Does It Matter Which Guard With Which Kick?

 

This was a question I had this morning on our forum and I thought it made for a good point to share.

 

Question:

In kicking from basic stance, you say, when you go to the side you switch your guard.

For example, if you’re standing with your left hand forward in a guard and you go to the left to kick with your right leg, you right guard comes forward to change.

My question is this, if your left guard is forward and you go to your right to kick with your left would you still switch guards?

 

Answer:

Okay, here goes..

If you are in a basic stance, Left guard forward, about to kick with the Right leg.

The process would be;

Pivot on the Left heel, change to Right guard, transfer the weight and kick with Right foot, then step the Right foot back down, closing on Left heel back to a  basic stance.

BUT WHY THAT GUARD WITH THAT KICK?

Why not?

Basically there is NO REASON for that guard with that leg apart from my asking you to do it.

AND WHY IS THAT?

Simply to show you have control of your bodily functions (never a bad thing!), having the ability to have your body do what your brain has just told it to do.

Also to have some flow and structure to your technique rather than simply kicking wildly.

 

To be honest, in many ways the Left guard with the Right kick is the better option as it balances the body, and is an exercise I used when teaching Biu Mar to beginners, ‘Right leg forward with a Left guard’ by means of making sure the shoulders stay facing forward.

 

 

As I was writing this blog I looked over the question again and re-read the last part:

 

Question:

My question is this, if your left guard is forward and you go to your right to kick with your left would you still switch guards?

 

Answer:
The simple answer, NO!

 

If you had a left guard in basic stance and decided to use a left kick, you would not NEED to change your guard, as I said in my last reply, the truth is you can use whatever guard you like.

The regimented and almost binary method I used to teach on the wingchun.online site is just to give you a guide.

 

You can pretty much guarantee that if I didn’t say what to do with you guard hand, someone, somewhere would have asked, “Which guard do I use with which kick?”

 

 

I hope this clears it up for you and do remember, when it comes to teaching, ‘I have a reason for everything I do’.

 

It is not enough to me that I simply ask you to kick and HOPE everything else goes ok, hence the structured breakdown and additional detail.

 

Here’s a clip from our video library to help explain the sequence I’m referring to.

Here I talk of the kicking process and the connection of the back foot between Biu Mar and Cheun Mar.

Please note that the reason for kicking at two targets is due to the kick coming from a Biu Mar principle,

 

Thank you: