How Long Should You Train On a Wing Chun Dummy Each Day?

How long each day should you train on a Wing Chun wooden dummy?
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Answer: Are you kidding? If I had the room for one at my place, I’d tuck in bed with me at night!

To get to your question, perfect practice makes perfect. So train as much as you can, beware of burnout, and get critiques and tweaks from sifu and refine your practice.

One Word of Caution:

Many people beat up on the dummy when they train. They hit it as hard as possible… bare knuckle.

Personally, I don’t do that. And my sifu doesn’t recommend it either (iron palm/iron shin is another topic).

Where I train, we’re taught to “affect” the dummy, not break it or smash our fists (palm, knee, elbow, etc.) into it.

However, someone did break the wooden dummy leg once. But stomp kicks exert maximum damage to a target with minimal discomfort and damage to the kicker, you know what I mean?

Some health experts believe if you repeatedly hit a hard object it can cause needless long-term injuries. They don’t mean bruises, they mean things like arthritis and such. Dit da jow can help, but not if you keep injuring yourself on purpose, over and over again. Ever see a retired boxer or other sport professional who has trouble walking and moving? Not fun.

Plus, breaking wooden boards for demonstration looks cool, but beating your bones on a hard wooden dummy isn’t necessary or practical in a street situation.

In a real event, where your life is in danger, you ought to be using your hard body weapons against softer and weaker target areas. i.e. elbow to face, chop to neck, kick to the jewels; kicking shin-to-shin tends to ruin your day.

The dummies at our kwoon have pads on them. This allows us to smack it hard without breaking our hands. It also makes dummy practice more fun, for longer hours.

If want to pound on your dummy for hours at a time, I recommend using some protective pads, not for the dummy, for you.

Keep training…