the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Different schools seem to have different ideas about what mud stepping is, and why it is trained.

johnwang wrote:-

The reason that you do mud walk is you don't want to step on something sharp in the dark.

That sound so 1970 Shaw-Brothers

Ever walked in deep mud? It looks nothing like the BGZ muddy walking. If ever stand in deep mud then try to drag your foot forward in that mud, feel the resistance the mud give? That’s the resistance to feel/imagine while BGZ mud walking..it’s a tool of practice.....But we all know this

Trick wrote:

johnwang wrote:-

The reason that you do mud walk is you don't want to step on something sharp in the dark.

That sound so 1970 Shaw-Brothers

What do you think the purpose of the training is? What's the combat usage?

If you

- lift up your foot and land it back down, your opponent can only sweep your leg when your foot is landing.
- use Bagua mud step, your opponent can sweep your leg anytime he wants to.

Why do you want to give your opponent such advantage?

Apparently the whole "not bobbing up and down" thing has something to do with people walking and running all day long wearing heavy armour - (again, apparently) the less you bob up and down the less you're lifting and dropping the weight with every step, so you save the precious bodily fluids.

johnwang wrote:

Trick wrote:

johnwang wrote:-

The reason that you do mud walk is you don't want to step on something sharp in the dark.

That sound so 1970 Shaw-Brothers

What do you think the purpose of the training is? What's the combat usage?

If you

- lift up your foot and land it back down, your opponent can only sweep your leg when your foot is landing.
- use Bagua mud step, your opponent can sweep your leg anytime he wants to.

Why do you want to give your opponent such advantage?

Why on earth would anyone facing an opponent outside of the Shaw-Brothers studio use Bagua’s mud-stepping ?? That suppose to happen on the set in the studio.....to look KungFuey cool on the screen.

johnwang wrote:Which method is better?

1. Bagu mud step.
2. Each step is a kick and each kick is a step.

IMO, 2 > 1.

If all your steps are just to land on your opponent's knee joint, you don't need mud step.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkMqF-J ... e=youtu.be

Ideally, more like 2 = 1

edededed wrote:

johnwang wrote:Which method is better?

1. Bagu mud step.
2. Each step is a kick and each kick is a step.

IMO, 2 > 1.

If all your steps are just to land on your opponent's knee joint, you don't need mud step.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkMqF-J ... e=youtu.be

Ideally, more like 2 = 1

Unless you use mud step to shin bite on your opponent's ankle, otherwise 2 combines offense and defense in one, and 1 is defense only.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7a0Xig ... e=youtu.be

Bagua stepping should combine 1 and 2 together, but the kicking is less obvious (thus bagua is often known for its 暗腿).

johnwang wrote:

edededed wrote:

johnwang wrote:Which method is better?

1. Bagu mud step.
2. Each step is a kick and each kick is a step.

IMO, 2 > 1.

If all your steps are just to land on your opponent's knee joint, you don't need mud step.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkMqF-J ... e=youtu.be

Ideally, more like 2 = 1

Unless you use mud step to shin bite on your opponent's ankle, otherwise 2 combines offense and defense in one, and 1 is defense only.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7a0Xig ... e=youtu.be

I'd say mud-stepping is both offensive and defensive, but we should also keep in mind that there's more than one way to do it, so perhaps not all of us are thinking about the same thing. Some schools practice mud-stepping by gliding the feet on the ground to maintain contact at all times, while others prefer to keep the feet slightly above ground. There are also those who like to add a little fajin at the end of each step to train their low kicks.

Shin-biting is one of the classic applications for kou-bu (toe-in step). Due to the founder's Shuaijiao background, the circle-walking forms in Cheng-derived styles are basically a series of Shuaijiao techniques strung together.

I find mud-stepping to be training many things and some weren't even explained clearly. e.g., when I was teaching how to quickly and smoothly change angles during stepping for an attack/counter my students had problem picking it up naturally. As I went through correcting their various issues that were giving them problems, starting from gross movement problems to some subtle ones, one of the major issues I realized was their weight was dispersed when they step. It took a while for me to realize their problems as I didn't have to consciously make this happen and it wasn't obvious if you weren't looking for it. I realized it was natural for me because mud stepping trains it away via its requirements. Mud stepping also trains a lot of muscles that people don't normally use. My friend who trains weight lifting and shuaijiao goes to a really good physical therapist due to various health issues and one of his problems is weakness in some specific muscles in the hips. His PT taught him some exercises and postures for testing strength in those muscles. He tested those on me and was surprised that I had no problems with them. As far as I can tell I probably strengthened those extra because of the "reaching" part of mud stepping. Throughout the years via various experimentation I found more and more stuff that were trained by circle walking/mud-stepping. It's a really useful exercise. Sadly like many Chinese things, the reasons for doing stuff aren't always explained. Old teachers prefer to spend time training vs talking.

I found mud stepping to help with stability.

Working at a club, a riot kicked off because the top billed performer didn't show, broken glass and booze all over the tile floor. A couple times as I was running from hot spot to hot spot, I'd hit a slick puddle of that glass and booze. Since I was training the mud step and circle walking at the time I just naturally made the shape and while I could tell I should have fallen (a fraction of a moment of SLIP, no traction), it all just sort of fell together naturally and I was able to stay upright and mobile.

.Q. wrote:. Sadly like many Chinese things, the reasons for doing stuff aren't always explained. Old teachers prefer to spend time training vs talking.

Yes so it is. But I don't know if it's very sad. For many teachers of old Chinese Tradition it's perfectly natural that you learn from actually doing something instead of thinking about it. Explaining seems pointless if you don't already know how to do. First doing and understanding from practical experience. Talking comes later. Western people often value thinking more than to be able to do, which might seem strange in Chinese teaching tradition.

oragami_itto wrote:, it all just sort of fell together naturally and I was able to stay upright and mobile.

Makes perfect sense.

Bao wrote:

.Q. wrote:. Sadly like many Chinese things, the reasons for doing stuff aren't always explained. Old teachers prefer to spend time training vs talking.

Yes so it is. But I don't know if it's very sad. For many teachers of old Chinese Tradition it's perfectly natural that you learn from actually doing something instead of thinking about it. Explaining seems pointless if you don't already know how to do. First doing and understanding from practical experience. Talking comes later. Western people often value thinking more than to be able to do, which might seem strange in Chinese teaching tradition.

oragami_itto wrote:, it all just sort of fell together naturally and I was able to stay upright and mobile.

Makes perfect sense.

I understand you're talking about those that just like to think about stuff but don't like to train. It's a waste to share knowledge with those people since it needs to be burned into the body to be useful, not the brain.
However, it's sad not explaining the principles because training method that works for 1 person doesn't necessarily work for another. If you understand the principles and see someone not getting it you can develop other methods that might work for them. If you only got it because the old method worked for you but you do not fully understand the principles, you may not be able to help your student when they're stuck. As an actual example, I taught my friend how to stand in santi but for a few years he could not get his structure to connect to his hand in santi. I was baffled because I taught him the exact way I was taught and held no knowledge back. Just recently when I was thinking about the principles for the structure I realized he did something internally different from me and I developed a new method to change internal alignment. This new method worked immediately for him. Training via methods that worked for me did not work for him after a few years. I don't know if he would've ever figured it out by just training more. This type of disproportional result for the amount of work put in will more than likely cause dilution and degradation in the art.

A long time ago at my beginning steps into ICMA’s I got hold on a videotape on Xingyiquan by James McNeil(spelling?). For example his teachings on santishi as I recall where just - stand like this and hold it, when beginning to feel uncomfortable just hold it he instructed. I thought, well some sort of endurance practice(of which I had at the time been doing for way over an decade studying Karate), and the continued teaching on the elements where just as “externally”, remember he on that tape mentioned that XYQ was as supercharged Karate ......Well if teaching XYQ purely “externally” it ain’t gonna be supercharged anything. It’s not XYQ......I stuffed away that tape.....I can understand that this is how some teachers teach these arts, to se if the students dedicated or not. After that the real teaching hits in.