Dustin not really but I bet you did think BJJ was the most popular sport in Brazil too, didnt ya?
Tripper, im yellow, im allowed.
hope that works
Not nearly as bad as I thought it would be.
the boxer thrown on his face was cool
b- are you chinese?
Guys thats not the one i am reffering to, this one was in a ring and was way more recent. There were weapons matches as well including nunchaku.
It was still horrific and some mediocre westerner came in an won it, just like in this one.
I just posted that clip out of interest, it isn't what LEmon saw, obviously since it is nearly three years old.
I wasn't really refering to the skill level in my original post either when I talked about "coming some way", I was refering to the hosting of organized MMA events having progressed since then. I don't know if that was the first MMA event held in China, but it is definately an example of an early attempt.
Not a knock on the people who organized the event, because everyone has to start somewhere, I just thought it was interesting to see as a sample starting point in the growth of the sport in China.
"They have, thats what Sanshou is: half-assed kickboxing mixed with half-assed wrestling."
A lot of MMA matches also feature this IMO...
Look they arent THAT bad, but MMA is definately in its infancy there. The point of this thread was that there was NOTHING resembling kung fu in there even though there were kung fu fighters in it.
Lemon, long time no see mate. If by Jet Li kungfu style yeah there would be no kungfu in it. The BJJ was just as shit and resemble playground wrestling. No surprise as has been said, it's amateur and full of inexperienced or guys who trained for something else completely.
I'm sure you know quite well groundfighting is not a range kungfu guys are familiar with. For some real kungfu, please check out the sanda vs muaythai match clips I posted in the kickboxing forum.
I have beeb watching the clips in that forum bro. I am just suprised there was nothing resembling barefisted kung fu that has been practiced for centuries. There are some obvious Sanda guys on there that look quite good on their feet though of course. This isnt sanda vs mauy thai argument, i think no one can deny sanda is pretty good stuff.
It wasn't a sanda vs mt argumnet. I think you'll find most people enjoyed it for what it is, a great match ups between fighters with different types of skills.
But what is this barefisted kungfu that has been practiced for centuries you're looking for? The mt vs sanda clips showed off sanda guys doing sidekicks and throws alot. You'll find sidekicks in alot of kungfu styles. Infact it was a specialty of a syle of kungfu called Ziranmen ( lit. meaning natural gate style) which was a style that doesn't have forms. Then the throws come from shuaijiao, clearly of chinese martial arts origins. Xingyi Quan a style famous for their simplicty has a basic form styled after the horse which is basically a jab-cross combination.
I guess when you keep using wingchun as a guide to what good kungfu is, it becomes difficult to recoqnise kungfu in action. Wingchun was a little known southern village style until Bruce Lee popularised it. I don't think it ever made a name in any of the full contact tournaments during the early 1900s in China.
Anyway, I thought you reviewed Lkfmdc's sanda instructional positively? You should know what good kungfu is like now then?
Ironmonkey, i understand what you're saying. I have seen and done a few forms of kung fu from choy li fut, hung gar, tai chi wu style and a few others. I am no expert in them by any means. I have sparred and trained with a guy who did Xing-I and tong-bei as well. However i still saw nothing that resembled any of them in any of the MMA matches including the ones from guys from those styles representing their art.
Sanda/Sanshou is great as is Shiao Jiao. The throws are chinese yes and the kicks do largely have a different flavour to mauy thai, but lets not beat around the bush here, i know for a fact (and Marc Scott can back me up here) that the chinese government paid alot of money to bring over thais to adopt and teach their art to make sanda/san shou what it is today.
Does this mean i wouldnt do san shou? Fuck no i'd love to, but its very far from "kung fu", whether u think i've only seen wing chun or not, there are alot of chinese arts out there teaching garbage.
I don't doubt that muay thai coaches have been brought over to China to improve the sanda fighters but you can't possibly think that all the sanda gyms in the whole of China have received the benefits of this. I actually know of a a muay thai coach from HK who was hired to teach muay thai in one province in south china but that was just one gym in one province. I have seen afew sanda guys in the sanda king comp in China who fought with a very muay thai style but they are still a rarity. Most sanda fighters now still don't have much of a clinch & knee game. Their roundhouse kicks are more whippy rather than the swing of MT (they're actually called 'bian dui' meaning whip kicks in sanda). And most if not all need to better their boxing skills.
Learning what the opposition can do is the smartest thing you can do. You might not have to throw MT style kicks if you can just catch the kicks and throw successfully. Western Boxing was compulsary study in the martial arts institutes set up by the guomindang gov. I guess they're doing the same thing now with muay thai now though I don't think it is as organised, standardised or in the same scale as with boxing before.
Let's see. Side kicks. Jab-cross punches that can come from xingyi horse style. Whip kicks. Shuaijiao throws. How kungfu can that be? Sometimes you'll see the wild swinging punches that look like they come from Choy Lee Fut. No bong sau though unfortunately :). I persoanlly think sanda is a step in evolution in the Chinese Martial Arts world.
Those MMA matches, they're amateurs at grassroots level. They're probably still shocked at the thought that one can be so intimate on the ground :D. Let's give them a chance. Btw, the traditional teachers I met in China were actually quite intriqued about BJJ after watching or reading about UFC. There was no BJJ schools then though there at the time, and there is one now in Beijing but I heard it's too expensive for the typical Chinese.
That was only very recently, mostly after the Sanda vs MT challenges started. Sanda had been developing for a long time before that as well. Some of the fighters are now blending MT into their style, but not all of them by any means.
"i know for a fact (and Marc Scott can back me up here) that the chinese government paid alot of money to bring over thais to adopt and teach their art to make sanda/san shou what it is today."
I should rephrase, obviously not all sanda/san shou is heavily mauy thai based, only the good ones are. Of course there are choi ley fut etc in it but they are never really the impressive ones i guess i shoulda said.
I've often thought that if a fighter were to use a lot of the more circular punches from CMA, it wouldn't be obvious. I think to the casual observer it'd just look like sloppy technique, and if a KO was scored, it'd just be called a lucky punch.
I hate these sorts of threads, the "oh sure, if it's functional technique it must have come from Muay Thai"
Honestly, do you think a billion people over the period of 5000 years never developed knee and elbow techniques ????
"There was no BJJ schools then though there at the time, and there is one now in Beijing but I heard it's too expensive for the typical Chinese."
yeah, i stopped in there once when i was over there last summer. nice bunch of guys, but i don't think there was a single chinese person training the day i was there. it was well out of the price range of all but the richest chinese.
Watched some fights from an MMA event in China. Looks like a smaller version of Pride Bushido or Shooto. The fights I've seen so far have been pretty exciting.