Those of you who have been around OpenSource Wushu for a while know that we spend a great deal of time on Tan Tui, a Longfist style which is sometimes known as the "essence of the northern fists." In class it is typical for us to spend perhaps as much as half an hour a night working on 5 lines both to train stance and technique, but also to work on application. What shows up in the Tan Tui lines, also shows up in many of our other forms - so they provide excellent examples of basics. However, many folks dismiss Tan Tui as being irrelevant for application, having misinterpreted a number of the movements. I commonly hear things like: "I would never swing my arms that way when attacking someone." My response is to remind everyone that Chinese martial arts focuses not just on hitting and kicking, but also on throwing and locking. Many of the movements in Tan Tui presume that you have already closed with your opponent, and as such, the swinging arms are training to throw them after you have, say, caught their leg. But this post will not focus on that. I'm probably going to hold off on applications posts for a while considering that applications of forms are done best with partners, and due to social distancing considerations, we should probably be avoiding partner drills.
Rather, these posts will focus on some of the details of our Tan Tui forms as well as some footwork to consider when your practice space is limited to your living room, balcony, or back deck. I'll point out that while for many years I did competitive wushu which specified exactly how every movement must be completed, in the last decade my teachers have emphasized to me that ones practice must be flexible to become real for anything other than competition. If you want a challenge, take your compulsory straightsword form and do it on a lei-tai as I saw Amy Chow do in the early nineties for a demo. Or else, as Sifu Artie Aviles challenged me to do - do your Lian Bu Quan in a 10'x10' square. Doing such things forces you to consider space differently. You can't just be on autopilot, and you must be adaptable.
So after that lead-in, here is an introduction to some common ideas in all the Tan Tui lines we do. More detailed videos of our Tan Tui will follow in coming days.
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