I have recantly started taking kung fu classes. Now in kung fu a huge emphasis is placed upon stances and the techniques are all very "traditional" if you get my meaning. I can see how stances can give power and stability, but but effective would they be in a chaotic street fight scenario? I am off course talking about once you have reached the level where the movements are comitted to muscle memory.

Ps. I am not practicing kung fu for self defense, I'd just like to know how I should apply my techniques in self defense.

Something I've found from training in taekwon-do is that I can't even use any of the stances in sparring, if you take that to mean in the exact form we meticulously do them in linework. Thus I end up with a bit more of a vague, not-really-any-of-them stance that changes slightly depending on what technique I'm doing.

If you've got a situation anything like that (and especially if you're ever in a stance and think "this would get me killed" ) in your martial art, I'd suppose you should train in the stances just as you're taught them in order to drill in that muscle memory for the best way to do your techniques for speed and power and whatnot, then just do what seems best in a more dynamic situation based on what your body is good at doing. You may well be practicing something whose practice just makes your "general" stance (the in between one I mentioned) better for something.

I went to a seminar by Master Willie (sp?) Lim a few years ago and the general idea I left with was that a lot of techniques and stances have applications that aren't immediately obvious, and, of course "If it works, it is correct."

So what I'm saying is, when all your techniques are committed to muscle memory well, they should also be natural reactions to stuff from what you've been practicing. Don't bust out a stance that doesn't seem like a good way to do the job.

Then again, I've never done kung fu, so don't take anything I say over anything said by anyone who does. Also I am tired and taking a break from writing a huge essay so I might just be waffling.

Hmm yes that sounds pretty good to me Phil. I used to learn karate and I know what you're talking about with the "sparring stance". And I really do think the concept of muscle memory is important, though until now I haven't thought so much about it in stance work!
Building on to that, in most forms of japanese/korean striking arts students are often told to bounce around on their feet. This seems like a good idea since you remain "on your toes" and you can suprise your oponent by swapping suddenly to a big leap, but in chinese martial arts you often hear about staying "rooted" and gaining power from the stability staying in a firm stance offers. Which ones the "best"? Anyway thanks for your comment Phil, much apreciated

C'mon people, post!!!

We have some great footage that we will have online shortly from 35th generation Shaolin masters.

Awesome application!!!


Will drop you a line on this thread when its up..

If you try to use stances in combat they probably shouldn't be as deep as they are when you do your forms, but they should still resemble the stances of your forms. Your body understands most of the basic stances of the martial arts just naturally. For example, in Combat Hapkido we don't really teach the traditional stances. The only stance we drill is out fighting stance, but if you watch any of my experienced students for any length of time you will flashes of horse stance, front stance, and back stance. I only bring them up when a student seems to be at a stumbing block that is mostly related to their footwork or their general body position. Since they are trained to work in harmony with their attacker instead of directly oppose his force they tend to naturally fall into these stance because their bodies want to be in them. Just remember that stances are just snapshots of time. They are not meant to be held for any length of time in real combat. They are there for the instant of the technique and then you should be back to a neutral fighting position that allows for good movement.

That's good way of putting it.
In response to the bouncing/grounding thing, I never really got to grips with actually bouncing, but I stay on the balls of my feet to keep maneuvrable (that said, I find sometimes a nice flat foot can help your traction when you step).
Getting your grounding in some way is very important for power, and probably speed too, depending on what you're doing. I've not thought about it so much before, apart from
Ok I've stopped that sentence mid-thought, because I'm pretty sure the idea of using your grounding for power is nicely described in what dmccarthy said. I mean, you only need to use power when you're doing something powerful, right? Otherwise stay maneuvrable, whatever that means.

Thanks guys, this is really good information for me! I especially enjolyed your post mccarthy, very informative. Unfortunately resent events have made me realise that I can't really go to this kung fu club

Its too far away basically. Its not that I don't want to sacrifice my spare time, its that I need that time to study and do homework. I'm looking for places nearby my home now. Anyways, this information can be applied to any traditional ma so again, thanks a bunch!

ps. Those pictures sound great, Pete, I'm really looking forwards to seeing them on the site! :)

What I learnt is that stances are nice for development and training but when it came to actual combat I adapted movements from boxing and learning to execute moves from those movements. Then I became I total smartass and now use Drunken Boxing movements for laughs (saying that, it is surprising effective).

I use stances when fighting- not necessarily as deep as when I train them,but to get decent punches from the hip then I use them. Your sparring/fighting wont necessarily look exactly like your forms, but you can often tell a kung fu person, well I have been told I look quite kung fu, basically from my guard and the way I move around.

Can I just ask, if you aren't learning kung fu for any kind of self defence what are you doing it for?

meditator wrote:
I have recantly started taking kung fu classes. Now in kung fu a huge emphasis is placed upon stances and the techniques are all very "traditional" if you get my meaning. I can see how stances can give power and stability, but but effective would they be in a chaotic street fight scenario? I am off course talking about once you have reached the level where the movements are comitted to muscle memory.

Ps. I am not practicing kung fu for self defense, I'd just like to know how I should apply my techniques in self defense.


Have a word with your sifu. Mine always makes a point of telling us the various applications of what we are doing, that's why I think he is an excellent teacher. You should also be drilling techniques and stances so often that they get committed to memory and you build the strength you need to be able to use them effectively.

Su Lin wrote:
I use stances when fighting- not necessarily as deep as when I train them,but to get decent punches from the hip then I use them. Your sparring/fighting wont necessarily look exactly like your forms, but you can often tell a kung fu person, well I have been told I look quite kung fu, basically from my guard and the way I move around.

Can I just ask, if you aren't learning kung fu for any kind of self defence what are you doing it for?

Basically I practice martial arts in general in order to become fitter, have fun, become more disciplined and a better person. I like to look at ma as a way of life (lovely cliché! ), rather than just a way of self defense. The ability to defend myself is sort of a really good side effect of the training if you ask me!

Meditator, thats an excellent repsonse. Kungfu isnt all about learning how to fight.

What I would like to add, is that as you are new to Kungfu, just take it in slowly, dont start thinking about fighting applications and stances in a street fight just yet otherwise you will over flow your brain with too much info.

Your only a new starter, just get used to get your stances, footwork, rooting etc into shape then start thinking about fighting applications a little later, as you will understand them far better.