Basic Wing Chun begins with learning some simply fundamentals such as stance and hand positions. Initially you will usually learn the basic stance Yee Gee Kim Yeun Mar – the Character 2 adduction stance. You’ll get some “testing” on your structure to understand pressure in this stance. This gives you the basic building blocks to develop your connection to the ground which is important for power generation and absorbing/redirecting force later on.
Next you will learn some basic positions such as tan sau, bong sau and fok sau. These three positions are fundamental to Wing Chun and form the basics for chi sau. Chu sau is like a fight put into a game scenario. In the game, each Wing Chun practitioner attempts to land a hit on the other, but without compromising their defensive positions. So the basic positions of tan sau, fok sau and bong sau make up your defence.
Once you have learned the basic positions, they are put into “poon sau” or rolling arms. This is a basic interplay of positions which gives you the building blocks for chi sau. In chi sau, there’s a lot more going on. Chi sau (sticky hands) involves attack and defence and the interplay of constantly moving positions. In poon sau, you remove the attacks to learn the basic movements and positions. This gives you time to learn before you add techniques, attacks and more complicated movements. In the picture above you can see the interact of poon sau (rolling arms). Each practitioner is rolling between positions of bong, tan and fok sau.
Basic Wing Chun – Dan Chi Sau
One of the the first basic hand drills you will likely learn is dan chi sau. Dan chi sau teaches a basic interplay giving you an attack and defence movement. Each person has an attack and a defence. Because this drill is with only one hand (and in a static stance), it allows you to deeply understand the main principles behind the drill without much interference. Those are:
- To stop attacking when the attack is deflected (therefore not wasting any movement)
- To react upon the launch of an attack (instantaneously according to the movement)
- To maintain your intent to attack, despite knowing your partner will blog (leaving defence open occasionally to test your partner) i.e. not preempting your partner’s reaction to your attack.
- Staying in the moment and not presuming anything – reacting according to touch and feel rather than any preconceived ideas or notions (of what your partner “might” do)
Basic Wing Chun – Lap Sau Drill
The lap sau drill is another basic hand drill teaching basic principles of Wing Chun. It teaches each person how to pull their partner’s arm at the wrist and launch an attack. The other person defends by throwing up their elbow and recovers their back hand so they can’t be trapped.
The lap sau drill teaches a number of important fundamental basics such as:
- Recovering the back hand to a guard (avoiding the possibility of getting trapped) and giving you greater defence
- Elbow reaction – allowing you to react automatically to the grab/pull, throwing up your bong sau position without thought
- Moving off centreline – the turn is introduced teaching you to move your head off the attacking line
- Elbow positions – allowing you to understand how the elbow defends the centreline during both attack and defence movements
Basic Wing Chun – Pak Sau Drill
Pak sau drill teaches how to break a contact and attack simultaneously, striking an opponent before they have a chance to recover. In pak sau drill you coordinate stepping in with your attack, changing range.
The drill can be extended to more complicated movements once the basic pak sau movement is learned. Once this level is reached, you can add further defences, which are removed with continual attacks. But the basic movement of pak sau is very effective once a contact has been created. Pak sau drill teaches a number of principles:
- To break the contact and attack simultaneously
- To keep relaxed so as not to give away your intention to strike
- To strike with the whole body mass, not just the arm
Once basics have been learned you will move on to follow up techniques where the first attack is stopped. This helps you understand:
- How to instinctively choose the correct follow up technique according to wing chun principles (economy of motion and minimum movement)
- Flowing from one attack to another, without having to “regroup” or change body position
- The most efficient attack
- To defend while attacking, maintaining positions which give you an advantage
Summary
These are some of the Wing Chun basics. They are fundamental to learning Chi Sau. There’s also more advanced Wing Chun movements and drills, but many of them can be found (in principle at least) in these basic drills. Once the basics are learned well, your chi sau will change. You won’t overcommit attacks, and your defence will be much tighter. You will naturally attack when a gap appears, without any thought, using luk sau jik kuen (lost hand strike forwards).
My Sifu used to say, there’s no such thing as advance techniques in Wing Chun, just better use of basics. A popular Wing Chun saying is “there’s no advanced techniques in Wing Chun, just basics mastered”.
The first hand pattern of Wing Chun is called Siu Lim Tao (little idea form) and gives the beginner a basic overview of the movements within Wing Chun. You can access a free video course covering Siu Lim Tao here.
