Getting a Bad Rep
Rene Ritchie, March 5th, 2008
A bad rep is no fun at all. It wastes time, it wastes effort, and it gives a false sense of accomplishment.
We’re talking about repetitions, of course (not reputations, you salacious gossipmongers!)
Let’s make punches our straw man (or straw technique, if you will). It’s sounds good (and mass macho!) to brag about banging out 1000x punches (or sets of 1000x), but is it? What do you gain by large numbers? Muscle fatigue? Mind wonder? Are you getting better at Wing Chun or just worse at math?
Reps need to be conscious. Each rep has to — deliberately — be better than the one before. And it has to be in very specific ways. Did the latest rep follow the proper path along/towards the centerline as exactly as possible? Was the rotation perfectly timed? How about the alignment from horse, through waist, project from elbow to middle knuckles, was it as structurally sound as you could make it? Out of all the many, many tiny little details (the ones that make all the difference between good and great), was each and every one optimized?
Unless you’re Ng Mui, chances are slim to none. But that’s good news. Humans strive for perfection, and getting Wing Chun Kuen as close to perfect as possible takes a lot of striving!
So what do you do?
Pick something. Take the first, most obvious defect that comes to mind and try to — consciously — fix it during the next rep. Then assess that rep and try to fix it even better in the next. And the next. And the next after that. If you feel yourself getting lazy, if your body tires, your mind wonders, or your technique suffers even slightly — STOP! Take a break, take a breath, take a moment to relax and get your focus back. Pick something else to work on if you need to. Keep it fresh, keep it enjoyable, keep it productive!
Kung Fu doesn’t mean martial arts, it means work over time — effort. That effort isn’t dumb or dull. It’s smart and bright! Keep that in mind (and in heart!) and your all Kung Fu will certainly pay off!
http://www.goanimal.com/newsletters/2004/LTP/ltp.html
This is a nice reminder of why to train as correctly as possible from the beginning.
I like the link too Terence but I’ll be honest when I say this is nothing short of common sense. Muscle memory, as a term, has been knocking around for as long as I can remember and maybe the word ‘muscle’ was incorrect, in relation to neural transmission, but the results were always the same.
I like the point of not having to understand which Neurons are involved to make them work. It’s all very simple.
It also implies as to why WCK, as a concept and principle based system, which often relies on contact to guide to the appropriate reaction, was deemed as quicker to learn than older systems. Those which consisted of many forms and relied on answer A for attack B sure can work (not an old system per se but look at Kyokushin as example), if the many years of hard work was put in, to download the package as it were.
I question ‘all education being physical’ as learning a language requires much more than retaining the shapes the tongue makes, as example.
Peace
Shen
http://www.goanimal.com/newsletters/2004/LTP/ltp.html
A very good read indeed! And totally relevant to WCK imo. Begs the question ‘what is the ‘code’ of Wing Chun?’
Personally, I felt an awakening in the body fairly early in training. In fact I like to use the term ‘youthful’, as I felt as healthy as I did as a child and the body was moving so naturally at will.
All this by just therapying the ’seed’ of WCK within SLT…