Formosa Neijia

I’m finding that some throws are nearly universal. Sumi-otoshi (the four corners throw) appears in aikido, judo, and taijiquan. Consider the following clips:

This is an aikido version done smoothly against a student. Notice the positioning.

Now here’s a version from a Tomiki aikido competition. Great timing here.

This is a judo version in competition.
How […]

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There’s a transition you have to make in going from someone who does the taiji or whatever as a personal practice to someone that competes with their form. It can be a difficult transition.
Consider that you normally just practice for yourself and you likely do your thing as you and your teacher see fit. For […]

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I would like to point your attention to a post written by Tom on large and small frame training. He put so many insights into it that I think it deserves to be looked at again. I see something new in it each time I read it. The comment section also shows what happens occasionally […]

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There’s some interesting discussion going on at the large vs. small frame post I put up a long time ago. The comment was made that Zheng Man-qing’s people are better at push hands than some of the Yang family. That doesn’t surprise me in the least. The answer as to why: they spend a whole […]

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http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_ce00XMjI5ODE5MjA=.html
(How can I download this clip? I want to to post it to youtube.)
This clip slays a whole lot of sacred cows. I think this is the most explosive clip since Chen Xiao-wang’s debacle with Liao Bai.
This is a push hands competition from 1992 showing some of the biggest names in mainland taiji all competing […]

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I think most of us realize the importance of transitions in taijiquan. Many of the best moves in the art are found as you move between the so-called end points of the postures. Just paying attention to the extension of a kick or a punch often misses the point completely where taijiquan in concerned. […]

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One of the main things to work on in taiji IMO is mastering the individual postures. This forms the bulk of my practice with form work coming in second. I take each one of the moves from my Chen Pan-ling form and do them individually as straight line drills. This is perhaps a unique feature […]

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I can’t recommend Douglas Wile’s Lost Tai’-Chi Classics from the Late Ch’Ing Dynasty (Chinese Philosophy and Culture) enough. This is easily the best set of classics I’ve ever seen. These are the Wu/Li and Yang family 40 chapters classics. They are very rich in detail and cover both martial and neigong training. In both […]

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I was reading a smaller martial arts forum the other day and I came across an interesting discussion. A woman in her late 50’s that trains taichichuan said that she trains hard everyday but that she would stop any time she felt any pain and try to ascertain the source of the pain. She would […]

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This is his upcoming DVD. He apparently takes each of the 37 postures in the Yang style and gives applications for each of the moves. This is brilliant. Why someone didn’t think of this before is beyond me. There are only 37 or so moves in the Yang style, the rest are repeats in […]

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