10th World Wushu Games

[David Jamieson]

I am in support of any kind of events that are related to CMA.

no interests in politics.

may the best team win.

I really do not like the nan do things.

here are why:

1. if you are promoting wushu for common people, you would make it easy so more people may learn and enjoy it.

such as Yang tai chi made easier without a lot of kicks, and stomping feet, so that 80 some years old may do it, too.

2. they should have wushu events for different age brackets

such as kids wushu, teen wushu, college or young adult wushu, middle age wushu and senior wushu.

since wushu is a communist idea, then why not make it available to everyone.

and not just for the elite kids chosen since young, hours of rigorous training from 5 to 6 years old all the way to 16 in wushu schools for years, and then compete--

so wushu is for athletic elites and not for everyone?

all athletic competition is for elites. Or should be.

everyone can do wushu, modified or otherwise.

would you pay to watch old men dotter about and pose? I wouldn't. BUt I would pay to see hot chicks flying through the air and screaming with a spear whirling about their head.

because that has value and is marketable.

If i want to see old people and kids playing martial arts, I'll go to the park. lol

no offense and I agree that it should be for everyone and I think it really is.

but for entertainment value that is worth paying for, I don't want to see anyone who isn't an elite in their sport.

[GLW]

While I have no real problem with the flash and elite aspect of IWuF Wushu competition, I do have two basic issues with how it is being done and the impact it all has on Wushu (as in martial arts) practice on the whole.

First, the IWuF keeps changing the judging rules in their attempt to make it "Better". For example, currently, there is a requirement for TEN judges in a Taolu ring. The duties of the Head Judge were expanded to include actual scoring in addition to the other duties the Head Judge has. It has traditionally been hard enough to get the 5 scoring judges and 1 Head Judge required in the old way. Getting 10 in a competition such as Taiji Legacy or others is almost always going to be out of the question.

Second, they keep changing the scoring ideas in addition to adding things like'extra' movements that have to be approved. Workable in China but not in the US or Canada.

Third, and most importantly, with the move towards harder and harder moves, the injury rate rises. It is not uncommon to see the 'elite' competitors walking around with knee, ankle, back, etc... braces and performing injured.

Personally, I would discourage my daughter from doing such things since : (1) there is no money in it long term and (2) the types of injuries possible are PERMANENT and mean pain for a lifetime.

As for the others, the late Wang Ziping maintained that Wushu should have Lien, Yong, Kan... as in serve for use (martial), have art to it, and promote the health and development of the body and mind.

This new approach throws martial out - and many will argue that Contemporary Wushu always did... but now it also throws the health and development aspect out as well. They simply keep Kan - the look......

[SPJ]

yes. everyone wants to see what is the best among the bests.

everyone may play soccer on the streets, but only the best plays at world games for soccer.

I like to stress 2 points

1. opera vs folk songs. opera for the singing talents, folk songs for common people. everyone may learn easily and start to hum.

I am for making wushu easy to learn and people may remember them for life and enjoy for life for health/fitness or some fighting skills.

wushu should take roots at grass level, or folk arts. if it is only staying among elites, then it will die soon.

shuai jiao has grass roots among mongolian and moslem people. not everyone is the best, but everyone may tumble a bit and enjoy it. any cultural events, or gathering, they will be shuai jiao event as folk activities. are all of them good? probably not, but all have fun.

the continuation of an art relies on the support of the common people.

2. nan du issues

flying kicks, cartwheel, high jumps, tumbling, etc included, not that they do not have martial values. but people may see them in circus and acrobatic shows, too.

where you draw the lines?

the research and development for wushu programs should have 2 tiers

1. make them accessilbe to the general volks.

2. add more and more nan du to make them more and more difficult each year.

for estoric reasons or showiness all you want. b/c you get bonus credits for nan du. everyone has to do it to win.

olympics is going toward beyond human. using technology to make new records, there are limits of human anatomy, we are doing everything to make new records.

yes. we will see what new training regimes, or technology are used to make new records in London in 2012.

let us hope, wushu is not going the same direction of achieving beyond human.

[GeneChing]

I got to see my Bermudan friends at Legends of Kung Fu this year.

10/23/2009 12:33:00 PM
San shou fighters off to World Championships
Bermuda's full-contact mixed martial arts fighters are in Canada this weekend to take on the world's best.

Seven san shou fighters are competing in the World Wushu Championships at the impressively named Ricoh Coliseum in Toronto, starting tomorrow.

It is the second time Bermuda has sent a team to the world championships and Garon Wilkinson, president of the san shou association and one of the fighters, admitted they were facing a gruelling challenge.

He said it would be an 'extraordinary achievement' for any of the seven fighters to come out with a podium finish in the championships which features 1,500 athletes from 85 different countries.

The team, five of whom had strong performances in the Legends of Kung Fu tournament in Texas recently, has gone through months of preparation to prepare themselves, physically and mentally, for the unique challenges posed by the brutal, full-contact fighting style.

"The world championships bring out the 'who's who' in the sport of san shou. This is the absolute highest standard of competition in our sport and all of our training is geared towards performing well in this competition," said Wilkinson.

He said the 'luck of the draw' would determine how far the Bermuda athletes went in the elimination competition.

But heavyweight Jermal Woolridge, who finished fifth at the last world championships in Beijing two years ago, the experienced Sentwali Woolridge and Wilkinson himself are expected to be the island's strongest contenders.

Big things are also expected of Bermuda's lone female fighter Talia Iris.

Wilkinson, who was part of the team in Beijing, said they had modified and improved their training methods since the last competition. "I feel that we are far better equipped than we were two years ago.

"I had the opportunity to train with one of the top U.S. san shou fighters in the 90's earlier this year and I have had a chance to implement some of his training methods into our own training. "We also have had access to more sparring partners with some of the fighters from Skipper Ingham's gym that are taking part in the WAKO World Kickboxing Championships in Austria taking part in a number of our sparring sessions."

Rwanda is out.

Rwanda: Cash Strapped Kung-Fu Team Shun World Hampionship
Ostine Arinaitwe
23 October 2009

Kigali — RWANDA will not be represented at the world wushu championship in Canada after the national Kungfu team failed to get the required funds to participate in the global showpiece.

The biannual event which starts today and ends next Friday has attracted over 1500 athletes from 121 countries.

The national team was banking on financial support from the Sports ministry but the national Kung-fu federation president Yassin Uramukiye Mubarak yesterday revealed that they had failed to raise the required amount.

"The Sports ministry could not raise the amount needed because they have been stretched a lot by funding Amavubi and the national women basketball team that recently traveled to Madagascar for the Afrobasket tournament."

The team needed Rwf 18m to participate in the competition.

[SPJ]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZM7Za...eature=related

I picked this song for my son to learn. he is just starting to learn french.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSasU773tzo

my father picked this song for me to learn when I started to learn french in 1960s.

these are children folk songs, but easy enough that we may learn to sing and remember for the rest of our life.

wushu should be made simpler, punch, kick, throw etc

and not to add flashy stuff or too many difficulties nan du.

---

shuai jiao is the same for thousands of years on the great grass plains of China.

boxing is the same in ireland or celtics.

---

[ngokfei]

a performance of the Staff from the games.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-UsP...layer_embedded


Yep David, the seats do look empty like baltimore.

[GeneChing]

Not that much coverage online so far...

Iran's Arabi wins silver in World Wushu Championship

TORONTO, Canada, Oct. 26 (Mehr News Agency) -- Iran's Farshad Arabi claimed a sliver medal in the 10th World Wushu Championship.

Arabi won the silver in talou (form), scoring 9.72 points. An athlete from Hong Kong finished first with a score of 9.75, and the South Korean participant came third with 9.69.

About 1000 athletes from 73 countries are participating in the tournament which started on Saturday and will end on Thursday in Toronto, Canada.

A total of 20 Iranian men and women athletes represent the country in the event.

Wushu standout takes childhood obsession to world stage
October 26, 2009 12:03 PM

Wilson Lui says a good segment of his social life as a youth was far different from others his age.

While many of his friends would go out and play when they weren't attending school, Lui would spend a good portion of his leisure time attending martial arts classes specializing in wushu.

Today, the 19-year-old Markham resident is glad he took that route.

When the 2009 World Wushu Championships commence today at the Ricoh Coliseum in Toronto, Lui will be centre stage.

As one of five athletes representing Team Canada at this six-day event, Lui will compete in the non-combative segment of this martial arts discipline.

Earning a berth on the national team through qualifications at the national championships in Newmarket in August, Lui is entered in three events including barehanded long fist (changquan), short weapon-double edged sword (jianshu) and long weapons-spear (qiangshu).

"This is my first time to compete at the world championships and it's pretty amazing," he said.

Lui is no stranger to international competition having participated last year in the World Junior Wushu Championships in Bali, Indonesia. He felt he gave a good account of himself after placing in the top eight in two events and top 15 in another.

Taking a realistic approach to the upcoming world championships, Lui doesn't expect to come away with a gold medal.

"But I expect to go out and do the best that I can," he said.

A second-year computer science student at York University when he's not practicing, Lui's introduction to the martial arts took place 14 years ago when as a youngster, he had a fixation to the TV set whenever any martial arts programs were on the airwaves.

"I wouldn't blink an eye whenever those action movies came on," he recalled. "My parents thought it would be a good idea to attend those classes because it would teach me some discipline."

Attending the Sunny Tang Martial Arts Centre in Scarborough since Day One, Lui said he would spend a whole day, providing there was no school, nurturing his craft.

For the upcoming world championships, Lui said his daily training schedule goes from 6 to 8 a.m. before going to school and then returning home to train for a few more hours.

In explaining his love for wushu, Lui said there's always something new to be learned.

"There's no way to be completely perfect at it because there's always something you can work on," he explained.

- Michael Hayakawa

Pinoys miss weigh-in for wushu worlds
Written by Reuben Terrado / Reporter
Monday, 26 October 2009 19:29

THE Philippines would not be taking part in the 10th World Wushu Championships in Toronto because the national team members failed to make the weigh-in.

The team actually flew to Toronto, but missed the weigh-in by six hours, according to Wushu Federation of the Philippines secretary-general Julian Camacho.

Camacho said the organizers earlier agreed to conduct a special weigh-in for the Filipinos because their flight schedule would not allow them to arrive in Toronto at an earlier time.

But to the surprise of the team, Camacho said, the organizers did not grant special weigh-in.

“They [organizers] even e-mailed us that they will allow a special weigh-in for us. The team was six hours late but there was no weigh-in,” Camacho said.

He said Germany also arrived late but was granted a special weigh-in.

“They perhaps are afraid of the Filipinos because we are traditional winners there,” said Camacho.

This is the first time that Filipinos, who have an enviable reputation in the event, will miss the world championships. One of the more notable Filipino world champions is Willy Wang, who won a gold medal in 2007 in Beijing.

The team that flew to Toronto was composed of Mary Jane Estimar, Mariane Mariano, Mark Eddiva, Eduard Folayang, Jessie Alidadag and Stephanie Alday. Estimar clinched a silver medal in the 2008 Beijing Wushu Tournament and a gold medal in the 2009 Asian Martial Arts Games. Mariano, on the other hand, bagged a bronze medal in Beijing also in 2008 and a silver in the Asian Martial Arts Games.

Enter the wushu dragon
Competitors from 72 countries vie for gold in 10th world contest of Chinese martial art
Image
By Oakland Ross Middle East Bureau Chief
Published On Mon Oct 26 2009

Canadian Timothy Hung, 20, competes Sunday in a men's event at the 10th World Wushu Championships being held at the Ricoh Coliseum.
RICHARD LAUTENS/TORONTO STAR

If Timothy Hung had a more imposing frame, he might not be where he is today – Canadian men's champion in a sport called wushu, competing for international gold.

"I'm a small guy," the slim but remarkably fit Torontonian explained Sunday, "and my mom didn't want me to get picked on at school."

And so, at the age of 11, he began training at the Sunny Tang Martial Arts Centre in Scarborough.

Hung managed to keep the bullies at bay, and now, at age 20, he is part of a Canadian team that's taking on the rest of the planet at the 10th World Wushu Championships.

With more than 600 competitors from 72 countries, the event is the largest sporting contest to be held in Ontario this year, and it's continuing till Thursday at the Ricoh Coliseum. It's the second time the sport's premier competition has made its way to North America and the first time it has been in Canada.

"I just love the sport," Hung said as he prepared to compete in his discipline, a noncombat martial art called taolu. "You meet people from all over the world."

The word wushu simply means "martial arts," and if that doesn't evoke a clear image of the sport, then try to picture a combination of gymnastics and boxing – a marriage of grace and power, on the one hand, with physical mayhem, on the other.

"Hong Kong action movies are all wushu," said Jackson Pellatt, a Canadian coach attending the championships this week.

The sport was effectively born in 1949, when the new, revolutionary government of the People's Republic of China sought to meld more than 300 martial arts disciplines into a single coherent athletic pursuit, a sport that now goes by the name of wushu.

In the form on display in Toronto this week, however, there are really two pursuits: one, taolu, which does not involve fighting, and another, sanshou, which does.

Just ask the Peruvian competitor Sunday who went up against a heavily favoured Chinese fighter.

One thudding kick to the side of the head, and it was lights out in the Andes. The South American went down like a stone, and they carried him off on a stretcher. Out cold.

The Peruvian subsequently regained consciousness, before medical workers transferred him to a downtown hospital for a precautionary CT scan.

"Now you know why it's 18 to 35," said Eileen Fauster, president of Wushu Ontario, referring to the allowable age range for sanshou fighters.

In taolu, it's different. A demonstration sport in which the athletes compete individually, the discipline bears considerable resemblance to floor exercises in gymnastics, only with a lot more grunting.

There seems to be no lower age limit in taolu.

Nalei Chang, an 11-year-old taolu specialist representing Estonia, gave a spirited performance when his turn came, unleashing flips, twirls and spins, all the while brandishing a long, flashing sword, as his coach roared approval.

But the judges handed the boy a mark of just 6.65 out of 10.

"They don't understand!" the coach raged, meaning the judges. "No good!"

Still, he gave his rather disheartened-looking protégé a big hug and bore him off on high, just as you would carry a champion.

Although they may begin young, taolu specialists don't tend to remain in competition much beyond their mid-20s, a result of the sport's punishing physical stress.

Asian countries dominate both the combat and noncombat aspects of the sport, but Canada is a strong contender among non-Asian countries.

"In North America and South America, we're number 1," Fauster said.

For a sport that did not have an international governing body till 1990, wushu has grown fast and travelled far.

"It's in the top five sports in Iran," said Ibrahim Fathi, a taolu specialist from that country, who was watching his teammate, Shamim Mahrdipoor, deliver an almost miraculous performance in a women's taolu event called taijiquan, better known as tai chi.

Clad in yellow robes and wearing a white head scarf, Mahrdipoor seemed to float across the floor.

The judges gave her a score of 9.55, and both she and her teammates seemed pleased.

[GeneChing]

I went over the character count limit with the last post...

Wushu a guiding light
By STEVE BUFFERY, SUN MEDIA
Last Updated: 26th October 2009, 3:06am

Eight years ago, Mohammad Ziaei and his family moved from Iran to Canada.

For the 12-year-old, who could not speak English and was unfamiliar with the culture, life in the new land was difficult.

However, the one guiding force, other than his family, which kept the youngster on the straight and narrow was martial arts.

And now, eight years later, Ziaei is representing Canada in the sanshou discipline at the 10th World Wushu Championships at Ricoh Coliseum, and he couldn't be prouder.

"It feels amazing," said Ziaei, who will begin his competition in the first round today. "Yesterday, walking through the crowd (during the opening ceremonies), hearing everybody chant for us, was the best feeling in the world."

Wushu is a sport derived from traditional Chinese martial arts with two main disciplines, sanshou, a combative style which matches two fighters in a contest that includes kicks, strikes and throws, and taolu, a performance discipline, which includes artistic routines with and without weaponry.

The 20-year-old Ziaei hopes to win a medal at the Wushu championships and some day represent Canada at an Olympic Games, if the International Olympic Committee ever decides to include wushu on the program for future competitions. That is definitely possibly as the sport is becoming more international every year and is certainly becoming more popular in Canada. The Canadian team is ranked No.1 in the Americas.

More than 600 athletes from 80 countries will take part in this week's event.

Yesterday, as Ziaei prepared for his first match, a couple of Canadian teammates, Andrea Hung and Margherita Cina prepared for their first competition in the taolu discipline of northern long fists. Cina, 18, finished fifth in a field of 41, while Hung, 17, tied for 11th. Full results will be tabulated at the end of the competition.

Mississauga's Cina, a first year arts and sciences student at McMaster University, began wushu when she was five and last year placed first overall with two golds and a silver at the Pan American championships.

She is also is hoping for a medal this week, but acknowledged that many of the top athletes competing at the worlds are basically full-time athletes who receive funding from their respective governments. Still, being able to compete at a world championships is reward enough for Cina, who enjoys teaching others about her sport.

"It's like gymnastics with the choreography and stuff, but it's a martial art," she said. "It combines fluid movements with aggressive ones. And, yes, it is beautiful. I don't have any problem with anyone saying that."

NATIONALIZATION

Wushu was created in China in 1949 when the central government attempted to nationalize the practice of traditional Chinese arts.

One of the most popular practitioners of the sport is Jet Li, who won 15 gold medals in the Chinese championships, eventually translating his martial arts skills to a successful career as an action movie star.

[lkfmdc]

weigh in promises broken and other "dirty tricks" on the part of the IWUF are just standard stuff sadly... Anyone remember when US team member was told he was not fighting in third segment, and when he wasn't thre they DQ'ed him

[GeneChing]

I just read Alfred's FB page and he said he captured a gold in straight sword.

[lkfmdc]

I just read Alfred's FB page and he said he captured a gold in straight sword.

that is amazing considering how competitive the taolu is

any news on the sanshou?

[David Jamieson]

a performance of the Staff from the games.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-UsP...layer_embedded


Yep David, the seats do look empty like baltimore.

That is a wickedly good wushu staff routine!

seats behind the judges are full.

[lkfmdc]

seats behind the judges are full.

can't watch the clip at the gym, but does it look like 10,000 people

[David Jamieson]

can't watch the clip at the gym, but does it look like 10,000 people

ricoh only seats about 8000.

Anyway, why didn't you send any guys up for the san shou?

[GeneChing]

or I should say they will be on the official site.

Here's the window to their results page.

At this posting, they have some pdfs of the sanshou results so far and the promise of some taolu results to be posted tonight. I didn't go through the sanshou results yet.