"we can still form a pretty good idea of the comparative skill levels by watching others compete in tournaments and do demos." You're kidding right? Watching is not the same as doing, LOL! If that was the case then you can learn everything you need to know from a book. Those badly choreographed demos are a real joke. I also can't believe one of your arguments for your cause is that your school does choreographed demos. That is a far cry from a dynamic and unpredictable fight. Any real martial artist will tell you that the basis for every fighting art is sparring. That is where you learn your timing and distance. In addition, you learn what works and what doesn't work under real pressure. You are learning martial arts from people who never fought?!?! (a street fight against an unskilled fighter doesn't count). You are learning how to fight from Masters and instructors who have never been tested. In fact, you are now a third generation student who will continue to learn your fictional fighting moves. Maybe you can pass down the "knowledge" of how to fight down to another generation of students.

"Ask someone in the room with you to hold up a random number of fingers and then you bob and weave as they switch. You cannot see much. Your head being in motion creates blurred vision." You don't bob and weave just for the sake of it. It is done at the right time and place. Your statement shows simply how little you know. Do you know what the difference is between a bob and weave?

Hey DaveS, I like a good discussion about martial arts and this definitely qualifies. You asked for my comebacks and here they are and no disrespect is intended or implied. Breathing During practice, I was taught to breathe from the diaphragm. That is silently in through the nose to the pit of the stomach. I know that the air is actually going to the diaphragm but by practicing to the pit of the stomach several benefits are achieved. There is a slight pause, then I tense the belly, breathe out through my mouth and making that rasping sound while keeping the tip of the tongue on the roof of the mouth. There are various methods of moving the limbs while doing this. When I use this I find an increase in energy, focus and balance. But because breathing is also a committed move and may be timed at close range, I was also taught to breathe normally and quietly during sparring and fighting. Also, by keeping my teeth together in combat my jaw is protected. Proper posture is also a must, as is good cardio. All the chi in the world isn’t going to help if I’m gasping for air. Stances When I first learned Moh, I was taught low stances and my legs were predictably weak. As my strength increased so did my ability to move in low stances. When I had been training for some time I used higher stances because they afforded me faster movement. Lower stances give me greater stability while higher stances give me greater mobility. Blocking For me, being able to block effectively is the result of solid theory and hard practice. Solo drills, formal two man drills and freesparring are the general categories that will maintain my blocking abilities. In closing I not only have understand the “why”, I have test it repeatedly and in various ways before I’ll believe it. So in one way you are right. A good sparring partner is absolutely invaluable. Moh (or at least the variation that I practice) does float my boat. As a matter of fact, I’m getting so energetic just writing about that I’m going to go practice. Good Luck in your Training!

RE
North: "They use deep stances. Deep stances develope flexability and stronger legs. Deep stances allow you to move larger distances in a single motion which can confuse an opponant, get you behind them or barge right through them. High stances are much easier to take down, develope less strength and ultimately represent poor training. Have the ability to do something after you have mastered it. Because a high stance seems more convenient now doesn't meen it is better. It means your legs are too weak to make proper use of lower, superior stances. It seems TKF is switching to high stances anyhow so congratulations. It sounds like you are just using a varient of a pushed in horse for their bow stance atm....." It's common for variuos traditional CMA styles to use and practice deep stances. They do develop strength, etc, etc. I'd suggest though that if you find higher stances easier to take down then you need to go back to square one because your balance is off and your rooting is weak. Too high is no good, too low is n good. Please understand something here. When I say balance I 'm not simply referring to the ability to maintain an upright position while moving or standing while performing a technique, at speed, defensive or offensive. I'm referring to your balance as a unified whole; rooting, rotation, breathing, angles, touch, power, etc, and the integration of the 3 doors. If you're too low in your stance you've over-compensated and you're out of balance. Another example is too much muscle power in your shoulder and you're out of balance. It's endless really, is measured in inches, and it all starts from your stances. When you get it right a proper stance is next to impossible to take down because it's dynamic and uses the opponents own energy against themsleves. These points represent the most basic fundamentals. There is so much to it and so much more it's mind boggling. IMHO, low stances make good targets. But as I said before, to each his own. Yet how do we define a low stance? What is too low for me may not be too low for you. Only you can determine what is right and that is done through feel. I will say this; once you get all of these aspects working together and learn to use power, any style you study becomes self-correctiing, whether it's Xing Yi, Moh, hug gar.....whatever. BTW...."High stances are much easier to take down, develope less strength and ultimately represent poor training...." That statement is pure bull...plain and simple. MrE2.......glad to hear your breath isn't stuck in your lungs up top. Remember something about any of my observations and comparisons; I was there at TKF. It is extremely unlikely your TKF training is any better than what I received. I spent a lot of time with some excellent teachers, Piercy, Smith, Sparrow, Hanley, etc...and quite a few PHS lessons with Simon. I have an accurate perspective from which to draw these comparisons. I continue to be open minded and find value in antyhing I've learned or learn. For variety I periodically train JKD/ Escima/ Jui Jitsu with a couple of instructors I know. It all has it's merits. Thanks for keeping it civil and let's be open minded. Cheers! Dave

A few words on low stances
When I first started training taijiquan I was introduced to a particular part of qi gong training, Wuji, which is a part of a wider array of standing exercises known as Zhan Zhuang. An English translation would be pile standing, plumb bob standing or simply, standing. In a nutshell this particular type of training has you standing with feet shoulder width apart, with the top of your head, your perineum and your heels in a straight vertiacl line, as if a plumb bob was dropped down from the top of your head to your heels. These would be the basic alignments that you must adhere to! The purpose of this training is to lenghten/loosen your spine and all your joints, it teaches you central equilibrium. It also teaches one to relax/loosen your body until you reach a state the Chinese refer to as "song". This is not as easy as it sounds as it may take many, many years to reach this relaxed state. Now when I first started training this I would bend my knees greatly trying to increase the load on my legs, which would bring a quick rebuke from my teacher, " You're too low, your spine is out of alignment and feel all the tension in your pelvic region and lower back, lift it up and correct your alignment". Since then I have practised wuji in a much higher stance and it has done wonders for my alignment. The surprising thing was that when you stand with correct alignment it really puts the burn in your thighs, much more then you would guess if you were to see someone doing it. At first I could only stand like that for a few minutes, it really burns!! Now I hold it for 30 minutes each day and my root is much better! THe point that I am trying to make is, go as low as you want but if you have to compromise your central equilibruim to do it, well your training is counter-productive!

Any real martial artist will tell you that the basis for every fighting art is sparring. That is where you learn your timing and distance. In addition, you learn what works and what doesn't work under real pressure. You are learning martial arts from people who never fought?!?! (a street fight against an unskilled fighter doesn't count). You are learning how to fight from Masters and instructors who have never been tested. In fact, you are now a third generation student who will continue to learn your fictional fighting moves. I agree - I think a lot of TKF's issues come from theorizing while never putting those theories to any sort of test. Vortexx - I was making the same claims about the TKF system as you are when I trained there, and I genuinely believed I was right. I was not.

Re: RE
It's common for variuos traditional CMA styles to use and practice deep stances. They do develop strength, etc, etc. I'd suggest though that if you find higher stances easier to take down then you need to go back to square one because your balance is off and your rooting is weak. Too high is no good, too low is n good. Please understand something here. When I say balance I 'm not simply referring to the ability to maintain an upright position while moving or standing while performing a technique, at speed, defensive or offensive. I'm referring to your balance as a unified whole; rooting, rotation, breathing, angles, touch, power, etc, and the integration of the 3 doors. If you're too low in your stance you've over-compensated and you're out of balance. Another example is too much muscle power in your shoulder and you're out of balance. It's endless really, is measured in inches, and it all starts from your stances. When you get it right a proper stance is next to impossible to take down because it's dynamic and uses the opponents own energy against themsleves. These points represent the most basic fundamentals. There is so much to it and so much more it's mind boggling. IMHO, low stances make good targets. But as I said before, to each his own. Yet how do we define a low stance? What is too low for me may not be too low for you. Only you can determine what is right and that is done through feel. I will say this; once you get all of these aspects working together and learn to use power, any style you study becomes self-correctiing, whether it's Xing Yi, Moh, hug gar.....whatever. BTW...."High stances are much easier to take down, develope less strength and ultimately represent poor training...." That statement is pure bull...plain and simple. I have seen students who practiced with lazy high stances years into their training and I have seen students who practiced with low powerful stances years into their training. A student who trains using low stances and chooses to use a high stance in sparring is not the same thing as I was stating. Students who do not develope the leg strength required to practice with low stances also have sloppy kicks and movements. They do not have the leg muscles to prevent takedowns or to evade as quickly. Leg to leg blocking is too slow for them to make proper use of. I personally use low stances even in sparring. I have been sparring every week at least three times a week for many many years now. You can choose to ignore my advice if you think you know more. lol that I simply won't fight over! Balance is certainly not off in a low stance when it is your home to be in that stance. Perhaps as I mentioned when you first train a low stance you find yourself off balance but master the use of the stance before you judge it. Your body changes constantly from the training, what is one day awkward is another day unbelievably simple. That is the way it is for serious students of the art.

North, I used to train low stances all the tiime. I have since learned that I do not need them. You seem pretty sold on them so keep doing them. What I can tell for certain is if your stance is really low or deep you're limited. We can sit and debate it but what's the point? You seem to have drawn some sort of conclusion about stance training that really has no relevance to me. Your focus seems concerned with developing muscular strength as a core part of your training. While this does contain a certain type of power you'll always be fighting a loosing battle because someone will always be bigger or stronger. Will technique come to your aid? Perhaps. I can't speak for others on this forum but my focus is completely different from your's as is my style of kung fu. If they were even remotely similar we wouldn't be having this conversion. At least you're out training something and that counts for something. Cheers

"If you hold your breath you're unbalanced because your breathing from your lungs." I really don't see how locking in my breath for a couple of seconds is going to unbalance me. "You've introduced tension into your body and, while it may make you feel strong, it actually works against you." I've been hit both with and without having my breath locked in, and believe me, it doesn't just make me feel strong, it saves me from getting winded and going down. "Your chi is in the wrong place. Don't worry about that though because it won't get past your arms with your bent elbows." Are you seriously saying that you fully straighten your arms? Tell me this, then: how well does chi travel through an arm with a broken elbow joint? And even if you don't get it broken, how will your arms feel after years of hyper-extending your elbows.

"If you move your head or torso, even slightly, without having this corresponding motion you will not maintain proper structure and all your power and balance will be gone!" A slight movement doesn't seem to be a problem for me. "I can tell you that it is so far removed from anything that I learned at tkf, it's like learning to walk all over again!" It's a different approach. Neither way is necessarily wrong, but each has its own advantages and disadvantages (I've listed a bunch of advantages for the TKF approach in my earlier posts). As I mentioned before, this argument has been going on for ages before us, with many styles on each side. I hope what you're learning works for you.

"Because a high stance seems more convenient now doesn't mean it is better. It means your legs are too weak to make proper use of lower, superior stances." Unfortunately, most of us don't train nearly enough to develop the kind of leg strength needed to move quickly from a deep stance. It was fine for the Shaolin monks who trained all day long, but not for the average North American who trains 3 to 5 hours a week. Furthermore, low stances are much harder to apply in the street, when you're wearing tight jeans and the ground is uneven. I do agree with you, though, that low stances are good to train for developing power and flexibility in the legs.

"Against multiple attackers you need to be moving very fast and never standing your ground." I agree. You need to take the initiative, rather than waiting for all the attackers to come at you at once. The only time you should be standing still against multiple attackers is if you've positioned yourself in such a way that you can only be attacked from one side and by one person at a time.

"I would say no single style of kung fu I have studied was enough." It's true that there is a great variety of systems out there, and most of them have something valuable and possibly unique to contribute to a martial artist's skill set. While no system is likely to equip you perfectly for every possible situation, some systems are much more comprehensive than others, and will not benefit as much from cross training. So while I agree with you in theory, there is enough in just the Moh style to last me decades. You might have trained at TKF for a decade or so, but you've still barely scratched the surface. Training a good style is like studying science: the more you know, the more you realize how much more there is to know, not even talking about mastering it. No one posting here has even remotely approached the skill and understanding of some of the martial artists this system has produced over the years. So how can anyone feel qualified to say that there's not enough in the style for them? If you constantly change styles, you're not giving yourself a chance to get really good at any one of them. Furthermore, a good style is designed in such a way that everything you do depends on and complements everything else. The better your stances are, the better your body structure will be, the more power you will have on your blocks and strikes, and so on. The style is internally consistent. Now, when you start mixing in elements from a different style, this consistency may get broken, since the elements are only designed to work within a specific framework. The result may be that while each style may work independently, the combination may not. Therefore, I think that mixing styles should be done with a lot of care, and requires proficiency and thorough understanding of the styles and underlying principles and concepts involved.

"Watching is not the same as doing" I never said it was. But when you see somebody doing Kung Fu, you can usually tell if he's any good or not. You either say "wow, he looks really fast and powerful", or you might say "ouch, he looks so unskilled". So while you don't know for sure whether you'll be able to beat him or not, it still gives you some idea. You can also see if he does any moves which you don't know how to counter. "I also can't believe one of your arguments for your cause is that your school does choreographed demos." Nobody said anything about choreographed demos. All I said is that you can sometimes guess at someone's skill level by watching a demo in which they participate, and see a sampling of the style they train. For the record, TKF now has unchoreographed fights in its demos as well (including a 5-on-1 fight in last year's X-Mas demo in Edmonton). "You are learning how to fight from Masters and instructors who have never been tested." "Untested" only in the sense that they haven't sparred too much outside their own style in recent years. According to the posts from those who trained in the sixties, Simon's students have been successfully competing back then. Do you consider your masters and instructors "tested" because they enter tournaments? They do not become good by participating in tournaments. They become good by training, and they train within their style. Anyway, I think that a street fight, where there are no rules, no refs, and no guarantees as to the number of attackers and the weapons they have, is a way more realistic and important test.