And still no new posts. Don't worry, I haven't given up on this. It's just that I'm getting ready to go to China (Beijing) soon. Once I get there you can expect more fresh content: interview, articles, photos, videos... You'll see !
I just noticed Art of War have posted their schedule for 2007.I'll let you know when there's more info about the upcoming events.
Sanshou/Sanda may not be as popular as other forms of kickboxing, but it also has its strong points. Although the rules may vary from one country to another, fights generally permit punches, kicks, knees, short clinch work, and throws, and prohibit elbows and ground work.
Sanda means something like "free fighting", while "sanshou" means "free hand" ("shou" meaning "hand"). In some places people have kept using older names, such as "Shoubo". And sometimes Sanshou and Sanda actually possess two separate sets of rules. I'm not going to explain the history of the sport this time, but I'll introduce you to a few examples of Sanda fighting.
One of the most famous Sanda fighters in China is Liu Hailong. He's taken part in a few "Sanda vs Muay Thai" tournaments. Since these tournaments usually end with the Thai boxer winning, he's famous for actually defeating his Thai oponents. As you can see in this video, Karo Parysian is not the only one who knows how to throw people around.
In the US, the big name in Sanshou is Cung Le. After you watch him destroy Shonie Carter, you can learn how to catch a leg and take someone down, Sanshou style.
With a little more emphasis on boxing, and some ground game, Sanda fighters could become pretty dangerous in MMA.
A very good Shuai Jiao instructional (about 1 hour) by Li Baoru is avaible on Google Videos. As far as I know there are very few Shuai Jiao video documents avaible apart from this one and the Wang Wenyong videos.
Speaking of Shuai Jiao, they also have it in Taiwan. On the mainland, two of the main styles are Beijing style and Tianjin style (Li Baoru and Wang Wenyong both represent Beijing style, although I think they went to train in Tianjin too). The style they do in Taiwan is Baoding style if I'm not mistaken, and its most famous master was Chang Dongsheng. Here's a demo, and another, with him throwing a student around like it was a rag doll. And without mats.
Not everybody thinks that Taiwan is part of China. Some people consider the two countries separate. And other people even say that it's actually China that is part of Taiwan. Anyway, without going deep in geopolitics, I think since Taiwan is close enough to China and has its own MMA activities going on, it's only fair enough to include it in this blog. So here's a short list of places where you can train MMA and BJJ in Taiwan.
Taiwan Brazilian Jiujitsu Club
Evolution Combat Taiwan
Hong Kong has a lot of places to train:
Hong Kong BJJ Association
The One Martial Gym
Gracie Barra Hong Kong
Kylin Martial Arts & Combat Club
HK MMA
HK Jujitsu
Since it's a slow news day, I tought I'd browse around Youtube and see what are the most interesting vids concerning the matter at hand (MMA and combat sports in China in case you've already forgotten).
First, to celebrate the Chinese new year, here's a great example of Chinese wrestlers using the "key stone" (although to me it looks more like a padlock than a key), which is a kind of square kettlebell. Remember this thing weighs 12 kg !!
You can check out more great shuai jiao videos on Ashwix's user profile page.
Second, Wohsai has assembled a compilation of training and seminar videos. Wohsai is one of the main Chinese MMA sites, kinda like the Chinese Sherdog (but on the average the forum members are much nicer).
Next, you can check out Art of War's video section to see some of their fights, for example He Peng vs Yang Jian Ping.
Here is the third and last part of the interview with Andy Pi. You can check out the first and second part if you haven't done so yet.
About ChinaChina Combat: You have hosted seminars by a lot of famous personalities, including Rickson Gracie. How did you get in touch with them ? Was it hard to convince people to come to China ?
Andy Pi: I was introduced to Rickson through a mutual friend. He was able to establish a connection for me, and the rest they say, is history! It is not very difficult to convince people to come to China. China is a very hot topic in world discussion right now. People understand the business and economic potential of China. There is also a certain amount of mystery regarding China, which I think rouses people's curiosity. Most people when they get here, find that it was not at all what they expected it to be. They are pleasantly surprised.
Chinese Martial Arts have a very long history, but MMA practicioner often have a negative view of traditional arts and label them as "innefective". What do you think of the value of traditional Chinese martial arts (such as Shaolin Quan, Xingyi Quan, etc) in MMA competitions ?
It has been proven in MMA competition that what you train is really not as important as how you train it. How you train will dictate how you fight. I think most MMA practitioners and coaches are critical of traditional Chinese martial arts because most traditional Chinese martial arts lack proper training methods FOR COMPETITION.
Most martial artists are not training for COMPETITION. Rather, they are training for the love of the martial arts or self-defense. So the training methods are very different. When you are training for professional competition, your goal is to defeat your opponent, and you leave nothing to chance. Therefore, all aspects of the fight game should be studied, including nutrition, strength, endurance, psychological and mental strength, skills training including standup fighting, wrestling and ground fighting. If you have a martial artist who is training to defend himself, fight against a 24-year old professional athlete, who runs, lifts weights, and spars everyday, it is not a very fair fight. Of course the professional athlete is going to win, because it is his profession. All he does is train, full-time, to kick people's asses. It's not even a fair fight. It's not even a fair comparison. But that doesn't mean the traditional martial arts are crap.
The value of traditional martial arts should not be overlooked, because if there is just one thing that you can learn from a particular style, that will give you just a little bit of an edge, it should be learned and incorporated into your own training. I do not like to use the term traditional martial art, because it labels the art as a "non-progressive" martial art. All martial artists should strive to reinvent and improve upon what they've been taught. If you believe that only the old man in the mountain is the inheritor of real kung fu, then you are perpetuating a dying martial art, and your particular lineage will progressively get weaker and weaker. The key is to forget about the traditional aspect, and work on improving it.... "modernizing" the martial art style for 2007. All this means is to find more efficient ways to improve upon your existing training methods, so that you will fight or defend yourself more effectively. What was the Chinese viewer's reaction when they were first exposed to MMA ? Was it positive ?
The Chinese viewers couldn't believe what they were seeing. They couldn't believe that they were watching one man sitting on another man's stomach, and beating the crap outta him. The overwhelming response... WHEN IS THE NEXT SHOW???
The Chinese love MMA and we feel that it will become the national sport, especially if we have anything to do with it!
