Fighting: The soft overcomes the hard
About the article
This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from November 1993.
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This is according to five time World Karate Champion Ron Van Clief. He practices Aikijitsu but points out the common element of his style and Tai Chi.
"Tai Chi is based upon the Daoist idea that the soft ultimately overcomes the hard," Ron said. "With Aikijitsu, you deflect and avoid giving or receiving blows. That is the same principle of Tai Chi. With Aikijitsu or Tai Chi you don't need to be young and strong to be very good. Tai Chi is catching on in the west. I recently read a New York Times article that said more than ten million people practice martial arts in the US and of that, half do Tai Chi." There are four main styles of Tai Chi. They are: the Wu style with compact, gentle movements; the Sun style with quick and nimble movements; the Yang style with quiet relaxed motions; and the Chen style with smooth and strong moves.
-Guy Harrison
