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In this lession we focused:

• How to get out of a headlock (and taking hits while headlocked)
• How to reposition if attacked from behind.
• Last part of the 1st Section of the Wooden Dummy form.

Beginning the lession, my sifu taught me about the the outer and inner gates. The outer gates being the best place as a Wing Chun fighter to position yourself so you can disarm/disable the opponent or more freely use the tools of your “workshop”, in otherwords more choice of techniques can be utilziedi f you work from the outside of the person’s arms.

From the outside gate you can employ the Laan Sau ; essentially a technique that neutralizes or pins the arm of the opponent against their torso; restricting their ability to punch or grapple you while it is disabled. You don’t apply alot of pressure against their arm; just enough to proceed with your follow up techniques or maneuver.

After some practise of footwork and working the outer gate, my Sifu then proceeded to teach me the 1st section of the Wooden Dummy.

Here is an example of the 1st Section of the Wooden Dummy being performend (This is not my Sifu)

Wooden Dummy (First Section) demonstrated and explained – YouTube

It had been many years since i had recieved any Wing Chun training (Since 2015 if i had to guess) it was a great surprise to see that the first session went alot into Application of the techniques (I’m sure part of the reason for this was my prior experience in WC). But it was refreshingly different from most training experience i had in the past.

One of the first techniques covered was Laan Sau and how to drive this forward keeping it firm but not too much, this technique requires complete body movement to pull off directly, so the feet/hip and follow up punch with the other hand are essential part of pulling it off.

My Wu Sau was quite low for it’s postioning (Sternum level approximately) , this was raised alittle higher than that. Much of the lession was about application of the techniques that are taught in the drills or forms.

Once Laan Sau and Wu Sau were covered we then went into Upper Bong Suo and how to use it in application; probably the most sigificant difference i’ve seen in this lineage over my prior experince in Wong Shun Leung’s lineage.

We started the session by briefly going over the techniques covered in last week, Such as the Pak Sau and Upper Bong Sau in combination with foot work. Cham Kiu came up in conversation so he went on to explain the differences between drill and application which was an emphasis placed in the 1st session as well.

Two Steps Footwork

So to do this application footwork, the leading foot (right foot in this case) goes forward first but touches the ground at a 30 degree angle facing left, the back foot then lifts and is also turned to a 30 degree angle. So both feet should be parallel to eachother with a weight distribution ideally around the 50/50 mark but alittle on the back foot is also fine.

Once i got a basic grasp of the footwork i then repeated on my other side (starting with the left foot) in both instances i had a man sau + wau sau type of posture to recieve/deflect any technique thrown at me.

As i did not recollect what Man Sau was by name, the rest of the session went into how to use Man Sau / Wu Sau posture and how to switch the hands around to do the opposite side. It is not only good for attack and defence but to also measure the distance between yourself and the opponent.

I am reading this new book that i ordered last week as i wanted to learn as much as i could about Goju Ryu’s history. It delves quite deeply into the history of Okinawa and it’s martial arts in general which was a pleasant surprise to see how timelines align with everything that was occuring on the island (Such as Judo and the gradual emphasis on martial arts being taught in public schools on Okinawana and mainland japan) for the past few thousand year. The various instuctors/students are covered in more detail as we get closer to the present day.

I will share more once i have gotten much further into the book ( i am about 100 pages in so far!)