan is his insolence and trash talk.

Plenty of Chinese love this guy as well - he says what people think, embarasses 'masters' in public, and these 'masters' are powerless to respond.

There's no downside to this.

Actually, in the first clip I posted, he wasn't just disrespecting CXW, but specifically calling out ALL Taiji practitioners and TCMAists. I didn't translate everything because there were just too many offensive curse words. A direct line-by-line translation from the beginning would sound like this:

"TCMA is f**king pussy. Taiji? Go f***k your moms! Those who play Taiji? Your whole family deserve to die! I will f**king kill any TCMAists who come to me!"

In the "This is China" interview, he appears much more rational because it was given after he'd taken a lot of heat from the public for his bad-mouthing antics. (On a side note, the interview was chosen and translated by someone from HK, where most people have plenty of beef with how the Chinese government censorship. )

I personally give him props for willing to expose the frauds and stepping up to the plate. But the endless ranting, theatrics, and personal attacks are too crude for my taste.

The MMA guy is done.....publicly
at some point privately things will be rectified

johnwang wrote:How to use Taiji only (without mixing any other CMA systems) to become a good Taiji fighter? Is it possible? IMO, it's possible. Taiji has all the basic striking tools. It can be an effective striking system if train properly. Does Taiji has all the wrestling tools? May be not. But you don't have to learn 300 throws to be a wrestler. If you can master "cloud hand - body control", you can use it to defeat your opponent over and over.

IMO, the issue is the students. Taiji attracts a special kind of students. When those students become teachers, they attract a special kind of students again. If you don't have any students who are willing to test the Taiji skill that you taught them to deal with people from other MA systems, it will be very difficult to develop reputation for your Taiji system as a fighting art.

Agreed! Good statement.

The problem, IMO, is that Tai chi guys hardly ever test their stuff against resisting opponents. You must use it in sparring, against other styles ets. But when people try to use their stiff and it doesn't work, they lose confidence in their art. Instead of trying it again and again, learning how to use it, they take short cuts by mixing things up, adding stuff from outside or use excessive force.

Many years ago when I started a Taiji class in North Austin Community College. During the first day, I introduced Taiji basic stances such as:

- horse stance,
- bow-arrow stance,
- striking tiger stance,
- golden rooster stance,
- twisting step stance,
- 7 star stance,
- 40-60 stance,
- ...

During the basic stances introduction, one student stoop up and said, "This is not Taiji." He then left and I have never seen him since then. Even today, I still don't know why he left. When you learn ball room dancing, you start from box step, fox step, Cha Cha step, ... When you learn Taiji, you start from horse stance, bow-arrow stance, striking tiger stance, ...

What did that Taiji student expected from his 1st day of Taiji lesson? LKJ? That Taiji student is the "special kind of student" that I'm talking about.

Agreed, first stances, then transitions and drills. Forms later. That's the way to teach.

They want forms, forms, forms, maybe a qigong and a bit of love. Have no clue about the form obsession.
I met up with some people on the tai chi day. People show stuff and we practiced each other's things. Everyone showed forms and qigong. Only I tried to teach some partner exercises. Then a woman thought it was too violent, so she wanted everyone to do more qigong.

johnwang wrote:

Green Tiger wrote:Some Chinese millionaire is offering huge cash prizes to any TCMA fighter who can beat this guy. I had no idea TCMA was such a sacred cow. The UFC fighter Nick Osipczak does tai chi now, and said he'll fight him if there's going to be prize money, but he likes what Xiaodong is doing. https://medium.com/@goathed/ufc-fighter-says-he-will-defend-tai-chi-43e86284b64b

Xu Xiaodong only challenges Taiji guys. He still shows respect to TCMA styles such as:

- Da Chen Chuan,
- Tong Bei,
- Baji,
- WC.

IMO, only a 100% Taiji guy's challenge (with no cross training) will be able to end this discussion. Any other challenge will not be able to save the Taiji reputation.

Damn!! I'm basically a TJQ form practising(boxercise)guy, but i also dabble in the basic exercises of Xing/yiquan and Tongbeiquan, so i'm out of the challenge question then I actually brought up this question with my wife(now i also blame my wife for not being able to take on the challenge and that the looser would even get some 2 million RMB, but she said no

johnwang wrote:If you can master "cloud hand - body control", you can use it to defeat your opponent over and over.

Hey John,

Is there an example clip of this move floating around. Love to see which kind of throw you're talking about.
thanks

Bao wrote:
The problem, IMO, is that Tai chi guys hardly ever test their stuff against resisting opponents. You must use it in sparring, against other styles ets. But when people try to use their stiff and it doesn't work, they lose confidence in their art. Instead of trying it again and again, learning how to use it, they take short cuts by mixing things up, adding stuff from outside or use excessive force.

Like what stuff, can you be more specific ?

They want forms, forms, forms, maybe a qigong and a bit of love. Have no clue about the form obsession.
I met up with some people on the tai chi day. People show stuff and we practiced each other's things. Everyone showed forms and qigong. Only I tried to teach some partner exercises. Then a woman thought it was too violent, so she wanted everyone to do more qigong. [/quote]
What/when is Taiji-day, is it only something happening in your area of Sweden? i might be moving back to Sweden next year(Skåne area) would like to see something about the 'Taijiquan community' there

cloudz wrote:Like what stuff, can you be more specific ?

Goddammit! That's... that's... just the question I tried to to avoid!!!



Now I'm going to lurk for a while, pretending that I didn't even read your post, and maybe... but just maybe... return to answer later when I've found some kind of way to write something while avoiding answering directly to the question...

Lol.. fair enough

C.J.W. wrote:

Ian wrote:

C.J.W. wrote:There are numerous viral clips in which he repeatedly insults Taiji practitioners and TCMAists using the f-word (while making references to their moms and the female genitalia ).

But what's wrong with disrespecting Chen Xiaowang et al? They scam their own students.

The main reason Xu has gotten such a bad rep in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan is his insolence and trash talk.

Plenty of Chinese love this guy as well - he says what people think, embarasses 'masters' in public, and these 'masters' are powerless to respond.

There's no downside to this.

Actually, in the first clip I posted, he wasn't just disrespecting CXW, but specifically calling out ALL Taiji practitioners and TCMAists. I didn't translate everything because there were just too many offensive curse words. A direct line-by-line translation from the beginning would sound like this:

"TCMA is f**king pussy. Taiji? Go f***k your moms! Those who play Taiji? Your whole family deserve to die! I will f**king kill any TCMAists who come to me!"

In the "This is China" interview, he appears much more rational because it was given after he'd taken a lot of heat from the public for his bad-mouthing antics. (On a side note, the interview was chosen and translated by someone from HK, where most people have plenty of beef with how the Chinese government censorship. )

I personally give him props for willing to expose the frauds and stepping up to the plate. But the endless ranting, theatrics, and personal attacks are too crude for my taste.

Thanks for translating, and helping to put the interview in context.

Best,
Greg

cloudz wrote:

johnwang wrote:If you can master "cloud hand - body control", you can use it to defeat your opponent over and over.

Hey John,

Is there an example clip of this move floating around. Love to see which kind of throw you're talking about.
thanks

From 2.11 - 2.28.

- Your left hand control on your opponent's right arm.
- Your right hand control his left arm.
- Different from this clip, you redirect his left arm under his own right arm (let his right arm to control his own left arm).
- You let go your right control hand. Your right forearm put pressure under his right elbow joint (upward force), or under his right shoulder (horizontal force to your right).
- Your right foot sweep his left leg as "elbow locking foot sweep", or your right leg trap behind his left leg as "diagonal fly".

The "cloud hands" is a "door opening" move. You can use it to trap your opponent's arms, redirect his arms to wherever you want his arms to be, or move him to your right (as described above), if he

- moves to your right, you borrow his yielding force and throw him to your right.
- resists, you also borrow his resistance force and throw him to your left.

Here's a video that was put together by guys at one of my old schools. Kinda kitchy. I'm actually in there somewhere in the clips from the 70s and early 80s. I ain't telling. But, this is how we did it here back then.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2b8PGMvSVQ&t=35s

Something I learned right around the turn of the century is that the only time a tai chi guy is actually 'doing' real tai chi in any kind of fight is when he gets his ass beat. If he holds his own or bests the other guy, he wasn't doing real tai chi.