Saving Brain Cells

[yowie_steve]

Hi.



This question is directed mainly at Laoshi and his experience with san shou, but I'd love to have some advice from other people also.



My regular boxing sparring partner and I have decided to "tag" the shoulder to count as head shots since both of us have been coming home fairly foggy headed and with jaws knocked out of place etc. This kind of brain damage is really no good for it to happen so frequently.



Would aiming for the shoulder as a substitute for the head be detrimental in proper san shou, creating a habit of hitting the shoulder rather than the head when wanting to strike the head.



How this relates to push hands and taiji is that laoshi mentioned people picking up habits from training exercises that don't perform well in san shou. Could I be doing myself the same disservice. I'm wondering also if push hands was created in the name of saving brain cells, or if body strikes were preferred because it's a good way to really injure or kill someone by knocking the wind out or breaking ribs or stopping the heart.



I just saw "fearless" last night. I wonder if they'll do a movie about Yang Lu Chan one day.



Steve

[Roland Tepp]

From all that I know and remember that Laoshi has told us when teaching taiji here in Estonia, I can only assume that this kind off "tagging" the shoulder to count as head shots is discouraged. As you said yourself - it builds up subconscious conditioning to avoid hitting the head.

It also builds up conditioning not to care about protecting your own head... which is much more dangerous than being accustomed to hit a shoulder instead of head...



There is another interesting thing though that caught my attention and that is something I have recently thought a lot about...

since both of us have been coming home fairly foggy headed and with jaws knocked out of place etc.

The way I see it - sanshou is not about "banging away at the other guy with everything you've got". It's about learning to use your taiji skills in a fight.



That is not to say - don't try to be realistic while sparring. There is no use in sparring if you are just playing to be fighting, trying to be all nice and soft with your partner...



On the other hand - what exactly *are* you trying to learn.

For me - it is more important to learn to apply my techniques as cleanly as possible. If that means these techniques are not as effective at first - well... that's just the price of learning... I'm optimistic that if I try to improve and keep finding flaws, I will eventually become better. It's not about getting him *now* that I'm interested in - it's more about learning skills and building experience in a long run



Of course there will be occasional traumas and few bruises - that's just part of the martial way, but you don't have to kill each other in practice. Control your power as you (should) control your technique.



Or as a certain movie hero woult say: "Use Your Taiji, Luke!"

[Scott M. Rodell]

Dear Yowie-



Roland makes some good points. Many a great boxer has ended up with plenty of brain damage, something I'm sure you don't want.



There are two ways to sharpen your sanshou skills without doing damage to your classmates or self. One method we use, that is not uncommon in other schools of martial arts, is to practice slowly. Play sanshou at a speed just a bit faster than form speed. This will equalize the two players making it much harder to impossible for either to score a blow. In this way it is easy for both to see a strike coming & deflect it prefectly & then to likewise, see the prefect counter response. And so this way of moving is being trained into the bodymind. If you always play at full speed you end up relying on speed & power along, because that is all you have at first.



As you & your classmates get more skillful, speed things up. Don't speed them up too much at any one time. Try to take small steps in speed. Keep this up until you can go full speed. But when you are playing at full speed, don't use power. Naturally, there will be some power, maybe even half power. But there won't be so much that students who have concentrated on learning yielding & neutralizing will be taking much. Though I should add that even at half power we've had students knocked out.



So what about training power then? That's what the bag work is for, or more traditionally, weapons training. And occassionally, you can put on your head gear & mouth piece & go at it full power.



Remember, not every match need be a leave your duifang out cold on the ground match.

[josh stout]

"Though I should add that even at half power we've had students knocked out. "



Really? Wow, in twenty years of kung fu I have never seen a person knocked out by a blow to the head. I have seen someone faint from the shock of a blow to the stomach, and I saw someone undergo loss of consciousness from the extremely dangerous "choke hold" that cuts off blood to the brain, but never a knock out punch.



What do you do? I assume the person regained consciousness quickly. Do you send them to the emergency room, or just check their pupils and tell them rest for a while?

Josh

[yowie_steve]

I'll be able to spar slowly with the martial arts guys. As for the boxers I think it would be difficult to break the tradition of "ring time" being full speed. We discourage full power hits, and the both of us never hit hard out of respect for each other's brains, however moving the head ever so slightly to slip a blow and being unlucky and slipping or moving into it increases the power substantially. Even with full head gear and 20 oz gloves I can still feel it. On more reflection I agree with what you say. When tagging the shoulder of an incoming duifang it does nothing to stop or repel him since it doesn't hurt or affect your vision, so it completely changes the dynamics. And you get use to that. Yet when I sparred another person two nights ago in which we didn't agree to shoulder tag, I found the distance practise paid off and I managed to hit the head no problem. Though the dynamics were completely different and he was alot more hesitant. On the other hand it could be his fighting style.

When I got a chance to spar with a martial artist in the ring (gloves, shin/instep gear), the dynamics were completely different again. So I wonder whether it is good to have alot of variety to be "spontaneous", or bad because it'll just confuse me.

I'm finding the sparring useful for my distancing and timing. I can't really do much taiji with big gloves on, but when sparring the martial artists wearing body armour and helmet and no gloves I am able to more gracefully deflect and palm strike (without gloves I am a huge fan of palm strikes). So I will direct this kind of training with those guys - when I do get a chance to spar with them.

Thanks for your wisdom.

[Tashi James]

Hi Steve,



Although this may seem unreasonable my boxer friend and I, have a sit out period each time a "complete" blow is recieved to the head. We box using only standard gloves {26 Oz" I think} and a mouth guard.. We allow this time to overcome concussion. Which is essentialy what you get each time you cop a blow to the head. Although with some blows it is possible to get whiplash..

[yowie_steve]

Hey Tashi.



It's not unreasonable at all. I did receive one heavy blow once and stood around a little punch drunk and managed to have a breather.

It's a little tricky knowing when to stop with the lighter hits. Cumulative hits that don't really bother you that much start making you feel light headed at the end of the bout.

We tried full contact again last night, and we're both feeling pretty good. Maybe my head is starting to meaten' up like a shaolin monk.

[Tashi James]

Hi Steve,



Yeah you know when it was close to a ko blow..I'd be careful even though your beginning to have a resiliance to it even Muhummad Ali got parkinsons from getting too many blows to the head...