Rueben Littlejohn & Sun Style in San Diego

I’ve just returned from a trip to California and was fortunate enough to be able to train with Rueben Littlejohn lǎo​shī​ in Carlsbad and San Diego. If you are looking to learn 孫祿堂 (Sūn Lùtáng)'s three Internal martial arts and can get to California, I recommend you seek him out. Rueben has won numerous tournaments in the Chinese martial arts and came across to me as capable, knowledgeable, skilled as well as a very warm & friendly person.

Rueben’s world class teachers include ‘the Queen of Tai Chi’ 蘇自芳 (Sū​ Zì​fāng)​ & Tim Cartmell who have both themselves studied with 孫劍雲 (Sūn Jiànyún​) Sūn Lùtáng’s daughter.

Rueben Littlejohn and I

Here’s a link where you can find information to contact Littlejohn lǎo​shī;
http://www.youtube.com/user/CarlsbadTaiChi?feature=watch

Wasters

劍 Jiàn (Double-edged blade sword) sparring is something you don’t find in every martial arts academy, even those that teach a sword form. I’ve recently found two groups of enthusiasts that are keen to change that:

1. The World Jiànshù League

( http://www.worldjianshu.org/ )

2. The Traditional Chinese Sword League

( http://www.swordleague.com/ )

They both have a set of competition rules for Jiàn sparring and both hold tournaments that you can participate in (I believe you have to join both organisations in order to compete though), which I’ve yet to do.

The WJL has produced a standardised Jiàn (available from their site) for particpation in their competitions, constructed from a flexibile yet strong polymer called the CSJian “Onyx” (See the black sword pictured below). It handles pretty well and feels well-blanced. The nice thing about this sword is that because of the plastic appearance I didn’t feel awkward about messing about with it in case I damaged it.

The CS Jian “Onyx”

The TCSL uses wooden swords for their tournaments. I currently don’t have one but Raven Studios
( http://www.little-raven.com/RS/MA/index.html )
produce a custom sword for the Great River Taoist Center (See the sword pictured below on a green background). The GRTC happens to be run by Scott Rodell, who also happens to be a big part of (if he doesn’t run it completely) the TCSL. There’s no official link between these groups -that I’ve seen- but I imagine the chances are good that the Raven Studios sword would be acceptable at a TCSL tournament (if you want to be sure - join the TCSL and find out!)

The Great River Taoist Center (Custom) Jian from Raven Studios

And finally here’s some pictures of a different Jiàn (in the 明朝 Míngcháo (Ming dynasty) style) that I recently bought from Raven Studios. I ordered the blade to be 32” which was the longest they offered outside of a custom job. And I chose that length because all the methods that I was reading about on how to work out the correct length for your body had -for me- the blade at 32” or a little longer (I guess I have a long body!) I also opted to have the tip rounded rather than pointed. This sword is well-balanced to handle and I find it to be an attractive object to own in it’s own right. It is without question exceptionally well-made.

Míng style Jiàn

‘Wasters’ is a term used for wooden (inexpensive/throwaway) swords used to train in sparring.