Pressure Testing

Pressure testing at Cyclone Wing Chun
By David Charlton
 
The chu sau lei system at Cyclone, starts the pressure testing early,  with structure testing, where if you get it wrong you take a step forwards or backwards, not particularly damaging! 
 
However maintaining a good structure is a critical technique underpinning the system, the ability to destroy an opponent's structure whilst maintaining your own and then “doing something”  is a principle underlying many different martial arts, and it is key to practicing an effective form.  Practice in most cases does not make perfect, it just makes it permanent.   Knowing an ineffective form exceptionally well does not make the techniques within it effective, just as knowing an effective form superficially well, does not mean those techniques will work under pressure. 
 
Do the individual components of your form resemble what you do when you use them in training?  If not, why not?  Good western boxers do not spend hour after hour on the bags perfecting their ”form”; footwork, jabs, straights, hooks and uppercuts, and combinations to make them as effective and devastating as possible then to enter the ring and fight like a rowdy teenager or drunken thug.  Their form guides their techniques in the fight, if the form is terrible and the hooks are “wound up” before being thrown, or they repeatedly drop their guard whilst throwing a straight, chances are it will be a very short fight. On the other hand if their form (foot work and punches on the bag) are nice and fluid, tight, fast, and effective and they can apply them under pressure, then their boxing skills will be visible for all to see. 
 
This leads nicely onto the next step which is testing the application of the components of the form, not simply the form.  In a controlled environment this safely reveals not only whether  your form is correct but crucially if your application of the form is correct, usually this done with  14 oz boxing gloves for safety's sake.  This isolation of techniques is quite common in most good modern approaches to training.  The key word here is training and it is just that, not sparring, not fighting, not a system, but training.  Training a fighting system solely around a set of techniques in isolation, is not ideal, but as a training tool is it very useful.
 
The next step,  is bringing the isolated techniques together, applying techniques in combination or in quick succession, not two step or three step sparring, where each technique is predetermined, but responding to a limited variety of attacks, in an unpredictable order and rhythm.  This can be striking from a distance, striking from the clinch, grappling for a dominant position etc etc.  Learning how to deal efficiently  with an effective attack under pressure, without the additional worry of “is it going to be a punch, a knee, a kick, a takedown, a lock, a throw?”
 
The next step is the application of techniques in a more free-flowing style, (including punches knees kicks takedowns, locks, throws), some people call this sparring, and tend not to associate it with technical learning, however it can be, if it is trained that way.  It also can be a blood bath, with people trying to knock each other out, for a whole evening..... 
 
Sparring can be a two way street, the bigger person should learn not to solely rely on reach and power, which will mean they will have to pick their shots.  The smaller person should not just rely on moving quickly out of the way but use it to practice covering and counterstriking (for those times when they cannot move quickly out of the way).  Its really easy to do solely what you are good at, but working on the weakest part of your fighting chain will pay dividends in the long run.
It would be really easy for a more proficient person to really bash around a person who has been training for only three weeks, however neither will learn much (the beginner might however realise he is in a bad training environment and leave).
 
The next level is pressure testing in an arena, this is where it is important that the system you chose and your training method are suited to where you choose to test yourself.
The term “arena” can mean many things, if aerobic fitness was your aim, then do a “bleep test” or do the Great North Run, if getting a belt/sash was your aim then take a grading, if you wanted to fight in a rules based environment, then enter a competition, but make sure the rules are appropriate to how you have been training.  No matter how good the practitioners are, a western boxer and a kendoka should not compete under one another's rules!
 
Very rarely do one trick ponies win MMA fights, the Gracie family proved a system that relies purely on a striking  martial art will not do well.  Most good MMA fighters cover all ranges, striking, clinch, and ground, either in one system or in a combination.  Like we do at Cyclone Wing Chun in Newcastle.