The Truth About Traditional Martial Arts - PART 1- Kung Fu Report #269

i notice a positive trend of teachers bulking up their TMA less cosplay more thumping.

Thanks - Looking forward to part 2.

modern wushu, like the compulsory forms from the competitions, is actually a modern martial art. and its even more useless than traditional martial art like hung kuen, or even norther styles like xing yi, bajiquan or ba gua. If you know anything about the history of chinese martial arts, you would know that all these compulsory modern wushu forms are bastardized versions of traditional forms, just so they can claim that their modern wushu has historical relevancy. But they took out all of the "martial" part, then it just becomes a dance. Or maybe you want to learn how to do pretty butterfly kicks and flips so you can be the next jet li..

Now, as far as does it work in real combat or not, its debatable, personally i think theres always a place for traditional martial art, just for health benefits alone, but its also about learning about chinese culture. But modern wushu? nah.

Bruce Lee learned traditional arts but never conforms on a single idea. Martial arts techniques must adapt according to the person you are fighting with. If you see champion kickboxers and boxers, most of them don’t have a fixed style, they go with the flow.

Nice perspective Sifu.

This is not wing chun and unrelated to wing chun, don't mislead others. It's just basic self-defense techniques.

It started in Ancient Greece - Pankration - it was taken to Asia by Alexander the Great - it was associated with Buddhism which is a Greco-Indian Religion and Bodhidharma a Greek

So much sense here, love it!

This is not an accurate lesson because the attacker is freezing on the one punch to allow a response = Lets see this with a boxer attacker throwing 6 punches in a row. This is why Boxing is so dangerous to traditional martial arts.

Shouldn't we listen to people who actually fight

What about the “internal” aspect of martial arts and it being explained by professionals as the highest state of achievement? Do you(Adam Chan) know or utilize this internal power, and if so why don’t you ever even mention it at all opposed to those who demonstrate this ultimate ability;that being all they talk of?🤔🤷🏻😉p.s. I doubt it, but even if you possibly respond to this message stating you don’t use what people call “internal” martial arts, could you please at least consider making a video with someone who does know it and thus demonstrating the differences and finally being one or the first Sifu’s to totally set their egos aside in light of the greater good of humanity to learn the truth?🙀🤦🏻‍♂️🙄/👌✌️🤲☝️😇

Nice mouse stepping in the opening clip.

Kung Fu OVER Wu Shu! ☯️

Wu Shu 🚫 Real Weapons!

Xin or qin dynasty

Happy New Year Adam and Chris, hope to see you back in 2023.....

Great video, thanks Adam!

VERY RESPECTABLE, AND ON POINT. THANKS FOR THIS HIGH-QUALITY UPLOAD. BEST WISHES TO YOU FOR 2023. 🧸

Kung FU great for Military apps when surrounded ... see Star Wars and Chinese Monk just drops half the Storm Troopers, later dies sadly.

History, 13.8 B YEARS, amongst our JR., Abstinence and reverse or backward potentiation, has been ALWAYS controversial. Similar BOW AND ARROW with its (naught) ELASTIC Energy later FORCE.

The vast majority of "traditional" martial arts were created in the 19th century. There are very few genuinely old martial arts.

This is exactly right. I've trained in Wudan for 15 years, and I know exactly what you're talking about. We train weapons with equal emphasis on empty hands. But the question of "does this work?" is something that comes to my mind frequently. We can't train in weapons with real pressure because we don't want to hurt our classmates. The tendency is to always hold back, and if you get close to moving fast, you still are worried you're going to hit your opponent and injure them. But the fact is, we don't live in ancient times, and sword fighting, spear fighting, double elbow knife fighting, and so on, simply isn't something we typically rely on for our survival. 500 years ago, and further back into antiquity, it was exactly the opposite. So we are not trained in modern times to fight the way our ancestors trained to fight. I suspect that the methods they used to train for sword fighting included the distinct possibility of injury to training partners, and they had ways to train, and discover the actual skills required through that kind of training. The proof is in the pudding. The ancients lived and died by their weapons skills. We simply do not. We have guns. So aside from the cultural changes in China after the Chin dynasty, even if that had not happened, we have a new reality brought to us by the existence of guns. Small, fast, lethal at range. These weapons pretty much eliminate the usefulness of traditional weapons in the field. You can't pit a swordsman, even a great one, against someone with a gun. And so, swordsmanship as a skill has lost its primary purpose as a self defense skill. Thus, even if we're lucky and find someone who can teach traditional martial arts, it is incredibly rare to find anyone who can teach it in a living way, not, as you say, a dead way. If you can't hone your skill with combat level practice then you're not practicing a living martial art. I agree completely with this. I'm curious... you seem like you have worked out how to practice traditional martial arts with real energy and combat intent. Have you been able to do the same with weapons such as sword? Anyway, thank you very much for the video. This was very thoughtful and informative.

Great explanations, thanks!

Really interesting views as always. Would be interested learning more about the Chi Na material. And Adam’s opinion on pre war Chinese empty hand styles. I believe the pre war arts of empty hand were meant to Disable, maim or kill but seems the martial arts taught for the last 75 years have lost this and become for discipline, fitness and sport. Hence why peoples view of TMA’s not being effective anymore. What are Adam’s views on this topic?

I agree. I've said the same , many who are critical of TMA not working has no understanding of the full strength of techniques and movements.

Rather than what ‘traditional martial arts’ should be called for what its common name is, it should be recalled as ‘conservative martial arts’.

You sound a lot like a kung fu al pacino with your vocal man 🤌🙌👏

devastating... but I was I was taught,, DO NOT ENGAGE> unless you have to. and you better understand what that is. "By learning how to fight, we learn how NOT to fight." What that means is this isn't for a trophy , no rules, just survival. Your opponent will never be the same again. I found that my Ego went away, and humility was left. which took most of my fear away. Its a Great art.

An awesome video . Made absolute sense to me . Thankyou for the thorough explanation and demonstration of . 👏👏👏

The problem isn’t TMA. The problem is only training the prefrontal cortex, aka the thinking brain, meaning forms and sparring. In a real fight, not a bar fight, but a guy trying to murder you, the amygdala takes over and you’ve either trained properly and it comes out or you don’t and you freeze. There’s no in between. This is why the military trains by screaming at you from day 1. You have to learn correct responses to fight or flight and that starts with not locking up. Sadly, that means becoming used to traumatic experiences. Most 99.9% of instructors aren’t willing to do that or even know how bc lawsuits are a thing.

Exactly why I gave up Kung Fu (10years) And went to a combination of Kali,Combatives and Wrestling. The real world.

I am sorry to say but your form in using kung fu striking techniques arent good at all. I bet you cant use any fajin

Interesting discussion. I've been practicing for over 40 years in multiple disciplines and a master of one. A master I had decades ago once said, "Anyone can break an arm once they know how, the true mastery of your art is to control and subdue your attacker instead".
Despite the apparent hundreds of techniques in reality there is really only so many ways to punch, kick, knee, elbow, arm bar and wristlock, etc.. The same technique can be lethal force or to subdue.

I've gone through a similar thought process. I also started my "training" by reading a lot of the philosophy. That's helped me think about what is the objective, what's the best way, most efficient, and what is morally and ethically the right thing to do.
A lot of times I think the ego comes into play when the individual knows they are limited. If I've trained with the sole purpose of incapacitating my opponent, I'll be much more efficient at subduing them.

Great explanation and beautiful technique. Adam is the real deal

I must admit I thought your 1st few videos I saw were sped up, I don't have that delusion anymore! You are so incredibly fast Adam. Do you have speed training tips? Can someone train to become as fast as you?

Agreed 💯

He makes numerous important points.

Sifu Adam thank you for your enlightenment.

What you call traditional, i would call ancient, and what we have today are traditional, and the modern stuff (like wushu and sanda) - what is being developed today (the modern stuff) are specialization or they are trying to go back to what was traditional martial arts, e.g., karate ( China hands) before its adaption by the Japanese budo..association.

Traditional martial arts were complete fighting systems that were used in dueling and bloodsport. Meaning they have allready left the military.

The ancient martial arts were used by the military before the avent of guns.

I love how you think you can put someone on the floor by gently pushing them over. Here I am wasting years learning throws in judo when I cold have won every judo competition I ever entered with the 'gently push them over' technique.

So much interesting.
I've been looking for that type of explanation for long - thank you very much
subscribed

As usual I enjoyed your video. To share a little anecdote connected to the video - I was training and teaching in a bagua school and there was a young man training with us. In this bagua school you are being taught how to control and fight multiple opponents. However, BJJ came to our town and he quit us and began training BJJ. After a time training he was jumped by two guys in a park. He took one to the ground while the other attacked him kicking him in his head. He ended up in the hospital with brain damage. The moral of the story is "people are good at what they do". BJJ is a great mono e mono art, but on the street with one or more opponents it's not effective.
Likewise, many Chinese martial arts do not have ground fighting because they were battlefield arts. So the idea is if you go down there's a good chance you're done - someone is going to stab you. We did have dit dong sets in my northern mantis system. But dit dong only teaches you how to attack on the ground and get up to continue in the battle. So, a lot of Chinese arts have to be adjusted for UFC types of contests.

Add modern and traditional kicks, and all traditional styles become a lot scarier!

Mars is the Roman god of war, but yeah Aries is his Greek counterpart vice/versa. And it makes perfect sense for martial to be derived from it. I always find that fascinating.

Excellently explained! I'm also Hakka fist. Again, Excellent! Tony out. Peace.

Loge from Italy! 1rst time I saw a wushu kid multiple jumps and land without any energy in it shocked me, I am natural athletic as a cow but somehow talented for feel as chi as living pain 😂and wing chun's principles baji-filled I learned when I was a kid and defense tactic bec9me " wu shin" fight that let me risked for me to go in jail at16yo