NaamKyun.com Discussion Forum

Hello All,

I've recently been playing with axis of rotation, and its given me new lights on some of the techniques here and there in the forms. One is what I believe can be a setup tactic, and I'm curious what your thoughts are.

One other such setup tactic, just to make sure I communicate across what I mean with "setup tactic" in my broken English, is the well known "Twin butterflies" which creates an intentional opening after you exploit the opponents attack with "Twist Stance Uppercut". This setup tactic have been discussed on several forums and other places.

OK, back to my axis of rotation. When you want to turn around your axis really fast, you'll have to keep your limbs close to your body. The further from the axis of rotation, the slower rotation will be. See for example figureskaters when doing pirouettes. To slow the pirouette they move their arms further from the body. On many turns/shifts in our forms you'll see the same effect being performed by having the fists chambered, arms crossed in front of the body, etc.

But theres a section in the end of Fu Hok where you make a full step forward and give an Ox Horn punch. There are several ways to make smaller and bigger circles to complete the punch and thus slowing it down or speeding it up, but you need to circle it no matter what to finish the technique as an Ox Horn. But using this technique is a lot slower then for example a right firepunch with the same stepping.

Following the techniques, you first have the Spreading Gold to deflect a left punch from your opponent which you keep controlling with your left and then land the right Ox Horn.

But what if you look at it this way;
1) you perform the Ox Horn setting your opponent up to block it with his left arm.
2) doing so opens his chest after which you can forward with the palm,
3) and finish with the low firepunch. You could even say the palm opens the lower part of your opponents gates as when it lands well he will lean backwards.

I can see one flaw with this explanation, the opponent would probably not simply block the Ox Horn but also counterattack with his right arm, but the idea still stands (and could even be done with a simultaneous attack).

What I hope is to start a discussion on this type of setup tactics. Do you share my idea? Have other setup tactics to share maybe thats visible in the forms? Any other input?

not to hijack, but I see the whole sequence, from dragon swings tail, golden hammers, ox-horn punch ,fire punch, and Fierce Tiger pushes the mountain, as a collection of separate takedowns, so they are more or less, a syllabus.
Golden Hammers-in a horse, with your leg behind the opponent, the movement takes him down over your horse.
Step through ox-horn-as you step behind his leg,take down from the front
Fire punch,step behind his leg and drive through, again front takedown
Fierce Tiger etc-hook the leg and shoulder push.

could you explain a bit more as to yuor set-up theories? It sounds interesting

Hey TT,

Interesting too see them as a syllabus. Is this your own interpretation, or as taught through your lineage? Some of them were known to me, some applications were new. More to explore, it never ends

About the setup, well how can I explain... During sparring you throw a half ass technique, just to create openings. Like the half done front kick, a classic in kickboxing.
When playing around with the axis of rotation it became clear to me that an ox horn would be much slower to perform with the same stepping compared to a firepunch, because of the way your arms are positioned. So I started playing/pondering around to see why this was done this way.
So I was thinking, why would it not be a technique to open your opponents defense? There are obvious setup tactics where you offer an opening like the butterflies described above, which is far more obvious. But how about performing techniques which are just a bit too easy for your opponent to intercept, and thus creating an opening in his defense?
The ox horn is a wide attack coming in from his side, so to block the attack he would really need to change his position and defense, just enough to open his center for the two follow up attacks, which will need to follow fast of course to make this all work.
Maybe it is a bit too off for being included into a form like Fu Hok, but I was just thinking about the usefulness of creating openings this way. I've done similar things in sparring, so was wondering what you guys were thinking about it.

And I heard it several times setups like this are present in the Hung Gar forms. I'm only just a bit ready to explore this type of tactics and finding them in the forms, but I wouldn't be surprised there are more to be found in the forms. Both intentionally or maybe with alternative applications.

PS: thinking about your syllabus makes sense when I think about it, as Fu Hok is overall 'divided' in sections; tiger, crane, long arms, etc. So why not a take down section?

Noone else?
36 reads and just TT jumping on?

" Does it ever end? "
_________________
My Sifu said his Sifu said," it doesn't end until they nail your coffin shut!"

Its also satisfactory knowing that what you like to do never has an end.

There is an old saying: "nature abhors a vacuum".

im am in a new phase of teaching where i am to watch for the elemental nature of the attack and conter with the opposing force. ie water breaks wood.
this is really adding a new dynamic to the techniques, 5 to each