morgothan’s kung fu repository

So I work out at the kwoon for about 15 hours a week. I also work out at home for about 3-5 hours a week. Granted I do not do weight training, but I still work out a lot. I am not used to feeling sore the next day after doing a laborious task. So imagine my surprise when the other day my arm was sore. My though process as to why my arm was sore went as follows. What did I do today to make my arm so sore. I worked on spear, and Hua Chuan 2 at the kwoon. Neither intensively enough to make my arm hurt. I ate lunch. Went shopping. Carried a bag of stuff. But that wasnt that heavy. I started helping my mother set up the house for her friends surprise 40th birthday party. And played some video games. I didnt do anything to make my arm sore. Then it hit me. I bought a nintendo wii. And I was playing wii sports boxing, tennis, bowling, etc. So my arm hurts because I was playing video games. I am still so flabbergasted by this. I understand that I’m working a muscle group in a way that I am not used to, but still its video game. Maybe I should start considering the time spent playing games on it, an addition to my training time. Sifu would buy off on that right? Right?

On Monday I finished spear. It is not as long as I was led to believe. However, it is still very long. After running through all of spear a couple of times. I decided it would be best if I ran through all the other forms I know. This worked out not as well as I had hoped it would. I ran through Hua Chuan 4 with out any issue. I had to run through Hua Chuan 2 twice, as the first time I ran into a few brain farts. Hua Chuan 1 was fine, save one question towards the end. The when it came to Dwen Da, I made a fool out of my self. I need to do that form a bunch in the next week or so, as I feel really weak in it. I stumbled my way through most of it, and had to ask questions about what came next early on. Not good at all. On a side note, I did buy a leg stretcher, So I am working on significantly increasing my flexibility. I want to be able to do a full split with in a about a years time. I figure by June 2008 I should be able to do a split. I will keep everyone informed on my progress, and how it is working out. The stretching machine is simple. It is a chair, with two leg rests. Each leg rest has a side piece to it, that holds your leg in place. There is a steering wheel in the center. The more you turn the wheel, the wider your legs are stretched. I am currently doing about an hour on it a day while watching TV. This way I can relax, and work out at the same time. hopefully it will all work out.

Not much has happened with regard to Kung Fu since my last post. I am still learning spear. My God is that a long form. There is some really nice parts in the form, and I really do like the form a lot. Its just very very long. Since the weather has been getting better, I have once again started picking up my rope dart, and playing with that outside. Hopefully I will get “good enough” to preform some nice moves with it by the end of the summer. Once I feel comfortable with it, I will post some videos of it online. On an interesting note, I picked up a copy of the Hua Chuan 1 book. Which is done by Grand Master Gary S. Torres. It is pretty interesting. I would not have been able to learn the form with it, but it is nice, as it has all the moves drawn in it, with there correct corresponding names. This is something we do not teach at my school. So I now know that one of the opening moves is called white gorilla steals fruit, and presents it to the emperor. Which is awesome. I would like to get all the books, and learn all the names of all the moves. But that is a down the road goal.

My internal studies are going well. I still really enjoy Hsing Yi. Although classes have just been running through An shen pao. It still a nice system. Also Pau Kua is very nice. I have yet to start learning the form, but I know all the palm changes, and have started to learn some of the stick techniques. All in all I really like it.