The Way of Least Resistance

Further to my article: "The naming of sanchin" ... I have heard it said in crane circles that there is a different sanchin for every student, or words to that effect. I don't know if that is true, but every variant of crane seems to have a sanjan/sanzhan/saamchien. Ngo cho kun (5 ancestor fist) is based on 5 shaolin styles of which crane is one, hence they have sanchin. While Kanbun Uechi's art seems to have been a compilation of his all his various studies, I think it was most heavily influenced by white crane. Uechi certainly looks a lot like Fujian white crane (in my view much more than goju). For downloadable videos check out my friend Martin Watt's site: http://www.fujianbaihe.com/ . He does Yong Chun white crane. His site has links to his Chinese school's site (which has more videos). Also have a look at Eric Ling's sanjin on http://www.goju-ryu.info/ (Fuzhou Ancestral Crane - said to be the crane form that lead to all the crane variants - calling c...

A colleague of mine on gojuryu.net recently said the following in response to my article: “ Whole lotta shakin’: pre-loading the hips ”: “When stepping, there is an inherent motion to the hips. If this is utilized to load a technique, then there is no telegraphing or slowdown. I think examples where there is a block THEN hip load THEN strike will never work against a properly motivated attacker. However, why can't all three of those things be the same - ie, block and punch with the same hip motion at the same time?” I think this is an excellent point. It occurred to me many martial arts movements are specifically designed this way. Consider the humble sanchin dachi (3 battles stance) as it occurs in goju ryu and other karate kata. That stance involves a pelvic tension which occurs as you step up into the stance just before you effect a technique (whether it is a block or a punch or both). That pelvic tension produces a 45 degree movement in the hips, creating forward and “upwar...