There are two type of lap sau and these two different types have two different purposes.
The first version and the most common version uses a soft grip. The soft grip does not hold tightly nor does it "pull" the opponent. Its purpose is to guide and control the opponents punch.
The second version is less common and it uses a tight grip. The tight grip is meant to pull the opponent and make them move. It can also be used as a precursor to chin na (which is something not covered in this post). Most beginners will interpret the lap sau as this version and will be blind to the differences between the first and second version.
What the novice will experience is frustration because they simply can't tightly grip on to their opponents wrist. Let this be a lesson to you. When your opponent throws a fast punch you MUST use a soft grip.
When your car is driving really fast, the correct way to stop the vehicle is to press on the break softly and adjust the pressure as the car slows down. The wrong way to stop a car is to SLAM on the breaks. Your car would begin to slide on the road and you will wonder why the car isn't stopping. (Cars these days have anti lock braking to prevent this skidding, but that is beside the point)
The analogy is very similar to what happens when you try to grab a super fast punch with a super hard grip: it will end up sliding in your hand. (especially if you decided to add a pull to it.)
ok, lets go back to the soft grip so i can tell you about the technical aspects of how you do it. In the soft grip , you only use two fingers: ring and pinkie.
1)When the opponent punches, you first make contact with the blade of your hand.
2) Rotate your hand so that you can grab your opponents wrist with just those two fingers.
3) Guide the punch to the shoulder gate. The elbow should still be one fist distance in away from the chest, just like the tan sau.
The soft grip lap sau is good because it is uncommitted. The wing chun man must stay uncommitted until the situation falls in his favor. When does it fall in his favor? It happens when you are able to draw your opponent into the wing chun trap. The trap enables the user to predict the opponents next movement. More on this in another post.
Now after the soft grip lap sau has been successful, and the battle falls in the hero's favor, you may use a tight grip. HAVE i mentioned that we are only talking about single handed lap sau?
Ok, now for the technical elaboration of the tight grip lap sau.
1) initially you already have the pinkie and the ring finger latched on to the opponents wrist.
2) continue to tighten one finger at a time around the wrist in this order:
pinkie-> ring -> middle -> index-> thumb
3) pull outwards. Do not pull it close to your body. The pull is best done when your opponent is about to throw a punch with the free hand. Reason being is that he will tighten his body to deliver the punch and that will turn his body into a lever.
double handed lap sau will be covered in another post.
in conclusion, a soft grip lap sau is used when the punch is flying at you really fast. A right grip lap sau is useful when the punch has already been slowed down. The slow down can be you or your opponents intervention.
No comments:
Post a Comment