looking for push hands practice partner in dun laughaire

goran.pavlovic

Hi

I have been practicing bagua for a few years now. i am working in dun laughaire and i would like to find someone to practice push hands with during lunch break in people's park.

anyone interested?

smacl

Would certainly be up for some lunch time push hands practice but based out by Marlay park, quite away from Dunlaoghaire. Pity.

Forest Master

The local school do patty-cake at lunch breaks - you could try asking them!

da-bres

Forest Master wrote: »

The local school do patty-cake at lunch breaks - you could try asking them!

That is so weak

Doug Cartel

Forest Master wrote: »

The local school do patty-cake at lunch breaks - you could try asking them!

Look, I don't like deleting posts or telling people off, but this kind of post is really annoying.

Don't scare off new people to the forum. All he's trying to do is organise some training. He's not making unfounded claims, he's not giving out bad advice, or trying to sign people up to some expensive course. Why are you giving him a hard time?

Massimo Giorgianni

Hi Goran,
one of my student is living in Dun Laoghaire - he would be interested in some extra practice. He has a very good background in Push hands as he was a Tai chi assistant instructor and participated in Tai Chi push hands competitions in Russia + trained in BJJ.
you can send me a private message if it s of any interest to you.
I would be curious to know what are the push hands trainings in ba gua ; do you know a good video of it?

Thanks
Massimo

Forest Master

Doug Cartel wrote: »

Look, I don't like deleting posts or telling people off, but this kind of post is really annoying.

Don't scare off new people to the forum. All he's trying to do is organise some training. He's not making unfounded claims, he's not giving out bad advice, or trying to sign people up to some expensive course. Why are you giving him a hard time?

Eh, it was clearly just a joke. Relax. "giving him a hard time" - lol. Yeah, maybe he'll need counselling after my unrelenting torrent of hate...

Richy06

Try not to talk down to or belittle every person you talk to on boards and maybe people will be more inclined to separate those times when you're cracking a funny and when your just trying to be condescending.

Doug Cartel

Forest Master, either be welcoming or be quiet. Everyone else, don't get sucked into an argument with this guy.

arybvtcw0eolkf

Forest Master wrote: »

Eh, it was clearly just a joke. Relax. "giving him a hard time" - lol. Yeah, maybe he'll need counselling after my unrelenting torrent of hate...

I warned you last night that the next time you acted the sack here you'd face a perma-ban from this forum.

Today I'm feeling a little more charitable so I'll see you after the sumer school holidays, sometime around the first week of September.

maguffin

For Massimo... a vid of Bagua Push Hands..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW_1p3p3jcU&NR=1

quite different from Taiji Push Hands as it uses the Bagua Circle

maguffin

Andrew H

Thanks for sharing maguffin. I found the clip really interesting and can see the similarities to Yang Style push hands (except circular of course) and even parts of the 2 man fighting set from the Yang Style too.

Niall Keane

You should elaborate on what you mean by push hands (tui shou), in the wudang style I practice there are formal drill tui shou methods which are very valuable, basically reducing to elements of combat so for example in "nine palace" sweeps can be perfected to work naturally with stepping in or out of range, "seven stars" which basically works on range and angle aswell as the similarity of uppercuts and diversions / locks. then there is free "tui shou", sometimes the stances are kept to work on upper body control and rooting, otherwise it is like stand up wrestling.
What I'm saying is I would imagine if the general martial artist had an idea of what "push hands" was they might be more interested? Certainly if its the free style stuff? I know Bagua has Rou shou, which involved strikes too. As for the more drill like stuff, well beyond IMA stylists I dont think many would understand the point?
Excellent idea though to practice during lunch time, smacl and myself used to do that in Patricks Cathederal park many moons ago, time well spent!

Massimo Giorgianni

maguffin wrote: »

For Massimo... a vid of Bagua Push Hands..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW_1p3p3jcU&NR=1

quite different from Taiji Push Hands as it uses the Bagua Circle

maguffin

Thanks Maguffin

However I still would ask Goran to send me a video link. In that way I would have an idea of what is more or less your way(s) of training. Sometimes different school have a totally different understanding of their art and the way they train it.

goran.pavlovic

hi guys

thanks for your rteplies and sorry not replying myself over the weekend, but tried to be out as much as possible before summer came to an end.

what i am looking for is to practice structural push hands excercises. this is (or i believe it should be ) the same in any internal martial ars. here is the example of ehat i am talking about:


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

or this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GTmHvuDR-Y&feature=related


or this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOZQqC_9R28&feature=related



i have been practicing martial arts for about 15 years now. i did 5 years of traditional taeqwondo, then 2 years of southern shaolin kung fu. since then i have been doing yin style bagua (water system bagua).

i have done a lot of push hands practice and i thought i was quite good at it. then i saw one of erle montaigue push hands videos, and from that five minutes video i learned more about push hands then from everything else i ever heard or saw before. I also realised how important is for me to start doing more core push hands practice.

so if anyone is interested in doing the core practice with martial applications, here is my email address:

goranpavlovic@ericom.net

maguffin

Hi Goran

You might try contacting Paul Moran at YMAA Ireland....they do a comprehensive set of Push Hands within the Yang style Taijiquan.

http://www.ymaa.ie/

regards

maguffin

goran.pavlovic

thanks for sending me the link.

the thing is, i know what i need to do. just want to be able to do it during the day on my lunch break. i can do all the single person practices on my own, but push hands is something you do need to do in pairs.

maguffin

...I understand completely...however since YMAA is in Deansgrange, which is close to where you are...they might put you in contact with someone in a similar situation as yourself...worth a try anyway!

best of luck

maguffin

goran.pavlovic

tried it. thanks for advice. we'll see what happens.

smacl

You could also give Alan Peatfield in UCD a call. He used to teach bagua, and may well know someone in your area. Might also be worth looking to see if there are any wing tsun schools locally, as their lat sau & chi sau practise can be very compatible with push hands, as would any shuai jiao without jackets albeit in a different way.

Out of interest, are you primarily looking for competition style / free style push hands, or mainly drills?

Niall Keane

The videos you posted of erle are interesting and make a fair few points, though perhaps over analysed?
Like it's handy to have your students know the relationship between the four phases and the related palm shape, simply for rapid correction, however I think it a bit restrictive to say this is right an that is wrong? Which he seems to suggest?
At first when learning, certainly an orthodox method should be followed bit not made gospel, the palms change not to ward off or roll back a corresponding force, but really you use your forearms etc. to add a little pressure (the famous peng) so it can lead the opponent, ie you could lift, uproot redirect but also on the "yin" side of things purposely let it collapse adding "an" to throw set up sweeps etc. The forearms twist as adhering to your opponents arms they act as gear cogs turning his, setting up throws locks etc.
If you practice push hands mindlessly repeating movement you get so far, in Wudang TCC there are 12 drills each also has 4-8 typical applications associated with them, like in nine palace there are 4 sweeps, three locks, 2 throws, elbow and shoulder strikes involved, so basically it's stripped down combat movement, and allows one to play with structure and defence skills setting up an opponent as although the techniques are limited to reflect the stepping method, they are plentiful enough to be a surprise, a nice way of improving skills.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qm2uYtTlz1E&feature=youtube_gdata_player

It seems like you are interested in exploring various other styles ph methods, so I wouldn't pass up on the YMAA school if you are out that way, every style has different methods all with their own preferences and focus. On Wudang I learned that the mountain was a martial artists Mecca, not a temple-school, so fair play, training as much as you can with others and their points of view / truths is the way to improve skills! In France they hold an event each year for a week where people can arrive and ph together exchanging skills, wonder if there would be the interest over here?

Personally I'd be interested in having a go at bg and xi methods always good to gather another point of view.

I assume yin Bagua has similar drills, any vids of what you do?

goran.pavlovic

hi Niall
in yin style bagua the emphasys is on developing abstract connected body movement, without using set routines and drills. you can and do practice with partners, but you are not thought the set piece routines, because they would just prevent you to move naturally in a real fight situation. you want to be able to move naturally and use natural movement as a technique. this is of course very dificult. building site, farm, fishing labourers know how to move naturally, because any other way would hurt them or not allow them to work for hours day after day. i remember watching old people in my father's vilage working. when i now remember the way they moved using my bagua eyes, they all moved perfectly naturally. the whole body was always connected. every movement was the shortest and the most efficient possible. the aim was to do the most with the least amount of effort and danger to yourself. that is why it was much easier to teach martial arts to people few hundred years ago. their bodies already new what to do. today its a bit different. i am sitting in front of a computer all day.
it took me 10 years of practice to realise that don't really know how to stand properly, let alone how to move. but i am getting there. i am planning to be be able to stand with no effort in a few years time.
the club that i train with is in UCD. the teacher is professor alan peatfield. lately i have been mostly training at home by myself, but if you are interested in comming to classes, i will send me an email and i will pass it to alan.
also i will show as much as anyone wants to see from the system that i am learning during lunch time practice in dun loughaire.:)

if you want to see some examples of style of bagua that professor peatfield is teaching try to find videos by fallowing people:

bruce frantzis - not yin style
liu shichang - yin style
He Jinbao - yin style
Xie Peiqi - yin style

the stuff he teaches is a combination of the above methods.

also have a look at erle montaigue (well of knowlege in core arts, unfortunately died this year)

goran.pavlovic

i am not preparing for competition. i did a lot of free stile and competition push hands. what iam looking is to work with someone on developing (further) the core allignment skills and body connection skills. this is the thing. i thought i knew a lot about it. then i realised after watching erle's videos, that there is so much more there. i want to learn that stuf. and to learn it i need to practice with someone. i believe that we can both benefit a lot from it.
i mean, there is lots more that we can do, like martial applications, semi free sparing...
if anyone is interested, i can teach what i know about bagua, that is not a problem.
but i thought that push hands would be the easiest way for both parties to benefit, without anyone imposing their own style.

smacl

Niall Keane wrote: »

In France they hold an event each year for a week where people can arrive and ph together exchanging skills, wonder if there would be the interest over here?

I tried organising something like this a number of years back, after coming back from Jasnierres and seeing what Phil Brown was doing in Paris. Sent out a bunch of emails out, primarily to the local tai chi community, and got a pretty negative response. Maybe things would be better now, certainly worth a go. The position back then was that the vast bulk of tai chi people weren't doing anything too martial, and treated tui shou as an advanced subject. Compare that to practical tai chi, where day one starts with basic static and moving push hands drills quickly followed by martial applications of those drills, and free style static and moving tui shou. For those who haven't done it, the latter basically involves trying to get your opponent off their feet or out of the area using anything except striking. The static version is similar, but you're not allowed move your feet. Both apart from anything else are great craic, and widely used in competitive tai chi, often as a precursor to full contact.

I tend to think of tui shou being a fundamental part of our tai chi system as an effective close quarters martial art, where you're sticking close to your opponent in very dynamic sense without holding on to them. Training with other styles is always interesting, but I'm not sure how much cross over there is to less martially oriented tai chi schools. Worth a try perhaps?

goran.pavlovic

i would definitely be interested in meeting and doing something like this. the potential problem i see with it is that it can quickly deteriorate into a competition, rather than exchange of knowlege. you really need people to let go of their ego and approach it as fun. quite dificult.

Massimo Giorgianni

goran.pavlovic wrote: »

i am not preparing for competition. i did a lot of free stile and competition push hands. what iam looking is to work with someone on developing (further) the core allignment skills and body connection skills. this is the thing. i thought i knew a lot about it. then i realised after watching erle's videos, that there is so much more there. i want to learn that stuf. and to learn it i need to practice with someone. i believe that we can both benefit a lot from it.
i mean, there is lots more that we can do, like martial applications, semi free sparing...
if anyone is interested, i can teach what i know about bagua, that is not a problem.
but i thought that push hands would be the easiest way for both parties to benefit, without anyone imposing their own style.

Hi Goran ,
the student i was telling you about start his working shifts at 12h so unfortunately he is not available for lunch sessions.
However if there is any chance to meet it would be very interesting to exchange some push hands training and more generally see what our discipline have in common . Same for Smacl

thanks for the video they are good and deal with the real stuff. Below I putted some wingtsun video presenting similar works. The guy was my guest a month ago and gave seminar in Dublin city center. He shares a lot of his knowledgeand is coming back in July if that could be of any interest to you


Connectivity and body mechanics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYoaN59GUwo

from Pushing hands to Lat Sao ( sparring training methods )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KXioJJ4Rxs

the same a bit more free
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E6oaQ2IMNc&feature=channel_video_title

goran.pavlovic

i would like to meet. it will probably have to be some weekend, or evening after 7 pm. i don't know where you live or work. but if you wonna do it in the evening, and you are anywhere near donnybrook, the apartments where i live, have a very nice big gardens with big green area. i train there most evenings. so you can join me there for an hour or two when ever.
as for the weekends, any city or near city park is fine, early in the morning or late in the afternoon.
so the best is to send me an email on goranpavlovic@eircom.net or post your email address and i will send you my mobile number.

as for wingtsun, i can show you some bagua stuf that was specifically designed to fight against wingtsun circular punching (or any other stile, like southern shaolin). you can use it as a party trick whith other wingtsun guys.;)

also i can show you the excercises that are used in bagua for developing "elbow force" or connecting elbow to your belly.

in bagua 3 dan tiens are connected with 3 joints in the arms and 3 joints in the legs and 3 joints in the fingers, and 3 joints in the toes (foot)...
also any of the joints from each triplet, is connected with the corresponding joint from the other triplets. the middle moves the whole. so lower dan tien moves the body. it also moves your elbows which move your arms. it also moves your knees, which move your legs.

so you first practice feeling the triplets, each part of each the triplet at the time. you can do this while doing what ever you do. when you move a leg, try to feel first your then your knee moving, then your hip and ancle, and so on.
then connect each triplet while moving. when you move your arm, try to feal your wrist, your elbow and your shoulder moving together. they will not tecessarily move in the same line or plain, but they all have to move.

then you connect the legs and arm triplets with your torso triplets. then fingers...

you don't worry about the force, just the feeling of connection and movement.
the connected movement produces the force.

as my teacher Alan says: simple but dificult.

smacl

quite difficult.

Not so difficult, but you need to state what you are trying to achieve with any given exercise or drill. Having been at mixed style tai chi seminars, my take on it is that pushing hands means very different things to different groups. This can range from collaborative sensitivity work to setting up for another technique, to something very close to freestyle stand-up wrestling. If you're practising with someone new, you agree what you're doing and what you're trying to achieve in advance. For setting up techniques this will usually go from slow / static with low resistance and little variation while getting to grips with the technique, and then increasing speed, resistance and variations as you get a handle on how the thing works. If someone's trying to break something down for you slowly, you don't start using a lot of resistance or flashy counters until you've gone through the basics.

The problems arise when this communication doesn't take place, and the person looking to improve their listening skills gets unexpectedly dumped by a hip throw into an arm lock.

As goes ego, in my experience it is as evident in those doing tai chi for health as those who practice it as a martial art.

goran.pavlovic

also thanks for the videos. i like the boxing stuf. i also saw someone teaching bagua monkey boxing to clasic boxers somewhere on youtube few months back. it just shows that you can combine martial arts if you understand the core principles of the arts you combine.

goran.pavlovic

hi smacl

i gree with you completely. you need to set rules and stick to them. but sticking to the rules is not always easy, because once you get into contact with someone, the emotions start kicking in, which starts the chi going everywhere, and most likely up, which causes people to start behaving funy.
i don't know how many times i have seen people panicking in the midle of a set partner drill. or getting angry, or going lula... even though we were supposed to be just practicing in a safe friendly environment.
unless person can controll their mind, emotions and chi, you have no idea how they will react next.
that is why i said its quite dificult.

goran.pavlovic

just a correction about triplets

"in bagua 3 dan tiens are connected with 3 joints in ..." should be the body as a whole is also viewed as a triplet, where qua is the center node in this triplet. lower dan tien is used to move qua which moves the body. this is why you connect everything to the belly (or lower dantien).

sorry, trying to do tomany things at once, and not being able to edit my own posts...