Wing Chun???

Post Reply New Topic

OK, I'm 6 foot 3 and I'm piling on the pounds at the mo (200lbs)

I'm just starting to get fit, but I also feel its important to start training in a martial art. I have been researching Wing Chun and it sounds like something I want to do. Does anyone else have any experience with Wing Chun and how its benefited them??

Any advice on other martial arts are welcome

Wing Chun was Bruce Lee's style before he made his own, Jeet Kune Do. If that's not an endorsement, I don't know what is.

I tried a few martial arts but Wing Chun was always my fave. Emphasis on short distance attack/defense using mostly hands/arms with good footwork. The short distance thing makes it very different to other martial arts (who train to fight at much longer distances) -- there are lots of videos on YouTube of Wing Chun people sparring with martial artists from other disciplines and the results are interesting and fun to watch (i.e. the Wing Chun person usually moves in way closer than the other person is used to or knows how to deal with, then hit them with a million fast punches, hehe).

Wing Chun is good, I would give it one stipulation. There are a couple different kinds of instructors. Some will teach you fighting with it more right away, will perhaps even start teaching wooden dummy within a few years, and will put practical application first. Others will have you doing chi sao for years before you get much fighting out of it.

My suggestion - find an instructor who will do it all and hit the technicals but emphasizes the fighting aspects first. Another thing - if you can find an instructor who teaches both Wing Chun and Kali (particularly Inosanto style of both) or Wing Chun and Silat, these styles tend to interact positively and mutually reinforce each other. Very traditionalist Wing Chun can get ritualized and over-drilled where the fighting loses emphasis or particularly where everyone keeps a straight line while fighting and never breaks line or tries to pass; when its like that you tend to get less out of it because you're limiting real life options and enhancements to your Wing Chun for historical purity.

That said, like I'd suggest with any art - do your research, observe as many instructors as you can and try go get a sense of who moves the best as well as who's students also seem to move well.