Pushing Hands and Applications Practise

The Four Directions Tui Shou exercise is an ideal platform for the practise of applying self-defence applications in a smooth continuous way.

For the purposes of this discussion I shall use the applications Fair Lady works the Shuttle, As If Shutting a Door and an arm locking technique.

To recap the Four Directions Tui Shou exercise is a partner drill to practises the four cardinal powers, Peng (upwards diversion), Ji (straight push), Lu (sideways diversion), An (downward press) in a smooth continuous manner with both partners adopting both offensive (Yang) and defensive roles (Yin) interchangeably. It is important to remember that the motion starts with the feet, is coordinated by the waist and only manifests itself through the hands. It is easy to fall into the error of just using the arms and physical strength to apply these techniques, doing so will make the techniques jerky and easily detectable.

Here the man on the right uses An (downward press), his partner responds with Lu (sideways diversion). The points of connection for the diversion are the wrist and elbow of the attacking arm.

Here the man on the left uses Ji (straight push), his partner responds with Peng (upward diversion). Again the connection points for the diversion are wrist and elbow of the attacking arm.

This connection at the wrist and elbow points is essential for the applications practise to be described later.

Here we can see that although one attack has been dissipated the man on the left does not disconnect from the attacking arm until he has connected with the second attack. At which point he diverts the attack with wrist and elbow diversion. The cycle then repeats until one of the partners decides to initiate a change.

The aim of the exercise is to develop correct coordination between the lower and upper body, sensitivity to the actions of the training partner in order to act appropriately to whatever they do. Either person may change the exercise by changing the direction of the arm cycle or by stepping forwards or backwards.

To move this exercise onto the next level it is necessary to add in the practise of self-defence applications. This incorporates an element of disguising the attack in the smooth continuous motion so that it can be applied without being countered by the partner.

In the sequence below the man on the right behaves as if he is just continuing the arm cycle but instead immediate launches Fair lady Works Shuttles to trap his partner.

The application requires control of both wrist and elbow and spirals the attack back onto attacker. This utilises one of the four ordinal powers, Lie, in coordination with Lu, the sideways diversion on the initial attack.

In this second example the same principles apply but the application used is As If Shutting A Door. Here it is being used in combination with Peng, upwards diversion. The man on the right makes sure that he is controlling the attacking arm at the elbow and at the wrist. He presses the elbow in towards the attackers body and then slides his other arm to control the attackers other elbow.

The third sequence is a technique of putting on an arm lock in a smooth continuous manner using the momentum of the attack. The technique is best applied if the attackers wrist is twisted at the same time as applying pressure to the elbow joint

Practising in this way develops the skills to apply applications in a smooth continuous manner with the motion coordinated with the attack. The difference between these exercises and actual self-defence application practise is that the connection has already been established. When learning self-defence applications the skill of attachment must be mastered which will enable these techniques to be applied correctly against a disconnected attack..

In my next article I shall look at the next stage of this process, namely the detection and neutralisation of these attacks.