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This is the third part of the interview with Lu Yan, Zhang Xianming, Lu Jinming
and Dong Honglin, four members of the original Beijing Wushu Team.
In this instalment they discuss how Wushu developed into an International Sport,
and describe how modern training methods put a lot of physical stress on the
athletes of today.
The interview has been left more or less exactly as transcribed so in places may
be a little rough around the edges. Due to its size, it has been split into four
parts:
- Part 1: Introductions, filming the Beijing Wushu
Team Instructional VCDs
- Part 2: Competitive and Traditional Wushu
- Part 3: The Rise of International Wushu, and
strains on Modern Athletes
- Part 4: Memories of the Beijing Team years
Thanks go to Andrea Falk from The
Wushu Centre for providing the interview transcript and the photographs used
on these pages.
[They have just been discussing Modern and Competitive wushu competitions,
and how China now has both. The topic now moves towards International
competitions]
Interviewer: We noticed before, at the earlier stage
of international competition, that China would purposefully lose competitions to
foreigners. Will it continue to do this in the future?
Zhang Xianming: Lose? When you have a competition,
there are going to be losers and winners. You want to develop the competition.
So, even when events come from a certain place, like taekwondo from Korea and
judo from Japan, they are now Olympic events, but, for example, judo has so many
weight categories and medals, but they aren’t all taken by Japanese. Isn’t this
so? As a competitive event, there are quite a few athletes abroad who are good,
even really good. This is normal. You have to admit that they can win.
Interviewer: In the eighties, the international level
hadn’t yet reached that level.
Zhang Xianming: In the eighties?
Interviewer: Yes, when wushu was just starting
internationally. At the first international competition China won all the gold
medals, then after that they lost a few.
Lu Yan: Yes, in order to develop wushu, people in many
countries have to hold interest. If they never gain any medals in any
competitions, perhaps they will lose interest in training, right? China felt
that, in order for wushu to spread in the world, to get more people and more
countries involved in competitive wushu, there needs to be some real
competition, if they came to competitions and lost all the time to China, they
would get discouraged.
Interviewer: So you won’t do that in the future?
Lu Yan: That, well, there will be a natural
development, we’ll have to see.
Zhang Xianming: Now wushu is pretty well developed in
Asia. Chinese culture has influenced quite a few countries in Asia. Countries
like Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Korea, Japan have had a lot of influence
from Chinese civilization. So its easier for Asians to do wushu, it’s easier for
them than for Europeans. The people and physical characteristics are more suited
to wushu, too. They also understand the culture. Asian countries mostly are
Buddhist, while European countries are Christian. So the cultures are not the
same. So, once the rules are set, everyone will compete on a level playing
field. Europeans and Canadians will all be treated the same. Everyone will train
to suit the rules. If you don’t have these rules, then how are you supposed to
prepare? Does this make sense? If you can just say he is good, or he is good,
that doesn’t make sense. With the regulations, everyone can prepare to compete
clearly and do well.
Lu Yan: The judges, too, will find it easier to score.
Zhang Xianming: So Chinese athletes won’t necessarily
win all the gold medals at the Olympics. Really, the countries with good
athletes might well win some gold medals.
Lu Yan: Actually the new regulations will help out the
foreign athletes.
All: They are good for them.
Lu Yan: With their athletic ability, they can reach
the higher degree of difficulty. There are less events to learn, and they have
quite good fitness levels.
Interviewer: The Olympics will have a fist, a short
weapon, and a long weapon?
Lu Jinming, Zhang Xianming: We don’t know the events
yet.
Zhang Xianming: The events haven’t been announced yet.
Whether or not wushu is in the Olympics won’t be announced until May next year.
Interviewer: When you finished your competitive
careers, you were helped by the government by coursework at the sports
university and assignments to coaching positions. Do retiring athletes nowadays
have the same support system?
Zhang Xianming: The system in China now is basically
like the system in Europe, not completely, but basically like that. While the
athlete is on the team they are rewarded for results, they are given a wage and
given special bonuses for results in competition. Sports operate on the market
system. While you are willing to be an athlete the government is willing to
support you according to your results, but when you are finished then it doesn’t
really. But the future of a wushu athlete is pretty good. Look at the Beijing
team, for instance, over ten have ended up in the U.S., some have gotten
married, working, some are teaching wushu.
Interviewer: Do you still keep in contact?
Zhang Xianming: Sure, they bring teams here. You saw
Hao Zhihua has her team here now. Lots of them bring their American teams here
to train.
Lu Jinming: [Kuang Wuquan? some name I can’t catch]
came.
Zhang Xianming: Yes, Kuang Wuquan? Also came. There is
one in Canada, too. I think in Vancouver. Xu Yi is in Vancouver, isn’t he?
Actually, wushu is great for developing people, for developing an all round
person. You can say this. Don’t you think?
Interviewer: Of course.
Zhang Xianming: It develops a person’s flexibility,
coordination, strength, speed, it trains everything. So it has a lot of
potential to develop. There is a lot of room for it to spread, a good future. As
an event, it develops so much of a person’s physical capacity.
Lu Yan: [Can’t catch]
Zhang Xianming: You asked before why I trained wushu.
Actually, I didn’t know anything about wushu. But when I was young I used to get
sick often, I was very weak, I always got bronchitis, pneumonia, and when I had
them I developed high fevers. But after I trained wushu I never got sick again,
I never got those type of sicknesses again. Because of wushu training I never
got these sicknesses again.
Lu Yan: Exactly. When we trained we did the more
traditional training, it was great. It was like this, but now, the way they
train, they are all injured. The same as all sports events. The competitive life
of an athlete is very short, and in that space of time the athletes have to
achieve the highest peak of ability that they can.
Zhang Xianming: Yes, now there are a lot of injured
athletes.
Lu Yan: Too many.
Zhang Xianming: When we were athletes we trained all
those years but very rarely hurt ourselves. Lu Yan, did you ever injure
yourself?
Lu Yan: No.
Zhang Xianming: You? Lu Jinming?
Lu Jinming: No.
Zhang Xianming: No, we were very seldom hurt. We never
pulled a muscle while stretching, well, not never, but very seldom.
Lu Jinming: Well, we sometimes did.
Zhang Xianming: We did, but not often.
Lu Yan: Now, there is not one athlete who is not
injured.
Zhang Xianming: They all train with protective
bandages, knee braces and such, on. They all have torn ligaments.
Lu Yan: So, you ask why people abroad like the old
wushu instead of the modern wushu? The old wushu was more for improving your
condition, you can keep training for a long time. They emphasise health training
more abroad, so like the more traditional styles better.
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Lu Jinming: You can learn a lot about China through
training wushu. That’s not to say that you don’t learn about Chinese culture any
more (with the new wushu) but a lot less, a lot less than before, it’s more just
about competition. Before, people had an idea about wushu, including
applications. There was a lot more involved before. Now they don’t really have
this.
Dong Honglin: [Says something that makes everyone
laugh]
Lu Yan: Now that you say that, it’s true, we hadn’t
thought of that.
Zhang Xianming: The training before was like that.
I’ve said a lot, haven’t I? You must be tired of me.
Lu Jinming: So have I.
Interviewer: You have to get back to work, too, don’t
you?
Lu Yan: You two finish your cigarettes and that will
be just about it, won’t it?
All: Have you got any more questions?
Interviewer: I’m just looking through the questions.
You brought up a lot of things that were on the list, before I had a chance to
ask them. Here’s one. Do you still train at all?
All: No way.
Interviewer: Do you still do any morning exercises or
practice any traditional styles?
Zhang Xianming: We lead the athletes in the morning
exercises, then when we’re teaching we of course are doing movements all the
time. So we do some traditional styles, like fanzi, styles we know like bagua,
as well as standard wushu, including taiji.
Interviewer: Dong Honglin, you don’t coach. Do you do
wushu at all?
Dong Honglin: After I left the team I changed
professions. I basically don’t train any more. My situation is not the same. I
don’t really have time.
Interviewer: Do you train at all?
Dong Honglin: I do. [Not clear, everyone laughs]
… After training all those years, of course I still feel strongly about wushu, I
still love it.
Interviewer: Lu Jinming, do you do any traditional
style?
Lu Jinming: This year, they are starting to do a
national traditional style competition again, separate from competitive wushu.
Every October or November they will have a traditional competition. This year
will be the first one.
Interviewer: You, yourself, do you practice any
traditional style?
Lu Jinming: Myself? While coaching I do. This morning
I was doing some tongbei. I’m training some athletes who will participate in
October. Just this morning I was doing some. When I teach them I have to
practice up.
Lu Yan: We all use the same general coaching
principles. That is, we have the same approach to coaching, if we are going to
teach something we will practice it. We will do it in the course of teaching.
But if you ask whether or not we set aside a time of day to practice on our own,
then we do not. Every day we are coaching morning and afternoon, and have done a
lot of movements all day, showing techniques, so we don’t have the energy or
time to train as well after work. You do not lose your basics and movements
because you are always doing them. So we keep our conditioning and our
abilities. But do we set aside a time to stretch and do techniques? No, very
seldom.
Dong Honglin: We trained so much at that time that it
is instilled into us. For example, I did that sparring form with Yanping, the
three section staff vs staff. How long has it been since we did that together? I
think it was in 1986. That’s 1986, 1996, that’s over 15 years, but someone asked
us to do it and we just got together and naturally did it.
Lu Yan: That’s 15 years they haven’t done it.
Dong Honglin: But we just naturally did the movements.
We had to do it the other day and we just did. As natural as anything.
Lu Yan: Wushu is part of who we are. It really is
instilled in us. We don’t specifically go out and practise, we don’t do the
basic practice and the routines, but it is how we have developed. We did this
since we are young so it is always within us. If we wanted to bring ourselves
back to our full ability it would take a very short time of training to do.
Zhang Xianming: When we pick up a weapon it is just
second nature to us. Very natural. We just can do everything without even
thinking about it. Because we’ve done the techniques so much.
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