A true Martial Arts master knows how to end the fight before it even starts.

Regarding a "true" martial artist from the perspective of Chinese martial arts, I recall hearing from one of the greatest living Chinese martial artists, whom I only knew as Mr Kwang. I was then studying in Han Chiang High School in 1973. The school was located in Penang, Malaysia. I was a student of Shao Lin under Mr Kwang. He was then already more than 80 years old, an exceptionally humble man, who used to cycle from his home to the training grounds in the school. He also taught different types of Chinese martial arts at the Chin Woo Stadium in Penang. One day, Mr Kwang told me that modern martial artists have time to master only one type of martial arts, whether Shao Lin, Tang Lang, Pa Kua, Hsing I, or Tai Chi, etc. He said that in the olden days, in order to become a real martial arts master, one had to know and master the whole gamut of Chinese martial arts from the hard styles to the hard-soft styles to the soft styles. To him, the highest of the soft styles of kung fu was Tai Chi. One had to master every style of Chinese martial arts before he learned and mastered Tai Chi. Mr Kwang had mastered all the styles. He also told me that he held the position of All-China Champion in martial arts for 30 days in his youth. Now, 30 days is a long time to wear the crown. Daily, many would come from far and wide to challenge you to a duel to replace you at the throne, which was a position of the greatest honour in China in those days. He is also one of the few masters of Dim Mak, a secret technique of killing an opponent with just a touch. He explained to me how he used to practise blindfolded on a mannequin placed behind him, until he mastered the various target points in the human body and could finger-strike any vital point without the aid of sight. Such was the extreme level of expertise. I heard from one of his assistant instructors, who used to practise with him early in the morning in Chin Woo Stadium, that he had developed supernatural powers through martial arts. In the stadium, there was a thick, green-coloured felt curtain. When Mr Kwang used to practise his moves, the power he emanated during practice sessions used to move the heavy curtain without any contact whatsoever. One day, perhaps in 1973 or 1974, Han Chiang High School hosted a world class demonstration of the world's most popular martial arts. Only the top of the top masters in each art form were invited to the event. So we had the top mahagurus of martial arts, all having the equivalent of 10th Dan in their respective arts. We had the top masters of karate, judo, aikido, taekwondo, silat, etc. I recall the name John Draeger, who was an exponent of one style of karate. In the end, after the various demonstrations, Mr Kwang was invited to give a demonstration himself. By the way, Mr Kwang was one of the three judges of the tournament. The other two were Japanese I think. As Mr Kwang was performing the demonstration, the other two judges stood up from their chairs and watched him in utter surprise. They were standing until Mr Kwang ended his performance. I could clearly see the look of utter amazement on their faces. After the event, I asked the assistant instructor, who was my friend, what was so special about Mr Kwang's performance that they had to stand up and look at Mr Kwang in utter surprise. He explained to me that Mr Kwang performed a kata (a set of martial arts movements) that was thought to be lost. It means that he was then the only living person with the secret knowledge of this lost kata. Enough said. I pay my humble respects to this great man, who in my view, was one of the greatest martial artists of his time, but was largely an unsung hero. I also thank Nature for giving me this opportunity to write about this great man.

These people are right . The real Chinese kung fu is the great and we all should respect it. We should ignore the fake ones which we see nowdays everywere

I can't even start to tell y'all how much I appreciate you taking the time to tell me this stuff!

When you speak english and use those chinese names in middle of sentences.. It sounds amazing :)

The difference between a master and a novice is that the master has failed many more times than the novice has even tried

The whole essence of Shaolin was not about violence, but to improve oneself, and for myself as a practitioner of Karate, this rings true.

WOW! You guys rock. I fell in love with Chinese language too. This was so much fun and educational to watch.

china needs to make movies of all these guys

When you guys said martial arts was designed to improve one's body and mind, wasn't martial arts designed for the spirit as well?

5:23 Neji’s fighting style

Zhang San Feng at number 2 is one of the Best!!! Love it when they make movies about him. a courageous, soft hearted man who taught the world tai chi. The heavenly sword and dragon sabres grand master!!!!

Thought the footprints were made after years of practice over the same spot?

What about the turtle from Kung fu panda?

I wish I was more familiar with these guys. Very informative

Huo yuanjia what a story, love how these guys mention martial arts is a balance of mind, body and spirit. Too many people claim martial arts these days but to hear those words is blissful

I love these type of videos! The history and kung fu, brilliant! Keep up the great work! :) slightly of topic can you do some more Chinese mythology/stories/legends? It's so fascinating, it's really great to hear them!

Awesome. And you guys are so right people do not have the mind power these days to be as great as the old masters.

This is really informative! Thank you for such an engaging video.

I knew some of the masters you talked about but I learned several new names. Thank you very much for this very useful work.

I remember for the avatar the last airbender series, there was this segment where they talked about the different types of martial arts for different bending styles! xingyi was for fire bending, chen tai chi for water bending, Hung gar for earth bending, and the eight tri-grams for airbending!

excellent video , you guys gave the correct list and logical also best reasons and explanation

I love how the names are pronounced.

as a fan of the classic Kung Fu movies I find this to be a great video thanks for sharing your knowledge.

Actually Wong Fei Hung was my master's master's master's master's master's master. True story.

Okay what I got from this is that I have never pronounced a Chinese name correctly. not ever....well maybe Lee

Gentleman; This presentation is; simply brilliant !

Great job! Love martial arts history and you guys covered this well!

You guys are soooo awesome! Loving these great history lessons! :)

Great video! You guys should read about Master Lu Zijan. He was a bagua master who was the sworn brother of Huo Yunja. He took place in the hand to hand death duels between the Chinese and Japanese and only recently passed away at the age of 117. He chose to retire from fighting and lead a peaceful life practicing and studying herbs. He may not make the list, but he is a fascinating character and brings the question, How many old masters are in the world but chose not the reveal themselves.

I appreciate this video, because all these new so call Martial Arts fans (or MMA fanatics) believe traditional Martial Arts are null and void.

Imagine if you could bring them back to life and see them challenging each other.

Great video, I've wanted to live in Hong Kong for awhile and I have now begun to learn Cantonese and some Chinese history. So now that I found y'all's channel, I've learned really fast, keep up the good work!

fascinating Gentlemen, the way you speak of this culture tells me how proud you are of this rich diverse way of life (as you should be).... superb video guys keep them coming!

Cool video !! Need more !

Great video!!! I was about to cut it off but the wisdom told me to keep watching. thank you!!!! that's why I never did mixed martial arts

This was enjoyable. Well done!

At 5:56 he says that a master would typically have one disciple, and the entire knowledge of the discipline could be lost with the death of that one disciple. The knowledge could also be lost due to Oriental tradition where the master teaches his disciple most of what he knows, but always holds something back for himself. That way he always has an edge over his student. Then when the disciple becomes the master, he repeats the cycle. If the wise old man knows 10 wisdoms, he will teach his son only 9 of them. Then when the son becomes the wise old man, he repeats the cycle.

These guys are like GODS Of Kung Fu... And Bruce Lee was their Son

Thank you guys for the info

Thank you for all of your videos!

I believe that masters did not usually pass on 100% of their martial art techniques since they probably thought they had to keep at least one powerful move in case their disciples took a turn for the worst and things went south (tried betraying them, etc.) If this indeed were the case, then many powerful techniques would have been lost throughout the thousands of years of Chinese history. Or maybe it's just because of my experience with watching wuxia haha...

Thank you for making this video and for touching on such important, powerful points! Please make more martial arts videos making strong points! -Thanks

first time I checked on you guys....the info was amazing!!!!

many of these styles influenced the fight choreography of Avatar; the last air bender!

What about Damo!?

Great video guys. I hope to be able to find out more of these people in the future.

Great video. I love doing Xing Yi Quan I wish more people appreciated it.

I studied the Eagle Claw system (Ying Jow) that Yue Fei did create, but you showed the incorrect claw formation. The way you showed it are in southern styles and wushu, but traditional Eagle Claw is a closed vice-like grip.

oh you guys should do one on the most powerful fictional martial artist like Hong Qigong 洪七公

I really enjoyed what you guys had to say about those Kung Fu artist artists

Tai Ji.. Cheong Sam Foong.Legend has it He achieved the ultimate pinnacle of Kung Fu and is Invincible . No Master can ever hope to defeat him in philosophy nor combat. Greatest of them all

You guys definitely missed out legendary Bagua master " Sun Lu Tang" (孫祿堂） and the founder of BajiQuan "Mr. Lee" - the only trusted lethal martial art that's used to protect all Chinese states man.There were a lot of extraordinarily great masters in secret that existed around late Qing and early Republic of China times that lend their hands to the revolution.

Yip Man is my favourite, so i consider him as Great Grandmaster !

Thanks for the Upload👍

Wow... love the video! Great job, guys!!!!

Really good stuff. Learned a lot today in a very fun way. Thanks Dan and Mike! :)

I know I sound like an old fashioned tourists but it's refreshing to see Asians talk about themselves you don't see that too often or I don't get out that much either way good stuff

Loved the video.

Just as soon as I finish my time machine, I'm going back to 1972 and puck up Bruce Lee. Then we are going to go throughout history and find these 10 guys and challenge them. I'll make sure to video all the fights so when I come back, I can upload them. Be on the lookout for those. I bet Bruce wins them all.

Huo Yuan Jia is the best for me 😊try to watch fearless by jet li ... he beat 4 greatest fighters in enemy side but in the last he was poisoned

what about "Damo" who originally brought Kung Fu to the Shaolin Monks over 1500 years ago..hes the triple OG Kung Fu master..n he wasnt Chinese!!

very great video, you explained a lot of the differences of today's martial arts purposes and the way they used it or practices it back then..

nice video,thank you guys!

the fact that they even mentioned; Ip Man and Bruce Lee, SPEAKS VOLUMES! Oblivious to ancient contributions, that Master and his (Master) student contributed a power-change in the paradigm of Martial Arts history.

Beautiful and brilliant, traditional wushu ( classic Chinese military martial arts- - not the dancing arts) are still alive!! I’ve practiced tong long chuan, many thanks 🙏🏼. I totally love your site. You give good props to classical military Chinese arts. Keep it up! I want more-😃

I really love how you guys talked about old vs new and a calm demeanor but let's be real those old-school dudes if they stood in a modern-day Arena they would devour Souls like Guan Yu or Zhang FEI Zhou Thai

I love your video. .. you stuck to the facts... Very nicely done.

Can you make a video about the Romance of the Three Kingdom? I love history during this time! My favorite general Zhao Yun!

You put Zhang Sanfeng as #2...a man whose actual existence is debated in history. Why not put in Guo Jing, Zhang Wuji, Linghu Chong, etc? Yue Fei should be on the list but he's a military general whose martial arts skills should be focused on spear, archery, horsemanship, swordplay...little room for empty handed arts on the battlefield. XingYi, Eagle Claw are attributed to him but are likely myths.

Nice list. I'd have added Li Shuwen, the Bajiquan master from Cangzhou. He wasn't exactly a virtuous guy though; he made so many enemies that he had constant challengers, but he killed so many of these challengers that they ended up having to poison him to take him down.

Very informative! Thanks a lot!

You guys are so cool I love the facts and I look up to you keep on the good work and videos

REMEMBER THERES A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN REAL MARTIALS ARTS FIGHTING AND MYTHOLOGY DO NOT MIX THE TWO

Liked and shared. Topical presumptions aside, it was useful for both detail and context. Thanks for posting.

Excellent! Thanks guys, really good stuff.

You forgot one extremely essential and important thing about Wong Fei-Hung. Wong Fei-Hung is known for using a technique called the Shadowless Kick or Mo Ying Geuk in Cantonese

Leung Jan (Liang Zan) The King of Wing Chun....the best.

these guys are amazing

1st time viewer and let me say wow you guys should have your own TV show or sitcom or something you guys just blew me away simply because of the chemistry and dynamics you have in your dialogue with one another, but on an unrelated note, I'd like to add that it's nice to be taught something about Chinese Kung Fu by 2 people who are indigenous of the area and also can pronounce the names of the masters correctly. Bravo kudos thank you very much I'm an instance subscriber!!!

4:22 HAHAHAHAHA Tai Chi Master: The twin warrior's soundtrack .... great

Dr Leung Jan, from foshan ?

Great, well explained about true masters and unskilled fake masters. ❤️🙏👍💯

This video was so fun...and informative

you should put Ng Mui in the list. She is the founder of wing chun.

I think ip man should be in this list

Excellent video !!!!!! great history

They were Kung fu masters par excellence!

I remember reading history of Tao, and they mentioned stories of Kung Fu practitioners commonly sparring on teacups placed upside down on a table as a test of skill and knowledge of Tao. Falling off or losing your footing was a big deal and disgraceful. Cool stuff to say the least. Traditional martial arts are really great to train and make you feel really good and a testimant to the mind+body philosophy. However not so practical in todays "fighting" communities. When I train, I don't do it to be a better fighter, I do it for the health, the fluidity, a sense of harmony with my body. When I first did kung fu (bak mei,a very taboo style in the community) i joined for the martial aspect, but it was the art that really hit home. The tradition, respect, wisdom. A feeling and gratification of doing something much bigger than yourself.

what about ng mui, fong doe duk, Jim shim shim shee, Bak Mei ???

please more of this

Simple and captivating

You left out Pai Mae. His exploding heart punch technique puts theses other “masters” to shame.

Well Ip Man’s Wing Chun was so good that the Japanese wanted him to teach their soldiers.

Horse stances for half a hour to a hour..... a day brings back memories back in 01 iv studied at a school that used that practice of sitting in horse stance for 1 hour the very first day and 30mins every day afterwards as part of our classes....

I want off the great wall back on this channel

Leung Jan was an amazing Wing Chun Gung Fu master. Ip Man is truly one of the greats in Gung fu history. Not just because of Bruce Lee or the movies.

MARTIAL ARTS: The word "Martial" means "Military". Never compare MMA to some one who actually went to war and stabbed a number of people and bathed in blood. People need to respect the classics. Chinese martial arts are superior in every way. Real war is not MMA. Please don't confuse a sport with the intention to kill or murder your opponent. Moreover; look up "Miyamoto Musashi" Whatever argument people have about MMA vs Real Martial arts ends there. There is no reffery and if you loose you will die.

I love this video

Thanks for the interesting video gentlemen.