For the educated minority..

**MaartenSFS** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 3:41am

I came to China when I was 18 years olde with the impression that China was the birthplace of Eastern Martial arts and so they should have the best, and that China was a traditional country..

After years of searching for that mountain-top Shifu and finding nothing but dancers and imported martial arts I have decided to take up the more modern Sanda (AKA Sanshou). Traditional Chinese Martial Arts* in China are DEAD.

I was wondering what your (the educated forum-goers) general opinion of Sanda is. It's not fancy. It doesn't attract tourism. It doesn't represent traditional Chinese culture. The bottom line is... Is it effective?

*Martial Art = The strive for perfection of the techniques that have been tried and tested in combat for combat.

- Maarten Sebastiaan Franks Spijker

**Judah Maccabee** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 11:29am

This is the wrong forum for this, as it relates to a style, not about striking.

That being said, Sanda is considered better in some regards because it trains in ranges beyond pure striking, which is typical of most kung-fu. It's standup with takedowns, and is thereby ALMOST MMA, but not quite.

**CanucKyokushin** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 11:41am

Sanda is for a lack of a better description China's answer to Thai-boxe.

**Lights Out** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 11:57am

Originally Posted by The Krumpus

Sanda is for a lack of a better description China's answer to Thai-boxe.

Yup, pretty much.

Of course, some Sanda guys can tell you all about how Sando is centuries old, and how it relates to some tournaments between schools of Kung fu and blah, blah, blah...

At least, the train with aliveness, as any other contact sport.

Also, it has some interesting throws.

That being said, I still prefer MT.

**CanucKyokushin** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 12:37pm

I remember around late '80s early 90's when I started hearing about Chinese-kickboxing being the true deadly art and all.Of course this was years before I had any interest in starting MA so i was easily impressed .

**meng_mao** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 2:37pm

Maarten, most people on this forum would say that Qinna is dead by your definitions, but you seem to feel otherwise. Can you reconcile that with your view on Sanda being the only alive way to train?

**MaartenSFS** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 8:37pm

Thanks for the replies. I start tonight. Even though, at first glance, I hated everything about MMA (Lack of culture, history, et cetera) it is still better than dancing with culture and history. Unless... It's sexy belly dancing and my wife is doing it...

Originally Posted by meng_mao

Maarten, most people on this forum would say that Qinna is dead by your definitions, but you seem to feel otherwise. Can you reconcile that with your view on Sanda being the only alive way to train?

In regards to Qinna... Qinna is not a style of MA, but rather a subset of all of them. And Qinna is never practised alone. Just because the MAs of today have specialised doesn't mean that they were intented to be learned apart from each other. They all complement each other. Qinna has worked in the past and will continue to work in the future. It all depends on the practitioner's training. I have seen it used to great effect by the Chinese police. That said, it is not a means to an end. Nowadays we can't hack people to bits with a primary weapon (Like the sword, spear) and must rely on secondary weapons like our hands and feet. In the past no masters could go up against countless adversaries without a weapon (And even then..). The same is true today. There are no end-all styles/techniques. If Qinna were not useful to some degree it would not exist and/or would not still be trained by military/police today. Under my definition and from my perspective Qinna is quite alive. Also, my definition does not apply to MA in general. It applies to a specific practitioner that practises that art. If a practitioner sucks it has nothing to do with the effectiveness of that art unless he/she is the founder.

I also don't believe that training "alive" is an end-all solution either. Being in combat day in and day out and testing those techniques on the battlefield is the best way. And you'd eventually get too olde or lose too many body parts and fall, anyways. Most of what people do today is LARPing... Even MMA. *GASP*

- Maarten Sebastiaan Franks Spijker

**feedback** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 9:30pm

Kind regards,
Maarten Sebastiaan Franks Spijker, london

**MaartenSFS** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 9:34pm

Originally Posted by feedback

Kind regards,
Maarten Sebastiaan Franks Spijker, london

... Thank you.

- Maarten Sebastiaan Franks Spijker

**meng_mao** · Posted On: 12/25/2006 9:42pm

Maarten -- I would say Sanda is a subset of all MA as well, in that its techniques can be found in other arts that are unrelated.

As to aliveness, we cannot fully train safely the ultimate in hand to hand fighting. But Sanda offers much more effectiveness under limited rules (for safe training) than Qinna does, if you were to only train one or the other.