What are people's experience of shock power in kung-fu?

I only know it from southern praying mantis, and I am intriged by whether it can be used effectively. The whole system is geared around developing this short-range power, yet most mantis guys can't apply it in a practical manner.

Any thoughts would be more then welcome

In Chen taiji it's refered to as shuddering, and yep, it works.

Chow Gar guy, rather than take someone's word, try this for 4 months: your "yee kup som bo jin" 100 times a day (exhaustive, I know, maybe more than one training session per day) with a light barbell balanced across your fore-arms in conjunction with the so-called "iron-sand palm" training for this same period of time. For me, the key wasn't so much in how hard one tensed, but how quickly one could totally relax in the instant between thrusts (also, remember always from the center, never just arms alone). See what happens.

Yeah relaxing in between releasing the power is vital. I do definately need to practice som bo jin more often!

What are anyone's experiences of getting hit with shock power?

Also is shock power an efficient way of punching in a real fight? How do you measure yourself becoming stronger at it?

Whenever I've used it (I've only been cultivating it for just over a year) it barely makes an opponement stagger back a couple of steps. Which is nice, but not quite the mystical force that some have come to view shock power as being.

My sifu had terrific "shock power" he used for short palm strikes, but his favorite use for this was to "pop" away someone's arms who was sticking to him. One of my classmates who was crossing hands with him and was too rigid ended up with one of his shoulders dislocated when his forearms were struck downward. I've felt it myself and hit on certain spots, your arms are buzzing and the force sends them flying. Supposedly, one of the reasons these fukien systems are so right-handed (besides the obvious reasons) is that shocking the heart was an oft-used technique back then, so one kept the left side away from one's opponent. Years ago, I met an advanced Shorin-ryu practitioner who was able to do this. I could actually feel the force of his strike course through my body. 2 people I sparred with this past year claim they felt something similiar from my fingerthrust, but one I struck at 2 pressure points, the other one had heard of it so may have been his imagination. My palm strikes, though still not as powerful as my sifu's, have become very "easy" to do, I feel like I could keep my arms up in front of me all day (I have been doing this for many years but only in the past few with dedication). I think only consistent sparring can show one's progress in something like that. Also, remember even though your arm may only move several inches, your whole body should also (in our system it looks like an explosive uncoiling). One last thing: bamboo forest style has an almost tai chi-like side to it that reminds me somewhat of yiquan. Does Chow Gar have "soft" chi'kung (perhaps that would help)?

We do have a few soft chigung sets in Chow Gar. I have only trained in one, known as 18 dark internal palms (nice name eh?).

Although no tension is used at all with this set, practicing the movements have given me the closest sensation to what I perceive 'chi' to be i.e. feeling a wave of warmth shoot down my arms, with the forearm skin tightening.

We have a similar structure in Chow Gar, although some critics might say it is not as soft as Jook Lum - so our punches no doubt use the same method of uncoiling a punch through opening/closing the rib-cage and sinking the chest etc.

Cheers though - I will take your points on board with my own training regime. But as always wtith gung-fu, patience/hard-work is a necessity

"feeling a wave of warmth shoot down my arms, with the forearm skin tightening"

Just realised how dodgy this sounds, especially if you glance at the post instead of reading it properly..lol!

Apologies

CGG

My experience with this has been limited, however I beleive that with a well delivered shocking strike the target should not be moved backwards.

As you improve with this it may not be a good idea to practice on people. I too, discussed methods of testing this type of strike, it caused much mirth in this forum. Check out old posts.

Chow Gar guy, that sounds about like our "moi fa sao" exercise. BTW, Mark makes an important point: properly done, the so-called "shock power" shouldn't be absorbed, it should go through the target. These demonstrations of people flying backwards and such aren't really relevant to this particular attribute, I would think.

The Chinese usually divide force into two broad categories, Long and Short. "Shocking" is an example of Short Power and uprooting/ causing an opponent to fly back a distance is an example of Long Power.

There is a saying in Chinese that Short Power strikes injure the opponent inside without causing him to move much ("da tong") and long strikes cause little impact injury but cause the opponent to fly a great distance ("da fei").

Interestingly enough, a few of my Shuai Chiao brothers have some experience with southern mantis and they use shock power to disrupt my balance and structure when grip fighting.

It's quite annoying and frequently painful.

Tim

I have often heard of long and short bridge power generation. but in the sense of how far the arm needs to move to generate power in relation to the opponents body. Often in my style it is refered to as inch power or one inch punch. Opponents being projected backwards often happens when you strike the sternum as this acts as a natural spring within the body protecting vital organs. We also have the kind of internal srikes you mention one in the chum kil form is known as bouncing punch the energy spirals inwards and bounces off different organ causing damage.

I would be surprised if you could sock your Grandma square in the jaw, little lone "chum kil" bounce punch gallbladder 12.

As opposed to gall bladder 1-11. Uber-fu how many gall bladders do you own.Plus I would not sock my grandma in the jaw she lived through the blitz and is a tough old bird.

In response to "My experience with this has been limited, however I beleive that with a well delivered shocking strike the target should not be moved backwards." I have read that there are actually several types of methods of performing the "chinese short punch" or "Bruce Lee's 1 and 3 inch punches". The basic type throws the opponent several feet back with practice. The long version (the next level) can throw a person much further back and off the ground, and can be felt through a line of 8 people. The final version (advanced) drops someone on the spot. I found this out via searching for "Chinese short punch" on google.

I also realized by using the internet that the iron-palm slap is really just the martial arts equivilent of a pro-baseball pitcher's throw. A strong pitcher's hand moves over 90 mph with the proper wind-up and technique when he throws a fastball. The technique for iron palm is very, very similar. The hand conditioning exercises just strengthen the hand to be able to withstand the force of being thrown at 90 mph at a concrete slab.

Remember, more than 30% of the power in a race car engine is lost in the transmission and power transfer system (I'm guessing much more in a family sedan). By perfecting technique and strengthening the joints (especially the wrists, I read something on this in Blackbelt magazine a few months ago; bruce lee was also a fanatic about strong forearms and therefore strong wrists) to prevent them from letting the power you can generate from being wasted, it will greatly increase the applied force without you even having to become stronger or faster.

Don't confuse 'short' hitting with 'shocking' blows. One refers to distance from the target, the other is about how your force is applied.

True. Also, Chow Gar Guy and I were referring to southern mantis "short" strikes. I think WC inch-punch uses rather different body dynamics.

The techniques are different but the principles and methods of generating the power are the same. The goal in both "short" strikes and "shocking" blows is to generate maximum power in a very small distance. The key to this is to get the entire body to work together when delivering the blows.

I think that really strong forearm and shoulder muscles are the key to both of these types of strikes. Your shoulders are used much more than your chest muscles when punching. I know from just messing around with doing wrist curls and then punching the heavy bag that because the forearms are stretched and ready to work hard from doing the wrist curls that my punches actually hit harder by around 15 to 20 % because the wrists don't absorb as much of the blow (I know in a book I read by an iron palm master that he said that one of the reasons he really likes palm strikes is because in them, the wrist absorbs less of the power of the strike).

I am not kidding. My vertical jump is also around 1 to 2 inches higher after I do squats and barbell toe raises (25-26 inches instead of the regular 24 inches) because the leg muscles are stretched and ready to work harder.

Even if you hate Bruce Lee, a lot of what he said is vital to practicioners of all martial arts. He showed that a lot of the "mystic, magic chi power" that many martial arts master taught can be explained easily through physics and physiology. How did he punch with such explosive power? Despite his small size he could lift a 135 barbell horizontally out in front of him with his elbows locked for 20 seconds. Do you know *anyone* who has shoulders that strong?

I think the key to getting "shocking" power is to strengthen the whole body as much as possible with weights (but not trying to get big like a body builder), getting really good endurance from running and such (which also gets rid of excess, slowing fat), eliminating all unnecessary tension from your body, and becoming as fast and as explosive as possible and then getting all of this to work together to create something called "shock" power.

All the "inch-punch" demos I'd seen where the subject was thrown back several feet involved their holding a pad or phonebook at point of impact to disperse the blow so they could absorb the shock. Otherwise (presumably), the force would have went through them.

Our training in the so-called "short power" was to decrease reaction time and keep our gates closed, never for performing stage tricks.

I find Elects' comments interesting. I used forearm and shoulder in karate. Now I use upper body muscles only to raise or rotate the arm. All power comes from below the navel. I understand there are also power generation methods involving the spinal and 'ribcage' muscles but I am not training those yet.

If I were to select one single thing which most increased my speed, it would be from standing in Wu Chi. That released unnecessary tension from my body.