Bruce Lee has been dead for 41 years.
He's a marketing tool, or, his visage is at least.
There's people who have heroes.
Let people have heroes. If they want that.
Kung Fu is good for you.
I read Showdown In Oakland last year, and being from the Bruce Lee/JKD side of things I will say from my perspective is that the truth is somewhere in the middle of both stories. TBH, Bruce thought he won because he didn't think, as WJM claims, that his opponent tripped. Anyone who has sparred/fought knows things happen fast and you don't always have the clearest picture of what is happening. I know I've experienced this from having been video recorded while sparring, I didn't realize I was doing something, and then noticed it was very pronounced on video. Subjective accounts are not the best source for information, unfortunately there wasn't a camera at the time to determine who really won, if anyone really won to begin with.
By the way, I think the whole story about race is just a story, probably one BL told his wife so that she wouldn't get too upset with him fighting.
Last edited by Fa Xing; 06-03-2014 at 09:31 AM.
I think the whole thing has been through the story mill so often it's not even worth considering anymore.
We are in the here and now after all and so any beef between a guy who has been dead for 40+ years and WJM is
not really relevant to our training cycles.
Bruce Lee has been dead longer than most here have even been alive.
I don't know how many times I've encountered 20 somethings going on about how Great BL was.
It's kind of not really helping me be convinced of their intelligence levels quite frankly...
But that's just me.
People gonna do what they gonna do.
Kung Fu is good for you.
I agree that the story is past being relevant. But I don't see anything wrong about somebody admiring BL. After all, LOTS of people go on and on about how 'great' John Wayne was, calling him 'A Real American Hero'. I personally disagree about JW, but to each his/her own. And as for BL, it's when the admiration crosses over into cult worship that it goes too far. But admiring BL is, IMO, far better than hero-worshipping people like Ed Gein, Charles Manson, etc., who, believe it or not, have lots of admirers.
Anyway, there's at least as many 20-something year-olds who post a lot of smack about BL, saying how much he 'sucks'. That's every bit as ignorant as those who believe BL was 'The Greatest Ever'.
Last edited by Jimbo; 06-03-2014 at 02:26 PM.
But how is the story not relevant anymore? They're making a movie about it. The fight was supposedly the impetus for Bruce developing Jeet Kune Do, a style that a great many people promote to this day. The claim that the fight was over racism (when it surely was not) is still accepted by most martial artists and Bruce Lee fans throughout the world.
Peter Ralston trained with Sifu Wong in the 1970's which was decades before I learned anything from him. Just the fact that he was the first Caucasian to win an international full-contact Martial Arts World Tournament should make people question the validity of these claims that the fight was over racism. In my experience, when one thing in someone's story is proven to be a lie there's usually a lot more falsities people don't know about.Originally Posted by SKM
Question: Is not Peter Ralston from your school? He carved out an impressive niche for himself with his Jen Hsin School of training. All the best.
Last edited by Siu Lum Fighter; 06-12-2014 at 08:18 PM.
The three components of combat are 1) Speed, 2) Guts and 3) Techniques. All three components must go hand in hand. One component cannot survive without the others." (WJM - June 14, 1974)
Jeet Kuen Do isn't a style though. It even says so in Bruce's book. It's about how to make the style you have effective. It's not bad info either overall and has some interesting aspects to it.
Making a movie doesn't give something more relevancy though. Does it?
Kung Fu is good for you.
Well, in the 1960's there was a set curriculum while he was teaching, from what I read, and heard from talking to Jerry Poteet that it was called Jeet Kune Do, and their certificates say Jeet Kune Do on them. Bruce has also mentioned in his book (we're referring to Tao of JKD, I presume) that JKD is modified wing chun, modified western boxing, and modified western fencing.
You are right to an extent though that it is not a style, especially the longer in you train with the principles that Bruce talked about. In fact when he trained Joe Lewis, he didn't really train in him in techniques but more had him train what he knew and adapt his principles to Lewis' already effective fighting abilities.
This is Ted Wong's certificate, and it says "Bruce Lee's Jeet Kune Do."
I have always liked this description of JKD.
As well as Bruce's own words. .
IN a nutshell, JKD is a set of principles that can be applied to any style/system of combat.
Does that then make that style JKD?
No, not really.
That said, the moment anyone formalizes anything, even principles, it is almost impossible NOT to develop a system.
Psalms 144:1
Praise be my Lord my Rock,
He trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle !
The "system" that was Bruce Lees was "Jun Fan Kung Fu"
the JKD was as Sanjuro states, but was not systematized, no sets, nothing there that didn't apply to any martial arts from Bruces understaning of them etc.
FWIW Jun Fan was Bruce's actual name IE : Lee Jun Fan. Bruce was his American name.
It would be like if a guy named Ted opened a Kung Fu school and called it "Ted's Kung Fu" same/same.
And yes, BL was junior classmate to William Cheung who was senior student of Ip Man. Bruce is said to have learned a little more than half the style of Wing Chun and he dabbled in a bunch of other stuff.
His primary interest was obviously making movies and being a movie star.
Kung Fu is good for you.