• Archive through July 21, 2004 July 21 - 11:51 am [20]

Fantasy of having skill by association is a common thing among martial arts geeks. Geek!

I was just looking for some information on gao style and came across this forum. Pretty funny seeing a forum discussion about George Wood. I was a friend and student of George's for years before he went to train with Luo de-xiu and he was definiteley not one to mess with then. The guy trained with amazing tenacity, his skill was very sharp and powerful. He was good then and I'm sure he's great now. And if Luo de-xiu authorizes him to teach then who are you to question his ability? I am sure he is a qualified teacher, but I question whether you deserve to be a student. George, if you're reading this, greetings from Kung Fu Chicken.

By the way, can anyone attest to the ability of a gao stylist by the name of Victor Chao, and whether or not he's a good teacher? He teaches in my area and I'm thinking about training under him, but I want to make sure I'm not getting scammed out of my money and, more importantly, my time.

Redbeard

you must live in southeast lower michigan as victor teaches in ann arbor. i have attended his classes before. when i attended, victor started beginners with basic warm-ups and excercises, and jumped right into the straight line forms. now i hear that he teaches more internal strength methods first as opposed to jumping right into forms. i spoke to him over the phone awhile back and he said that he would teach forms if you were experienced and that's what you wanted. he loses a lot of students though as they lose patience with him. i'm not sure if he is actually willing to teach what he knows. but i can attest to his skills. he is trained in yiquan, wu taiji, gao bagua, and hsing-i. he is very powerful, and appears to be a good fighter. i know another yiquan practitioner who crossess hands with him, and victor pretty much man handles him. anyway, you may want to attend a class and find out for yourself. he teaches in his house on pontiac trail in ann arbor on thursday nights. i'm always looking for martial artists in the area. where are you located, and what do you practice besides gao style?

Save your money and time. His asian descent might fool you and he can talk a good game.

Ali,I live in Ann Arbor and did Hung Gar and many random bits of other kung fu styles at a school here but stopped after I injured my back . I was there for around 8 years. I couldn't even do tai chi for a number of years after my injury. I also didn't think they were really going to advance my skills anymore either so I never went back. Then I checked out Pencak Silat Seni Haqq for a while, which I really liked and would've stuck with except the instructor seemed really sketchy so I got out of it. I've really spent a lot of time and money on training and was disappointed so I'm trying to find quality martial arts instruction in the area in traditional martial arts but I haven't found anything that impresses me. I know first hand that you can put total faith in your instructor and train very hard and they will string you along until you get wise so I'm being very careful. I don't think I will ever trust an instructor that teaches as a primary source of income. This is off the subject of Gao style but if anybody knows of a good instructor out here please post it for me. Frank Speaker, if you wouldn't mind, let me know what you base your opinion on, it's strange to me that it's so different from Ali's.

Redbeard,

Like I said before, you may want to attend a class and make your own decisions about victor or any other instructor. I've been around numerous instructors, and my impression is that while he is very skillfull, he may not be willing to teach the real deal, just my opinion for whatever it's worth. Have you tried Richard Miller? I trained with him in chen taiji and yin bagua for awhile. I had to stop training with him as graduate school (u of m), family life, and work got hectic. I never stopped training on my own, and actually travel to study chen style with a student of Chen Xiaowang's in Illinois, and I'll be returning to continue my studies with Richard soon. Anyway Richard is a student of Adam Hsu. Master Hsu is kind of a controversial figure in the world of Kung-fu, but his lineage is top-notch as he was a student of GM Liu Yun Chiao. People on this board will probably chime in about him, his students, and his skills, but the man can go, bottom line. And Richard is very good as well. His main style used to be baji/piqua as taught by GM Liu and he is very skilled. He is also very good at chen/zhaobao taiji. Now he really focuses on Yin style bagua as taught by the late Dr. Xie Peiqi. He travels to China several times a year to train with He Jinbao, Dr Xie's chosen lineage holder in the martial aspects of his system, and hosts He several times a year for seminars. Richard is very skillful and very accessible to his students. Classes are tough but fun, and a great amount of time is spent on applications as well as forms/basics. He teaches at Calvery Methodist Church on Monday and Thursday nights, and burns park on Saturday mornings, weather permitting. There are some other martial artists in the area, but I put most of them on the level of that "martial arts studio downtown" where you learned hung gar, GARBAGE!!! Although, there are a few others who are pretty good. If you would like to know about them or more about richard hit me up at a_shakoor@hotmail.com.

Anyone know of good Bagua (specifically Gao might be asking too much ) or Taiji near Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Thanks,
Richard

Follow up... Is Marcus Brinkman still in Oklahoma City?

I am Gao style practitioner for almost 20 years.But after I come to canada 8 years ago,I didn't train as hard as I was in Beijing before. My lineage is Gao yisheng to Wu mengxia to Bi tianzuo then to me.my teacher only tought 3 students,and we tried to keep it secret,because Its powerful and violent nature. this summer I invited my teacher came to Canada to visit.My teacher kind of worried about the futhur of this uniqe art.He is 70 years old now and can't teach any more.He hopes to let me to make the art pass along. after he left in Auguest. I found a Gao style website in Taiwan(YizongBagua). I found out what they posted on the net is not a complete Gao system, I tried to post some message on their board( in chinese),But didn't get any responds. I am not a KongFu teacher,I am a business owner. But I want to get some guy really want to know the real chinese internal arts, and make the arts continue to survive.
I live in Edmonton Canada.

What is the Yizong system missing in your opinion?

Richard - Check out www.gaostylebagua.com

That is Marcus Brinkman's website.

Yusen - I too am curious on what you think is missing from the Yizong system.

What is it with some of the Bagua posters on this board and secrecy and unique styles with hidden moves only taught to the worthy? I know people like to keep some things secret but really, some people have been a little too over the top.

Everyone remember the guy who said that his master paid 8 homeless people for him to fight for his 1st degree blackbelt in bagua test. He has to fight 16 for his second degree and so on and so on. He also claimed to be able to liquify someone's heart with his palm strike. He even said his master was a special forces guy in vietnam and learned a "super secret, super powerful" version of it there from a daoist monk.

I'll pay him the 20 bucks his teacher paid the homeless people to strike my chest with his heart liquifying strike.

If I don't die of heart liquification (cardia liquifiabullshitia in latin) then I'll take his blackbelt (after defeating him with my old fashioned technique of hitting his jaw with my palm) and start my own school of bagua

Richard,

Marcus Brinkman is here in Oklahoma City currently, but may be going to Taiwan again soon. I teach Baguazhang in Moore, Oklahoma just south of OKC. If you are interested in possibly training, or even in grabbing a coffee sometime, let me know. My email is chrsmckinley@yahoo.com.

I don't know anyone from Yizong Bagua, What I learned about them is only from their website.By what they post on the net tells me: they are the real Gao style practitioners. they have almost same thing as I was taughed. but somehow in the pre-heaven part, they didn't post 10-single exercises. and instead of 5 dragons wave the tails,they only have "black dragon waves the tail). and miss 2 other moves with it. In the past-heaven part, they miss the 8 sticky palms forms(which is Qing,min,qi,quan,he,gu,lian,bei).those forms contains all the 64 palms and 12 animal striks. after that is a" Red Phoenix face the sun".
Gao style is famous for it's no bullshit fighting system. It's more science than mistery.It's pretty hard on the body.So I do more
taichi after I came to Canada( I am a "lazy guy"). We paid more attention to how to get the power out at any angle than to actual fighting techs.and I never learned how to melt someone's body parts by palms.

If I'm guessing at what your talking about. The material is there.

If you get a chance drop on over to www.yizongbagua.com and introduce yourself.

I'd love to compare notes with you and many there are very interestaed in all branches of the Gao system of BGZ.

Yusen,

I am a student of Marcus Brinkman in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and at the last class he taught on Sept 3rd, he mentioned the 5 dragons sequences and demonstrated some of them but said he had decided not to teach this time. I haven't heard him mention the eight sticky palms but that does not mean they don't exist in Yizong (Taiwan) bagua. Perhaps Tim can clarify this or ask George Wood over at www.yizongbagua.com Both Tim and George are students of Luo. Marcus is the senior student.

Richard,

I encourage you to take up Chris McKinley's invitation. I know him personally and can vouch for his excellence as a teacher.

Matthew Webb

I am looking for a Ba Gua school or instructor within the New Jersey or New York City area for my daughter. Can someone here reccommend an instructor for me?

It's really nice to know there are so many people outside China practicing Gao style BG.I was too excitied to find you guys website and whithout more thinking I posted things above. Like I mentioned before, What I knew about yizong Bagua Is just from TaiWan Website. I might be all wrong about the whole thing. But by no means I wanted to show off or to point fingers to anyone. I apologize to the confusions. I will tell my teacher about you guys, I am sure he will be happy.
regards
yusen

Hi,

Try Frank Allen on the Lower east side of Manhattan. (212) 533-1751. That's the gym number, try calling weeknight evenings or during the day on sunday. If you get an answering machine, you should get a prompt reply. Otherwise, check out the website, www.wutangpca.com . Frank's a really good guy, an excellent teacher with about thirty years experience and teaches in a very accomadating way. By this I mean that he will get on the gloves and spar his students if you like sparring, he will focus on health practices if that's what you are into. There are two or three other instructors teaching at his school, Tina Zhuang (I think that's how you spell it) and Terri Ferrari, both of whom are also great people and strong teachers in their own right.

Best of luck,
Josh Vogel

Hi again,

I just noticed the topic of this thread. Frank Allen does not teach Gao style bagua. He is a long time student of Bruce Frantzis and the late BP Chan, teaching their Bagua, Hsing I, Tai chi, meditation and chi gung programs as well as his own "Fighting for health" program which is essentially boxing and kick boxing. His main thing, as I see it is the Bagua and I would say that last time I was around the gym regularly that's what had the most regular students.

Regards,
Josh

Yusen -
It wasn't taken that way. We're always looking
for more information on the Gao style, whatever
branch on the tree.
I hope you continue to correspond with us regarding your system and I'm glad you've decided to teach some people.

Best,
Pete

Matt,

Thank you for the compliment. I'd love to be able to recommend training with Marcus Brinkman to Richard, but from what I understand, he's now back in Taiwan for a while. Just as an FYI, if any of Marcus's guys would be interested in training together until he returns, I'd be happy to provide whatever instruction I can. Thanks again.

Chris

I live in Tulsa, Oklahoma and am looking for Baguazhang instruction. I have contacted Marcus Brinkman, but he is back in Taiwan again. I attempted to email Chris McKinley using the email address earlier in this thread. Does anyone have other contact information for him? No if he is still teaching? No of any other teachers near Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Thanks,
Richard

Richard,

I know Chris M and Marcus personally, Chris is still here teaching Baguazhang, I also teach(Taijiquan). Drop me a line if you want to come down. My email is gary@flowingcombat.com, my phone is 405-209-6381.

Marcus is in Taiwan now, but if you want any of his DVDs I am selling them on his behalf...


regards,

Gary

Richard,
You are fortunate to have Gary and Chris in your area. BTW if you go Geo's site or emptyflower you can get Luo's summer seminar dates.

Hi Gary,

So you teach Baguazhang and Taijiquan, or just Taijiquan?


To the whole group,

Do any of you know or have heard of Sifu Tuey Staples of the Floating Lotus School of Tai Chi Chuan and Baguazhang in St. Louis Missouri?

Thanks,
Richard