As we enter 2019, the year of the earth pig, let’s look back on the last year with the most popular posts on this blog each month.

Note: These are based purely on the audience figures, not on being the ‘best’ stories of the year. As such it gives you an interesting picture of what people are searching for, or find most interesting on Tai Chi Notebook.

January:

Old Wu Style Tai Chi video

“A video surfaced recently of an old performance of Wu style Tai Chi from a gentleman called Cheng Wing-Kwong (1903-1967), who was a disciple of the Wu Jian-Quan, the founder of Wu style Tai Chi.”

February:

How meridians relate to Tai Chi

“I think that somebody doing some background research into “Tai Chi” inevitably ends up looking at a picture of the “acupuncture meridians” and starts to wonder how they relate to Tai Chi Chuan.”

March:

Wing Chun (Ding Hao) vs MMA (Xu Xiao Dong), in China

“After his fight with the “Tai Chi master” Wei Lei, which rocked the contemporary martial arts scene in China, Xu Xiao Dong, the MMA fighter on a mission to expose “fake masters” is back on the scene this time showing his skills against a Wing Chun fighter.”

 

April:

The post Wave hands like clouds was actually written un 2016, but it has consistently been one of my most popular posts, and this month it rose to the top again.

“A look at the Cloud Hands movement of Tai Chi, and what it’s really all about”

May:

The post Tai Chi vs BJJ in China was actually the most popular by just 4 views, but the video has since been removed, so just 4 views behind we have:

Forrest Chang’s “Stupid Jin Tricks” video

“This is a great video from Forrest Chang showing what Jin is in Chinese Martial Arts and how it can be used.”

 

June:

Thoughts on an interview with Wang Yan, head coach of the Chenjiagou Taijiquan School

“Born in 1990, Wang Yan became head coach of Cheng village training centre in 2013 and is as a Taiji fighter as well as a coach, not to mention an expert in forms. He was one of the “nine tigers” – the best nine students of Chen ZiQiang. There’s an interview with him in English on Chen Taijiquan blog, with some great pictures from his private collection. The interview is pretty long, but there are lots of really interesting insights into his daily training, San Da competitions training and how exhausting it all was!”

July:

Does Cormier’s dirty boxing point the way for CMA in MMA?

“I’m always looking for ways that the sticky hands-like training found in Chinese martial arts like Tai Chi Chuan, Wing Chun, Praying Mantis, White Crane and Hung Gar, where contact between the forearms or hands is maintained and the practitioner is encouraged to ‘listen’ to the movements of the opponent through this contact, can be used in MMA.”

August:

Book review: Internal Body Mechanics for Tai Chi, Bagua and Xingyi, by Ken Gullette

“Anybody who has attempted to learn Tai Chi in any depth instantly realises that the choreography of a form is just that – choreography – and that the devil is in the details. Internal Body Mechanics is all about the details: How you move, what you move and where you move it to.”

 

September:

This month the review of Ken Gullette’s book was again the most popular post. The next most popular post was this one:

The whole Chen Tai Chi curriculum, in video form

“Well, this page is interesting. It’s from Chen Bing, a Chen family member who is based in Los Angeles, USA, and from the looks of things, and it looks like a video reference for the whole Chen style Taijiquan curriculum!

October:

What makes Xingyi’s Bengquan different to a normal straight punch?

I got into a discussion about Bengquan, one of the 5 fists of Xingyiquan, a Chinese martial art I’ve written about before, recently, which prompted me to consider what really made a Bengquan different to a regular straight punch that you’d find in any number of other martial arts. I thought I’d just jot down a few of my ideas about it, because that forces me to organise my thoughts, but it has turned into quite a long post. So, apologies for that, but I’m going to post it anyway 😉

 

November:

Once again, the post Wave hands like clouds rose to the top again this month, but the next biggest post was part 2 of the article above, What makes Xingyi’s Bengquan different to a normal straight punch? Part 2: The bow draw.

Following on from my previous post about Bengquan, one of the 5 Element fists of Xingyiquan, I want to take a closer look at some of the internal characteristics of the strike.

December:

Aikido Heresies. The dark side of Aikido.

“Just remembered I didn’t post about the last Heretics podcast we did. This one was about the history of Aikido. I thought it would be quite a light-hearted one, but as Damon explains, it turns out the history of Aikido, and its parent art Daito Ryo, is largely unknown to the average martial artists (i.e. me) and also pretty dark and nasty. Very nasty.”