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Does Size Really Matter?

by Guest Contributor, November 21st, 2007

In technical terms, strength from a purely weightlifting standpoint does not train the muscles used in Wing Chun Kuen to generate power. When people say ‘we hit with the whole body’, what do they specifically mean?

Now before you jump on my back, please listen to what I have to say :)

Where does the power come from? The implication is that the bigger person has more power than the smaller person from a physical point of view. Is this raw physical power the source of efficient Wing Chun Kuen power? My belief is that the power used in Wing Chun Kuen derives from a persons body structure. This gives them the ability to use the ground as a brace so that the point of contact to the base is one unbroken line through the body. This allows efficient use of the body’s mass in striking to deliver power and not because the muscles are bigger or more explosive. I would also hazard a guess to say that the efficiency of the tendons and ligaments to align the skeleton are more critical with the muscles being activated just enough to hold the proper position (or to bring the limb to the proper position) and nothing more. So if two people of different physical sizes hit each other similarly, from a pure power perspective, the larger person has the advantage in terms of mass behind their punch IF Their body structure is equivalent (ie properly aligned) to that of the smaller person.

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