Baji- 八極

The Baji’s foundation is a stomp plus a leaping step. (Left foot stomp, then right foot leap or right foot stomp, left foot leap) According to the Newton’s Law, how much force you applied to the ground when you stomp, how many force applied to you from the ground. The Baji is borrowing this force from the ground right after you stomp to do a forward motion in attack. The forward motion is followed with the leaping step so as to balance the body. There are two ways of stomping according to old books;

1) Raise your Stomping leg (the other leg is the leaping leg) in the air and stomp on the ground with your whole stomping foot, that means, the toes, the front foot and the heel of the stomping foot shall stomp on the ground at the same time, and then the leaping leg leap forward.
2) Raise your stomping leg’s heel(leaping leg hanging), that means your stomping leg’s toe are touching or standing on the ground (as you may have just done some spinning), Release your mass over your stomping leg’s toe thus allow the stomping leg’s heel to stomp on the ground, borrow the force from the ground to your stomping leg from the heel and do the leaping by your hanging and leaping leg.

*To prevent injuries, performer must ensure all stomping include the heel. Combined with turning hips, there are numerous powerful combos you could perform with the above stomping and leaping technique. The stomping technique could also apply to an upward motion, that the performer can apply the force from the ground on his shoulder, and lift opponent by his hips or thigh. Opponent is then totally vulnerable as he is now airborne and somehow upside down. This is a very good chance to do elbow attack by stomping and leaping technique on your airborne opponent.

From the old books, Baji performers stomp themselves to their opponent’s coming punch or kick to destroy the punch or kick. It is quite understandable because you always win if you swinging your entire body mass to collide with only one limb of others. Baji has another technique of pulling opponent from north to south, and performer himself attack the southward opponent from down to up (airborne opponent), from east to west(semi-airborne the opponent as he is losing balance, or from west to east, or directly from south to north (direct attack) 3-Dimensional attacks are essential in Baji