Page 179 - The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin_Neat plip book

away, on the far side of the arena, bal letic Tai Chi form compet ition was taki ng
place. B lood and meditation were coexisting.

My first match would be Moving Step. The rul es, simpl y put , are as follows:
Play begins from contact—this is a grappl ing compet ition like wrestling or
judo, so striking is supposedly not enco ur aged. The target area is from the
waist to just below the neck. You canno t lock your han ds beh ind someone ’s

back or grab their clothes, otherwise play is wide open . You gai n one po int for
throwing the guy out of the ring, two point s for a clean thr ow whe re the
opponent hits the floor and you are standi ng. One po int for a thr ow whe re you
go down on top of the opponent . Matches are thr ee rounds , two minut es

playing time each. If someone leads by four point s in a round, it is over. Two
out of three rounds wins and if rounds and po int s are even by the end of thr ee
rounds, the lighter guy wins. That rarely hap pen s, but if the Buf falo and I
stayed healthy and managed to make it int o the last round, it coul d gi ve me a

tiny edge.
My first Moving Step opponent was strong, fast, and aggr essive. His spe ed
surprised me—a very good athlete. All the players from the top Taiwane se
schools have a way of putting the cardi o load on the oppo nen t and dr aini ng

him with subtle pressure and leverage. They hav e excellent pumme ling
techniques, which means they kno w ho w to take inside position with the ir
forward arm in the clinch. Imagine an oppo nen t’s left foot forward, left arm
deep under my armpit and wrapped around my back or up my sho ul der. That

is an underhook. Pummeling is the fight for that po sition. The ins ide arm
tends to give more leverage and slight ly better angl es for thr ows. If a pl ayer ha s
“double inside position” it means that he has under ho oks on bo th side s. Thi s is
considered to be very advantageous in all grappl ing arts. If you ever he ar

martial artists talking about a “pum meling war” they don’t mean tha t two
people are clobbering one another, but that they are ght ing f or unde rho oks .
It turns out that pummeling would be a huge compo nen t of my tour na ment
strategy. You may recall that I hurt my right sho ul der fight ing Che n Ze-Che ng

in the semifinals of the 2002 World Cham pi ons hi ps . Since then , the sho ul de r
has been my Achilles heel. Abo ut thr ee mont hs before thi s year’s Taiwan
tournament, the 2004 Worlds, Dan came upo n an interesting metho d in
training. Whenever I had the right side under ho ok in the clinch, he woul d

clamp down on my elbow from the out side in a manner that jus t ki lled my
shoulder. After weeks of pain, I deci ded to concede the pum meling war and