8 Step Praying Mantis Taiwan

[Bob]

Interesting twist in Wutan(g) martial arts systems - many schools start with students learning long fist mainly from Adam Hsu's teachings - other schools start with praying mantis mainly from the late GM Su Yu Zhang - when I started in Wutan(g) I never learned any long fist but learned almost all of the 8 Step Praying Mantis which I never really appreciated until much later in my "elderly" years. It's good stuff and fit well with the bagua, xing yi and pigua that was also taught in the much earlier years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Jz2scYEcgg

Monkey Steals Peach
In part 3, Ghys (@wushuquestofficial ) and I meet up with Chang Juin Hau to learn about Eight Step Mantis, a style brought to Taiwan from Shandong province in China by Wei Xiao Tang.

[Bob]

A young GM Su Yu Zhang - this was the 2nd form we learned in 1988 - the first was qi shou.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8kJqfZkXT4




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Afl4ZOE ... C5E0E91D54

Damon Hwang's performance in December of 2006.
This is the first time in my life to show TangLangQuan in public !
黃偉哲生平第一次表演螳螂拳﹕八步摘要一段（於台北文化大學）

[windwalker]

Met James, many yrs back in SF...good guy, interesting skill set...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yau24iA_mZk

"Grandmaster Shyun was a World Champion in Full Contact Martial Arts for five years running when only in his twenties and has acted as a combat instructor in his native Taiwan, to the Taiwanese Marine Corp. "


Note the finishing movements after the throw.

[Bob]

Interestingly we were told that Wei Xiaotang had an original Wu style taijiquan set that was played in extremely low postures - we were supposed to learn it but unfortunately never got around to it - suspect a copy was made of it in Taipei in the 70s