Actually if no one cared about the whole style v style thing your coach wouldn't have stepped up to defend tai chi, and you wouldn't have posted going ill be there with him
I don't care if mma beats tai chi or tai chi beats mma. Or if Hung gar beats tai chi, or boxing beats bjj and on and on and on. That what I mean by style vs. style. Or comparing one system to the next - we like to take them for what they are. So no, you don't know how we think and feel as much as you think you do. Of course we care about tai chi and how it's perceived, but we also care about all martial arts and have an interest & respect for all fighting systems and the people in them. Of course if a sytem and style you care about and are invested in is being perceived in a way you feel is unrepresentative of what it can and should be. You might do what any caring person would. It's not so much that this guy lost, but its how and who he was and what's being made of it. That's a BS representation of both fighting and Tai chi in many peoples eyes, so excuse me if anyone feels they can do a better job of that. Xu was calling out Chen style but refused to fight any of them that has Sanda training. So frankly I don't really care who he beats or who beats him, I think he's just bringing the whole Bullshido attitude to China. On one hand that's a good thing. But over here we've been there, done that and got the T shirt haven't we. So whilst it's a good thing and we've recently seen a wave of happless traditional guys getting whupped - did you see the Bagua vs. Sanda "fight" yet ? Some aspects of Xu's narrative are a bit. Well I don't really know quite how to put it. But ok. How about old hat and boring for starters ?
It's one thing to care about how and by whom your central system gets represented, it's another to worry or care about who comes out on top in style vs. style type match ups (we are obviously both cross trainers) and all the arguments around all this nonsense. "Sport vs. traditional" for example. It's what we do with our rudimentary binary thinking caps.. It's not really our thing. Nick has been in TCC for 7 years now, and he also trained for a while at the Oxford branch of CTH Wu style (Dan Docherty line). They've also had good success in full contact competition here. Anyway, Nick can speak for himself, Part 2 of his article about his MA journey is here. I saw it last night and I really enjoyed it. http://www.jetli.com/2017/05/discovering-mma-taiji-part-2 The stuff with Xu is pretty much all over as I understand it, How he's been dealt with in China doesn't leave a good taste, but what did he expect really.
The thing about this open challenge, is that if the MMA guy is defeated, the debate could quickly go in the direction of "it wasn't real tai chi", "he didn't use postures straight out of the form", "it was just sloppy kickboxing that got lucky" or "he'd trained in other things, so it wasn't tai chi that won". This kind of Shakespearean-sword measuring contest can't be resolved, because of the misconceptions of what tai chi should "look like" in action.
Actually I doubt that would happen, if someone from a tai chi background beat him I think most would say well done, it would ironically be more likely said criticism would come from within the tai chi family. This is exactly what happens with Alan Orr's guys, most sports guys give props to him for training guys to fight and win in mma, it's the wing chun crowd who argue he isn't using wing chun. My point wasn't if nick one it wouldn't look like tai chi but more would it be considered a win for tai chi when his background is heavily mma and grappling based.
Sorry, I didn't mean solely the MMA - I meant the other parties, as you say, like tai chi families or associations.
.. The win here would be that tai chi is part of an MMA system.. Anyone who's followed MMA knows that one style can't cut it and a win for any individual isn't counted as a win for any one single style anymore. That tai chi could have been part of this hypothetical win is more than enough IMO. Just like it was enough last time Nick fought. If what he's been training most prior to (5yrs at that time) a fight doesn't count as part of it, then what the hell does mate frankly. If you want to go and make this about purity, you can. But you can do the decent thing and leave certain people out of it. Did Nick ever claim tai chi purity; no he did not. Does he or could he hide his background; No. In his last fight in 2015 he chose to represent tai chi, he obviously felt that way for good reason. I don't think him doing that is a denial of his background and training in any way, only a recognition of how tai chi and it's principles has come to the forefront in his training regimens and influence on his overall approach. That's my basic opinion anyway, take it or leave it. If you want to have hypothetical or theoretical discussions about style, systems and cross training there are opportunities for you to do just that.
Leave him out of it, you brought him into it I simply said is it a win for tai chi with his background which was heavily mma and grappling based and he had successfully completed before he started tai chi? If you dont think that's a fair point that's up to you, and it's simply a matter of different opinions, but this is nothing personal I have not said anything against nick in anyway or questioned his intention in any way
It's probably because they can't fight their way out of a paper bag. That's the problem with a lot of TMA's who refuse to train outside the box. No full contact sparring and training against a resisting opponent. I have seen some really handy traditional stylists from various systems (and have been lucky to train with some of them) They're in the minority though.
Fair enough, I've had fun playing devils advocate with you. Me and the devil, we're pretty damn tight. happy training
