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13 Energies in your Taiji Combat research

104 possible (Basic 1-2) simple combinations you can explore using the 8 energies and 5 steps:

peng+ forward step
peng+ backward step
peng+ left step
peng+ right step
peng +centered rooted
peng+ peng
Peng +Lu
Peng+ ji
peng+ An
peng+ zhai
peng+ Lieh
peng+ Zhou
peng+ Kao

Lu+ forward
Lu+ backward
Lu+ left
Lu+ right
Lu+ center
Lu+ peng
Lu+ Lu
Lu+ ji
Lu+ An
Lu+ zhai
Lu+ Lieh
Lu+ Zhou
Lu+ Kao

ji+ forward
ji+ backward
ji+ left
ji+ right
ji+ center
ji+ peng
ji+ Lu
ji+ ji
ji+ An
ji+ zhai
ji+ Lieh
ji+ Zhou
ji+ Kao

An+ forward
An+ backward
An+ left
An+ right
An+ center
An+ peng
An+ Lu
An+ ji
An+ An
An+ zhai
An+ Lieh
An+ Zhou
An+ Kao

zhai+ forward
zhai+ backward
zhai+ left
zhai+ right
zhai+ center
zhai+ peng
zhai+ Lu
zhai+ ji
zhai+ An
zhai+ zhai
zhai+ Lieh
zhai+ Zhou
zhai+ Kao

lieh+ forward
lieh+ backward
lieh+ left
lieh+ right
lieh+ center
lieh+ peng
lieh+ Lu
lieh+ ji
lieh+ An
lieh+ zhai
lieh+ Lieh
lieh+ Zhou
lieh+ Kao

zhou+ forward
zhou+ backward
zhou+ left
zhou+ right
zhou+ center
zhou+ peng
zhou+ Lu
zhou+ ji
zhou+ An
zhou+ zhai
zhou+ Lieh
zhou+ Zhou
zhou+ Kao

kao+ forward
kao+ backward
kao+ left
kao+ right
kao+ center
kao+ peng
kao+ Lu
kao+ ji
kao+ An
kao+ zhai
kao+ Lieh
kao+ Zhou
kao+ Kao

you can later explore 3,4,5 combinations using attach and defense. example peng+ an + backstep/evade + forward ji.

sample vid of solo and combination

http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=AGaIMdqb678

Observation- 24 form vs. CMC form vs. Yang form

In my small 20 years of Taijiquan practice and recent observations with frustrated new students of Taijiquan (TJQ), I am seeing a breakdown of good fundamentals not taught by many veteran and expert teachers of Yang Taijiquan and its other variants. This has mostly been students of more Traditional TJQ like Cheng Man Ching’s (CMC) and Yang’s Long form TJQ. It takes a very long time for beginners to grasp the form as taught by many instructors of these forms. However I see that people who learn the 24 form have much improved and better grasp of the movements of Taijiquan in shorter amount of time than the Traditionalists. Why is this?

Based on my own experience when starting with CMC form in late 80′s early 90′s, the teachers did not teach stretching, stances, or basic stepping and movements. They begin the student with “The form” with justification “its all in the form”. Rarely a teacher might import a brief warm-up like ‘Ba Dua Jing’ to the curriculum. In my experience with teachers who taught Yang Family Taijiquan form it was pretty much taught the same way with going right into ‘Raise hands’ , Grasp Bird tail, Single Whip, ect.” and thus leaving the beginner trying to copy a series of movements and stepping completely foreign to their balance, mind-body connection, and muscle memory. A high degree of frustration ensues, quality of movement sacrificed, inability to retain information, and willingness to continue with long term study is then defeated. A lack of interest and drop out rate soon sets in.

Enter the 24 form-

When I met a teacher from Yongnian Taijiquan Association, who was also a member of the Shanghai Wushu Sports University in early 90′s, a new understanding of Taijiquan was presented. As a teacher well versed in the International and National competitions in China and USA, the modern approach to teaching was modern and systematic. The negative scrutiny of the traditionalist that “It’s not Taiji” changed to small adjustments and corrections, to a ‘flowing movement vs exact posture’ approach. Here is how Taijiquan was broken down by the modern instructor:

Basics:
-Warm up consisted of joint opening and loosening exercises from head to toe. This included neck, shoulders, elbow, wrist, waist, spine, hips, knees, ankles.
-Various athletic sports style stretches for legs, back, hip, waist, ect.
-traditional stances.
-Stepping drills- walking forward, backward and sideways without hand movements.
-walking forward, backward and sideways with hand movements: Part horse mane, Brush Knee, Wave hands, Repulse monkey.

With learning those simple amount of basics and progressing with them, my own Taijiquan quickly improved. Later when I decided to teach, my students were able to quickly surpass the traditionalist’s students and even compete in local tournaments and win. Along the way I was even able to help struggling Taijiquan schools with established curriculum’s and have positive results with students I taught. It was because these teachers were not taught this way that the student has to miss this as well. Taijiquan teachers who opened up to this approach helped business and frustrated beginners gave thanks and ability improved.

The reason I am writing this is because two clients of mine from the Information Technology side business have taken up Taijiquan. One is learning the CMC form and the other Yang Long form from some teachers I know. Both are very confused and not certain how long it will take for them to “get it” after over a year now and just getting to 1st Brush knee- play pipa. After a year! I know if they were to learn the basics, they would grasp it much quicker as the information would be beneficial. I see this when I go to many groups that have free classes in the parks as well. Going right into the form without good basics simply does not help the novice student. Though I don’t teach anymore nor haven’t taught in many years, it motivates me to start teaching Taijiquan again even though I am happy with my current training with Boxing and Thai Boxing.

Addition:
Basics:
-Warm up consisted of joint opening and loosening exercises from head to toe. This included neck, shoulders, elbow, wrist, waist, spine, hips, knees, ankles.
-Various athletic sports style stretches for legs, back, hip, waist, ect.
-traditional stances.
-Stepping drills- walking forward, backward and sideways without hand movements.
-walking forward, backward and sideways with hand movements: Part horse mane, Brush Knee, Wave hands, Repulse monkey.

A little bit more about this:
The stepping drills is doing walking across a room so you get rows of repetition and a lot of it. The stepping without hand movement and then with hand movement takes a good 40 minutes and the legs are toughened and sore. The heavy elements sink making legs feel heavy and lighter elements move upward with arms feeling lighter.

Also ‘Peng-Lu-Ji-An’ sequence can be repeated moving forward getting both left and right side done.- excellent basic.

In this way you can choose small sections to repeat. For instance the last closing section of ‘Snake creeps down- 7 stars- ride tiger- Sweep lotus-shoot tiger’ can be repeated many times.

So instead of doing a form where you do a few movements once, with basic repetitions you get a lot done with quality.

Comments:

Some Feed back from some other people:

As some call it, Yang 24 (Beijing 24 or just plain old 24 form) does not come directly from the Yang family it comes from Li Tianji

And please correct me if I am wrong but Li Tianji trained with Li Yulin, Sun Lutang and Li Jinglin and he learned Taiji from Li Jinglin, who was a student of Yang Jianhou which of course gets it to the Yang family…kinda.

Li Tianji studied with Li Jinglin so the Yang connection is obviously there and the postures are as those of Yang Chengfu. Beijing 24 shi taijiquan’s movements are exaggerated but they are Yang style nonetheless.

more feed back:

Excellent opening post! Now i think the point of the topic has deviated to “what is 24 Taiji” which I am sure is not the point. Let me firstly say from my experience in CMA that , as traditionalists one should try to stick the original as much as possible in all forms, but at the same time we should not be limited by this thought either. When we see something that is useful or beneficial that does not neccessarily come from within our own system, we should make use of it, and by the same token when something whithin our system does not make sense or is not useful, we should first try understand it more, and then improve it so it does make sense or benefit us. Without this type of mindset we will doom our own traditional systems to disappear in the future, or become irrelevant. We need to strive for improvement while still sticking in the confines of or styles as far as possible.
An example of this is the creation of CMC style of Yang Taiji. CMC Taiji is the result of his understanding of Taiji, and the environment in which he practiced. Personally, its not for me, but each to his own.
I want to quote from the topic:

“The 24 form was created in 1956 by the Government Sport and Health committee so people could learn for sport and improve physical health. It is often called the “Beijing form” and even the “Communist form” from many people. From what I have heard, the Yang Family had no say into the creation of this form and had much disapproval. It was a different approach to Taijiquan instruction that made learning Taijiquan much easier in my case. I had started with CMC taijiquan and each teacher taught more about how I was not doing Taijiquan than that I was doing it correctly. I guess its a positive vs negative reinforcement that I experienced.”

The government created a simplified form of taiji for one main reason, and that is to get more people practicing taiji, when I say more people I mean everyday masses and the reason was that they realized the vast benefits of Taiji practice. In comes the Li family who had the task of creating a form, that wasnt too long to be overlooked by the common people, and not too complicated in terms of depth, something they could practice everyday without taking up too much time. In effect it is an INTRODUCTION to taijiquan. It was not meant to replace any taiji by any means but just make it more practical and accessible to everyday people. This introduction is basically a “doorway” to taiji. With that it has to focus on elements that a beginner can grasp, and that will appeal to non martial artists. So it focuses on external elements as opposed to the whole kettle of taiji fish. This has benefits in many ways, including benefits for the promotion of traditional Yang whether you can see it or not. The fact is, the more people that practice this, the more interest that is sparked in people, from this there will be some who will go further in that just the doorway and seek deeper into the road of Taiji. The external is a road to the internal, remember that. Trying to teach people internal principles off the bat is very difficult and from my experience, teaching from an external point of view first helps firstly identify those that have the aptitude to do internal work and secondly get them geared for it.
Back to the topic at hand though. Above is stated that the Yang family had no say in the 24 form and they weren’t happy with it. Well lets not ask them what they had to do with CMC Taiji or what they think of it either…… The task Li Tianji had was a tough one, formulate a clear strategy on the development of 24 taiji for common people. So things had to be clear is black and white, or people wont understand. But with this I believe that a basic taiji training regimen (focus on the word basic here please) was created. Of course warm up and stretching are essential and this is a fact for ANY CMA….it can only do good. After that a curriculum of stepping basics, hand basics, and movement basics were created that helped the beginner develop the skills required for 24 taiji. These are all good, and can only create solid base for Taiji in all forms. Personally I think the approach is a good primer for further Taiji training, albeit superficial at first. But the point is, from the superficial we got in deeper, we cant jump into the deep end straight away from my experience. A systematic approach is needed for beginners, one that focuses on topics they can grasp easily, and this is exactly that.

Chen Zhen Lei’s Warm-ups, Basics, Silk Reeling, Fajin,and Tui Shou

Here are my notes of the Chen Zhen Lei warm-ups from a different seminar, but he always does these. Hope they make sense to you. I guess I should youtube them.

He does them for a good amount of repetitions so the set takes 20-30 minutes. Followed by two sets of Lao Jia Yi Lu or Old Frame Long form.

Chen exercises:
1. wrist circles hands clasped
2. arm circles both directions
3. body wave/ chi flow circles hands to dan tien
4. hands at shoulders arm circles both directions and alternating
5. waist twists- 2 elbow strikes
6. forward bend bouncing
7. squating
8. knee circles inside, outside, together both directions
9. squat and half squat
10. drop stance warm up
11. drop stance
12. gong bu bouncing
13. gong bu with heel up
ankles
14. shake out kicks
15. hands over head through body- heaven/earth walking.

Concepts-
1. anatomical planes-
sagittal- left/right
coronal- front/back
traverse- lower body/upper body
2. 2 dan tien: spinal rotation points- 2 lower dan tien at lumbar and in center of chest at Thoracic.
3. Horizontal body sections- the 2 dantien’s divide upper section, mid section, and lower section.
4. 4 kua: torso rotational points: ball and socket of shoulders and hips.

Vertical plane drills
Lower kua rotations
1. Right Front stance-
a. Sagittal forward using finger- a pushing hip circle
b. Sagittal backward- Reverse ‘sagittal circle’
c. Vertical right- small frontal circle
d. Vertical left- reverse direction small frontal circle
e. Horizontal right-small circle on horizontal plane
f. Horizontal left- reverse small circle on horizontal plane
2. Left Front stance-
a. Sagittal forward using finger- a pushing hip circle
b. Sagittal backward- Reverse ‘sagittal circle’
c. Vertical right- small frontal circle
d. Vertical left- reverse direction small frontal circle
e. Horizontal right-small circle on horizontal plane
f. Horizontal left- reverse small circle on horizontal plane
3. Both kua- standing in wuji
a. Sagittal forwards
b. Sagittal backwards
c. Vertical right
d. Vertical left
e. Horizontal right
f. Horizontal left
g. Vertical inside-out
h. Vertical outside-in

4. Rocking- body weight distribution
a. Lifting hands- rocking back and fourth
b. Rocking with sinking- lift hands
c. rocking with swinging arms

5. Open and close- check and back
Upper kua twine inside-out
a. Open and close- wrist touch method.

6. Turning, Twisting, and Wringing:
Turning: small horizontal rotation of the lower kua
Twisting- continues through the spine
Wringing- fully engaged feet, spine, to hands, upper and lower kua turn towards each other.
a. turning- swing loose arms
b. twist- swing arms higher to twist body, hitting
c. wringing- swing arms and hit tan tien and ming men.

7. Side-to-side torso rotation:
-helps to rotate your torso vertically and side-to-side.
a. right rotation- hips circle side-to-side
b. left rotation- reverse rotation

8. Single arm vertical inside-Out #1 (using vertical kua rotation)
-rotating the kuas and torso vertically in same direction.
a. circle left arm
b. circle right arm

9. Horizontal Rocking and Shifting-
a. Shift weight left and right through heel.

10. Single arm vertical inside out using horizontal rocking and shifting
a. Lazy tie coat Left arm-turn, shift
b. Lazy tie coat right arm

Concept: Postural alignment- feet touching, feet hips apart, feet shoulder apart.

Circle patterns: using a comfortable hips width stance.

a. Vertical Inside-Out: tiger back to mountain, raise hands and go outward.
b. Outside –In: reverse tiger back to mountain/open fan.
c. Vertical right- double hand roll back
d. Vertical left- double roll back other side.
e. Alternate inside-Out- wave hands: soft like yang style
f. Alternate inside-Out- wave hands: more detailed
g. Alternate inside-Out- wave hands: fully like chen Taiji.
h. Alternate outside In- brush knee circles
Horizontal Plane
Sagittal Plane

Chen circles in martial arts Chen horse/bow stance

1. Lazy tie coat (LTC) left- single arm

2. Lazy tie coat right- single arm

3. Reverse (LTC) single arm- right

4. Reverse (LTC) single arm left

5. Double hands roll back right side

6. Double hands roll back left side

7. Double hands reverse roll back right

8. Double hands reverse roll back left

9. Wave hands circles (circle outwards)

10. Brush knee circles (circle inwards)

11. Carry tiger/cover hand/shoulder left (downward two arms circle)

12. Carry tiger/cover hand/shoulder right (downward two arms circle)

13. High pat-Open fan left (upward two arm circles)

14. high pat-Open fan right (upward two arm circles)

15. Repulse monkey (Wrapping Upper Arms)circle right side

16. Repulse monkey (Wrapping Upper Arms) circle left

17. Small wrist at dan tien circle clockwise

18. Small wrist at dan tien circle counter-clockwise

19. Combine small wrist with lazy tie coat (xin jia) right side

20. Reverse #19 other side left

Chen circles done in empty stance

21. Vertical circle in chen uppercut-(Buddha warrior) two hands circle vertically

22. Reverse #21: arms roll like back fist/elbows (buddha warrior)

23. Side single arm circle right side

24. Side single arm circle left side

With stepping-
1. Part horse mane
2. Brush knee
3. Roll back
4. Single arm wave hands (er lu)
5. Repulse monkey

Fajin circles from Er Lu
1. Bell gong left
2. Bell gong right
3. Dragon head pose left
4. Dragon head pose right
5. Fajin push left side
6. Fajin push right side
7. Chen punch left
8. Chen punch right

Tui shou Push hands
1. Basic horizontal circle- peng
2. Basic horizontal circle- brush knee
3. Diving hand
4. Yank and pull
5. Inside/outside elbow circles
6. Inside/outside shoulder circles
7. Leg circles
8. Leg bumps
9. Hip bumps
10. Shoulder bumps
11. Pung-lu-ji-an
12. Da lu
13. Moving step

About Tai Chi Combat training for beginners

sparring and noobs-
1. build confidence in them- re-enforce it with confidence building drills like parrying, catching (things in tai chi form)
2. after teaching solo forms and applications, bring those into a sparring setting

i am having to baby spoon feed these cats so even doing sparring isnt a weekly event, its something that is thrown in ‘here and there’ until they are comfortable enough. My goal is to assist with getting them used to someone aggressive enough to be throwing punches and kicks at them and how to respond appropriately and calmly under pressure.

In tai chi I dare not teach the empty hand form without showing the applications. this way in practicing the form they can use the application intent or ‘yi’. i’ve introduce them to some hsingyi and drills like- heng vs pao drill or pi vs beng drill. I introduce them to circle walking and fan chang change. Then walking drills where one guy does a fan chang change and the other guys needs to react and change on circle. There is always push hands too which is very reactive.

i started as a tai chi guy but was lucky that my first teacher was a martial artist that taught hsingyi and bagua. He also felt neijia had a lack of real cardio so he taught western boxing as well. Neijia was water while boxing was fire…. the fire to burn up and raise the bodys metabolic rate and sweat out toxins and burn up the food/calories for health.

he was able to create many two person combat drills similar to push hands for each of the postures using a sticking approach, leverage, and body mechanics.
my approach is different. as much as i appreciate and have learned many push hands sets- I dont start my drills from a already touching.
example-
1. peng drill- guys throws a punch- bridge it with peng- (practice a few of those) then try grabbing the wrist and yank hard to unbalance them.
2. lu- one guy chases with left or right punch and student needs to train lu to outside on whatever arm partner feeds him
3. ji-using a sticking lu (from above 2.)to get to the outside of opponent and add jump stepping ‘press’ to uproot person or strike kidney.
4. an- angling off an attack by stepping away from opponents line and using peng to stick then attacking with a lifting/push their body from lateral angle.

these are working from a pre-sticking situation into a bridging one, how to blend and move with the opponents stepping, being in the right distance and angling to find line of attack after neutralization.

i am putting my friends at an advantage with boxing drills, as a matter i fact i show them how a MT guy might attack or a bjj might attack or a judo throw might be countered with a throw. its called “know your enemy strengths and weaknesses”

some of the taiji fighting drills and 2 man work I have shown are solo fajin drills using the 8 energies while moving forward, back and to left right, and being centered. good posture is key, this can be standing, and with jump steps when doing the offensive/defensive moves. Later transferring that power into a object like a heavy bag, eventually a moving target like on focus mitts, kick shield, and thai pads.

i like to have them do structured tai chi punches to the belly pad (step-parry-punch is a good example) and work palm strikes to focus mitts (brush knee/fair maiden palm) . we’ll take strikes and kicks from the forms and doing them on thai pads and create simple yet comprehensive combinations using good posture and structure. simulated various attacks like throw a kick to person and have the person do brush knee to stop/catch kick and push the opponent.

it takes some kind of wisdom and intelligence to study IMA especially baguazhang and taijiquan.

we are doing 2 man taiji fighting drills. some are solo movement drills, later they work with a partner on them. paired drills might be using the 8 energies of taiji, 5 elements of xingyiquan, jibenshou fa of baguazhang. we incorporate them with power on martial arts equipment. we sometimes use sections from the 88 “taiji san shou ” two man set as combat drills too. sometimes we do taiji with wrestling/shaui jiao flavor, sometimes we do taiji with qi-na flavor, sometimes we do taiji with combat sport flavor more of a striking with arms (boxing) or striking with arms and legs (kick boxing) and sometimes striking with arms, legs and throws (san shou). all of it is based on who comes to class, where they are in their training, what i want them to learn. Most of the combat stuff is pretty much after warm-ups, stance work, basics- (hand skills, footwork, other), forms, and conditioning. after combat work we do qigong/meditation/mind work.

i can care less to be a dogmatic traditionalist. to me the traditionalist are a joke and just gathering dust. my training is based on 15 years of CMA/IMA and 5 years of MMA training with Pros(boxing, muay thai, wrestling, judo, jujitsu, and cross fit) people with real combat experience. Most CMA/IMA people i know dont come near to having anything remotely close to real combat experience, it really is a rare type to find someone in IMA willing to fight and show it. those that do and have like john wang, wuziyidi, cerebus, ashe, cai longyu, cung le, kenneth fish, luo deixu, mike patterson (and his students) and a rare few others like myself with balls to step in a ring have my respect.

taiji is there for me, i dont have to be there for taiji.

Yang Taijiquan solo fajin and DaLu drills

In response to a fajin threads (response to person who said Chen and Yang taiji didnt have much) I wanted to demonstrate some solo drills that I learned from two Yang style teachers. Chen has a ton of Fajing , here are some yang fajin training drills: (notice the similarity to Xingyiquan, except in a more front weighted taiji stance)

Solo fajing was taught by Weiqi He, disciple of Fu Zhong Wen and solo Da-
Lu was taught by Xianhao Cheng, Jang Yu Keung line. Both Fu Zhong Wen and
Jang Yu Keung were disciples of Yang Chen Fu.

Recent video uploads- Linear Yang fajin, 88 two person set, Paired sword set, Yang Broadsword set 2

Linear Yang Taiji fast- Individual movements of the form practiced with fajin on a moving line- this can be pung- ward off, lu- rollback going backward, Ji- press, An-push, repulse monkey- backward, brush knee, ect. ect.. We learned it (Weiqi He, student of Fu Zhong Wen) with including a jump step as well similar to hsingyi but not a ‘San ti’ stance a more Taiji front weighted stance. There was one exception that was for a back leg weighted stance like repulse monkey or Lu/rollback.

88 two person set

Wudang Paired sword

Origin of this form: Jiang Yun Kun was a disciple of Yang Chen Fu when Yang’s taught in Hangzhou China. Performed by Zhu Liang Fang

Tai chi chuan on heavy bag

i’ve played around with these Yang Tai chi applications with mma gloves:
pung- whipping back hand
ji- fajing press to bag
an- fa jing push to bag, or duck then angle off line of attack and fajing push
brush knee- palm strike to face
step- parry- punch as a three combo attack= right backfist- left jab- right cross
high pat horse- chop to throat
separate foot- foot jab
heel kick
rooster on one leg- independent knee
bend bow shoot tiger- angle step then punch
step up to seven star- dirty boxing uppercut
sweep lotus- outside kick to bag
punch opponent ears- play around with this with one arm is a coiling hook
Fair maiden plays shuttles- palm strike upward block
repulse monkey- elbow from behind
slant fly- shoulder strike

Stacking Taiji and Pakua palm strikes

using the taiji and pakua from my last post in a stacking way- building techniques on top of each other- jab palm, cross palm, throwing palm, slap palm, coil palm, knees, kicks, over turning palm, ect.

part 1

part 2

Pakua and Taiji in the park May 24

Nice day in the park to record some training-

pakua and taiji palm striking drills- 5 of 20. shaking palm, throwing palm, slapping palm, over turning palm, Coiling palm, defense and attack drills.

pakua stance training drills for leg strength using traditional stances- horse, bow, empty, balance, drop, half-sit

Taiji- solo form, wrist conditioning, push hands- single, diving, two hands, pung-lu-ji-an