When I started training seriously, my then kung fu teacher was of the old school: train hard, don’t whine when you’re in pain, then do it again the next day. There’s a lot to say for that method but in hindsight, there were also a lot of things wrong with it. But that’s not really what I want to talk about now. My teacher’s background is though, especially the consequences it had on his teaching.
He started as a gymnast when he was a kid in the ’60 and his warm ups and stretching reflected it. We used to do a lot of extreme ballistic stretching:
- Launching the legs all lover the place.
- Doing deep stretches and bouncing into them as hard as we could.
- Pushing harder and harder with every single rep.
I did get more flexible but progress was slow and often very painful. But that’s how it was back then so I didn’t really question it.