Primary Evasion in the Single Palm Change

The first partner work exercise that Bagua beginners do in our school is the Primary Evasion exercise. The video below gives an overview. The exercise teaches distance and timing and allows student to become comfortable with partner work.

The evasion itself consists of three parts:

1. The step back - this removes most of the body from the danger zone
2. Lift the trailing leg - this removes the rest of the body from the danger zone
3. The sweep - the arm provides a backup cover for unexpected or penetrating attacks

Successful use of this step should allow you to avoid any single attack - but that's just the first step!

Bagua - Single Palm Change

This post is the first documenting what I'm teaching, as an aid to my students and myself.

I don't feel I can do a much better job at providing an introduction to Bagua and our Bagua in particular than my Kung Fu brother and friend Dan Djurdjevic has already done on his blog The Way of Least Resistance. The link to the specific article ("An introduction to swimming dragon baguazhang") is here.

Above is a short video of me performing the first palm change in the system, the Single Palm Change*. To quote Dan:

The single palm change teaches the basic principles (of) bagua evasion.

The very first movement of the change (frame from video above) is a slip or fade designed to avoid just about any attack. More detail on this in a later post.

The rest of the movements embody the principal of constant movement being constant evasion. Each motion causes constant shifting of the bodies position and visual scanning of nearly 360 degrees with each motion. More detail on this in a later post.

Significant shift is shown in the above image.

This is the first post documenting what I am teaching, as a record for myself and a resource for my students. More to come! As always, all feedback welcome.

*Note: I am still recovering from what turned out to be three bulged discs and a compressed spinal nerve root so the form is very imperfect.