Boxing/Muay Thai Training With BXFusion

Joined up with Ryan "da sniper" Willis of Boxing Xtreme Fusion from the Philippines to add on to my standup striking. Ryan is currently being poached by the first and only chinese UFC fighter, Tiequan Zhang, as striking instructor.

Ryan Willis is a 48kg Muay Thai Champion, ranked #1 in the World Muay Thai Association (MMA) in 2009 and a silver medallist in the Big Challenge 2 World Invitational Tournament Philippines in 2003. He has also coached in pretigous gyms such as Highland Stable and Elorde Boxing Gym as well as Club Hero in Beijing.

Boxing Xtreme Fusion (BXFusion) is his very first time venturing out alone on his own brand and it is indeed an honor to be with him at this starting stage of his own gym in Beijing and hope to gain a lot in terms of ring fighting tactics and overall conditioning from him.

If you wish to join us in BXFusion in Beijing, drop them an email at bxfusion@hotmail.com .

Muscle Building for Martial Arts + Representing Singapore Next Year!

A short video talking about building the right kind of muscles for martial arts.

I am also very happy to be representing Singapore for next year's World Wushu Tournament held at Huang Shan China for the Sanda event. I hope to put my ring fighting innovations into practise for this event and hope for good results.

18 Lohan Fist of Beijing - Kungfu Discovery

Interviewing Master Xiang Gui Jiang (项贵江师父), one of the last master of the complete Ji Family 18 lohan fist 纪氏罗汉拳 in Beijing.

18 Lohan Fist is one of the most complete traditional martial arts system barely surviving in China today. It is complete in the sense that it trains in BOTH internal and external with external striking form that includes grappling, wrestling, striking with all parts of the arms and legs as well as pressure point striking. Just like the "Yi Quan", the 18 Lohan Fist focuses first on internal conditioning through qigong in order to strengthen and prepare the body for the external "expressions".

This family of 18 Lohan Fist was passed down since Ming Dynasty when it was taught to imperial guards of the royal palace. It has its qigong basis in the 13 taibao qigong (十三太保功）which was the qigong practised by the imperial guards then which has strengthening as well as hardening properties.

It consists of 18 different forms that builds up each aspect of the art progressively. The first 3 forms, which focuses mainly on the internal chi movements, are introduced in the video by Master Xiang. Names of the 18 forms are: 开天 (opening the sky), 辟地 (Splitting the ground), 浑元 (integration), 连环 (striking combinations), 转环 (throwing combinations), 蹬环 (kicking combinations), 龙形 (Dragon Form), 虎形 (Tiger Form), 凤形(Pheonix Form), 长眉 (fingers acu striking), 比丘(elbow and kness acu striking), 赤脚 (legs acu striking), 降龙 (defeating the dragon), 伏虎 (subduing the tiger), 御风 (low stance), 醉卧 (drunken style), 疯癫 (crazy striking), 破尘 (final form) .

If you wish to check out Master Xiang in Beijing, please feel free to drop me a message through my channel and I would be glad to set you guys up.

Iron Wire Wing Chun - Basic Stance for MMA

This video explains the fighting stance I use for my adaption of Wing Chun for ring fighting, called "Iron Wire Wing Chun". This video explains the fallacies of the traditional Wing Chun fighting stance and the reasons for the Iron Wire Wing Chun fighting stance.



Note: This is NOT traditional Wing Chun I am doing (not even late Master Wong Shun Leong or Bruce Lee does pure traditional wing chun) but Integrated Chinese Kungfu for MMA purpose, so if you are a pure Wing Chuner and you hate what I am doing, please leave my video and comment box alone. (But remember that a narrow mind is what is eventually going to kill traditional martial arts, this is what Bruce Lee kept warning against.)

Note2: Hey, I am no master and I don't pretend to be. I am just a fighter who is just sharing my thoughts and innovations for the martial arts world. To me, master or not is pointless when you don't get into the ring and prove it against other styles.

4 Ways to Deliver Wing Chun Punches

This is a video filmed in Hero Club Beijing on the 4 ways that I know of to deliver Wing Chun punches. Indeed, the method of delivery of Wing Chun punches has been a topic of much debate online and on youtube and there are people bashing other practitioners saying that their Wing Chun punch is wrong simply because they studied it one way from their sifu. Through my interaction and experience with so many different sifus I see almost every sifu throwing Wing Chun punch a different way! Are some of them wrong? I don't think so. I think different sifu or lineage simply have a different focus and method and I conclude that there are about 4 (or more) ways to deliver Wing Chun punches and all of them are correct as they all serve different purposes. So if you learn one of these 4 ways, please remember that others aren't wrong, they are just learnt from different lineages and sifus.

Incorporating Val Riazanov's Ballistic Striking Method...

I chanced upon Val Riazanov's Ballistic Strike (Systema) videos on youtube and it really shocked me. Can punches so relaxed and slow have so much power? Instead of brushing it off as bullshit like most people would, I asked myself, What if its true? The kind of power would have tremendous use in my fighting method. Imagine all my punches turning ballistic!

As such, I visited Val Riazanov's website and found an Ebook titled "Science of Ballistic Strikes" for only $11.95 which was supposed to introduce some basic exercises so that we can get a feel of how ballistic strikes work.   I bought the ebook through paypal and was able to download it instantly. What I got out of that simple eBook blew my mind away. There was no mysticism or "chi gung" or all that kind of esoteric stuff behind that kind of relaxed power but simple physics which anyone can master! The ebook taught me four exercises which allowed me to instantly understand and begin to feel how ballistic strikes work. The first exercise helped me feel the weight of my arms. The second exercise taught me how to tense only specific part of my arm and isolate the other parts. The third exercise helped me feel the difference in impact between a regular punch and a ballistic punch and the final exercise taught me how to deliver the relaxed power.

I practised all the exercises in the gym and to my amazement, I started throwing punches FASTER and MORE POWERFULLY without any effort! What impresses me most is Val Riazanov's approach of helping any kind of fighter incorporate ballistic striking principles in their own style instead of trying to prove that Systema is the only way to go. I too found plenty of strikes from my own arts that I can now perform with ballistic striking principle for more effectiveness. I went on to downloading his paid instruction videos one by one and learning from them progressively. I was even more impressed when Val himself answered questions that arose from my training on Facebook right on the very day I asked it! Check out Val's Facebook.

So, does all these work in MMA?

IT DOES!

To my amazement, MMA legend Fedor Emelianenko's crazily strong but relaxed looking punches are Systema ballistic strikes!!! That is how he so effortlessly knocks over his opponents with a single relaxed punch and why his "ground and pound" is named the most effective ever in MMA! Every single of his punches are ballistic strikes! You really need to feel it to know!

Is Wing Chun Good Enough For MMA?

My personal thoughts on whether pure Wing Chun is good enough for MMA fighting and my current direction and development in using Wing Chun in an MMA cage fight.

Sorry about the cut off towards the end of the video but I am almost done then anyways so you missed nothing.

Iron Arm Conditioning - Is It Scientific?

Does knocking your arms with poles and bashing up trees really give you "Iron Arms"? Is this esoteric practise even scientific? I hope this video answers this question.

Sorry the audio is a little soft so you guys have to ramp up your volume a bit. I need a better mic...

Iron Arm Conditioning - The Right Way

This is my very first instructional video on how to start Iron Arm Conditioning as part of your Wing Chun, Choy Li Fut or Hung Gar training.

What you do is simply do what I said in the video as often as you can throughout the day or throughout your TV / Youtube session. I will come a point where it feels so comfortable, you just want to keep doing it. So there's no set number of knocks you should do per day. Just do it as often as you can and before you know it, you would be doing thousands of it per day, which is better than trying to build a routine around doing 100 or a few hundred a day.

My New Favorite Training Music...

Ready For War by Eminem...

Begin Second Level of Iron Wire Fist Training

After one recovery week last week, I officially begin the second level of Iron Wire Fist training (铁线拳第二层 - 铁线锻造） with two iron rings. It took me one whole month to achieve effortlessness in the first level using only one ring. I thought one more ring isn't going to make a big difference until I started the isometric part of the training. The amount of resistance offered by that one more ring makes so much difference that my tendons start to ache almost immediately. This is exactly why there are ten progressive levels of 功力in Iron Wire Fist. There is simply no way anyone can slap on ten rings on each arm right from the start and not injure themselves. The tendons and chi strengthening is progressive and takes time.

I am also starting the external hardening part of the Iron Wire Fist training starting from the insides of both arms guided by Master Anthony Goh, President of USA Wushu Kungfu Federation, a grandmaster in Southern 硬气功 Hard Qigong. He even gave me his ancestral formula for the ointment that is so critical for the achievement of such hardening.

Indeed, Iron Wire Fist is a form of internal training for external martial arts with the aim of strengthening the tendons, muscles and bones ala hard qigong style. The achievement of which can be applied on almost every form of fighting. My best friend said it best "The objective of Iron Wire Fist is to give you two baseball bat arms against unarmed combatants". Your arms become weapons that you carry always and can also be extremely powerful in MMA fighting. Imagine being pinned on the ground with me mounted and instead of punching you with my gloved fist, I slam my steel-like forearms into the side of your head... once is enough...

Taking a Recovery Week...

All power athletes and bodybuilders take a full week off every 4 to 8 weeks of intense training and I am going to do mine this week after 8 weeks of intense training.

Indeed, there are overwhelming evidence of power athletes hitting plateaus, burning out or permanently injuring themselves due to months of intense training without giving themselves or their muscles and neuro system a much needed break. Indeed, intense physical conditioning and martial arts training affects not just the physical body but also the neurosystem, leading to bad sleeping and ultimately, depression.

I am going to do my recovery week this week with light walking and light hung gar forms training just to keep the body active and recover from my various injuries. Indeed, I am bruised all over with aches in various joints and open wounds in various places as well and all of these injuries are lowering my motivation to train.

So, if you are an MMA fighter as well, please remember to schedule in your recovery week... you really need it!

Start Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Training with Chet Quint

I officially started my Brazilian Jiu-jitsu (BJJ) training under Professor Chet Quint (Helios Gracie --> Rickson Gracie --> Pedro Sauer --> Chet Quint) of Team Chet Quint in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu China of Beijing.

The training was short, intense and of course, many of us walk away with certain degrees of injuries. I walked away with some mat burn and a sore windpipe. However, this is the kind of training that makes real fighters who has the ability to execute techniques under real resistance. Indeed, it is Professor Chet Quint's belief that being able to execute techniques under full resistance makes you a real jiu-jitsu fighter. As such, there will always be a session of full resistance rolling after extended demonstration and practise of techniques.

My first lesson in BJJ also taught me that size does matter when fighting on the ground. As such, as a fighter, I would definitely not want to go to the ground in the ring with a fighter who is bigger than I am.