Was at class the other night and looking around there where various training bags and dummies which are used in wing chun. Got me thinking about if there where any wall/punch bag drills that are specifically aimed at taiji players?
I'm not aware of any training equipment that is particular to Tai Chi??? We use a heavy bag (15st - 210lbs - 100kgs) which is full of sand to practice various Tai Chi strikes and pushes. Have a light bag (standard punch bag) that we use for a few things too... Basically you can use any equipment - even a wooden man - with Tai Chi
Only the stick and the ball exercises (stick and ball being held in frames) created by a Wu practitioner and demonstrated at the '36 Olympics. Lee,Ying-arng wrote that they weren't anything useful for TC development,and as they never caught on even in the Wu lines it would seem he was correct. However,if you and I study the youtube vid of the Olympic demo I'm sure we could work something out to enable us to hold $ome $eminars teaching these "Unique TC Training Methods"--- revealed to the public after decades of silence! Po---- there are methods of working on wall/punch bags that are specific methods/drills in a particular system or line of the system, but be aware such methods are only TC specific within a particular line,or even an individual teacher.A Hsing I guy might be doing much the same thing.So yeah,there are such drills,but there's so much crossover and such a buffet of choices on drills and methods that the drills themselves aren't just TC specific .
Learning to strike with fist and palm, and in combos, with feints and evasions (footwork and bodywork); is to my mind an essential aspect of TaiJiQuan - Quan meaning boxing. As El Med points out, there are many boxing drills, but they tend to be specific to lineage. In my lineage of Cheng Tin Hung's Wudang/Practical Taichichuan, there are the Running Thunder Hands drills/techniques/applications - with lead jab setup/drag back the block to open opponent, and counter with reverse strike - this uses a drop step - not unlike Jack Dempsey; and also Flying Flower Palm boxing, which has Taoist duality origins; but these are very specific to this lineage and seem to be largely passed down through oral tradition. Any old boxing pads, heavy bag, speed ball are good for this. To me the key is bringing in changing forces into your strikes, so that they follow duality of yin yang polarity into defence and attack.
Not bags and not obviously for striking but there's some tai chi training equipment in here: [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDaV9C0ERP8"]Early Wu style Taijiquan (1937) - YouTube[/ame] Cheers Rob
Thanks guys, my main aim was to find information on using things like the wall/hanging bag for striking but striking using taiji principles, for basic punch/striking development etc to train on at home.
