JKD Wooden Dummy

Editor • November 10, 2015 • 0 Comments

In this article Sifu Tim Tackett discusses the JKD Wooden Dummy Set created by Sifu Dan Inosanto using Bruce Lee’s modified Wing Chun techniques and the boxing phase of JKD. Also, be sure to watch the a rare historical clip of Sifu Tim Tackett demonstrating the Wing Chun Dummy Form…

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Wing Chun Meets JKD: A Wooden Dummy Comparison

Bruce Lee spent a lot of time working on the dummy. Even though Bruce had not learned the entire Wing Chun dummy set, he was creative enough to freelance it using elements of the Wing Chun he had learned in Hong Kong plus boxing and other techniques. Former students such as Pete Jacobs, who saw Bruce working out on the dummy, have told me he hit it so hard it was frightening.

Working with the Wing Chun dummy is excellent supplemental training for Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do as well as an essential part of Wing Chun training.

How should you accomplish this?

If you don’t have a person who can show you the proper way to use the dummy, feel free to experiment with any technique. Then absorb what is useful. Reject what is useless and add what is specifically your own. If you are a Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do practitioner you can make up a set pattern or patterns, but you must eventually dissolve these patterns and work in a more free-flowing freelance fashion.

This process is a lot easier if you are fortunate enough, as I was, to have an instructor such as Dan Inosanto. I started studying JKD with Sifu Inosanto shortly after Bruce Lee closed the Los Angeles Chinatown school, and many of Bruce’s and Danny’s advanced students started working out on Tuesday and Thursday evenings in Sifu Inosanto’s backyard.

After Bruce Lee’s tragic and untimely death, Inosanto went to Hong Kong to film the revised version of “The Game of Death.” While in Hong Kong Dan learned the complete Wing Chun Mook Jong form, which is comprised of 108 techniques divided into 10 series, from a Wing Chun practitioner named Chris Yik. Dan taught many of his backyard JKD students the entire Wing Chun Dummy set.

Dan Inosanto then created a Jeet Kune Do dummy set consisting of Bruce Lee’s modified Wing Chun techniques and the boxing phase of JKD.

It is clear from Bruce’s notes that JKD is not based on 26 different martial arts, as has been reported, Bruce writes that he had created a new martial art – Jeet Kune Do or the way of the intercepting fist – based mainly on Wing Chun, Western Boxing and Western Fencing. The JKD Dummy set Dan created consists of 125 movements, most coming from Western boxing and modified Wing Chun.

This article will show you seris 1 (the first 10 movements) of the Wing Chun set and the first 10 techniques of the JKD dummy set. While neither set is part of the core curriculum of Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do, it can be a valuable asset to the Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do practitioner. he can pick and choose from each form. he can learn the forms, then dissolve the forms so he can honestly express himself.

This article was written by Sifu Tim Tackett of the JKD Wednesday Night Group originally published in the February 1998 issue of IKF.

About the video: Never before seen rare footage of Sifu Tim Tackett demonstrating the first section of the Wing Chun Dummy Set as taught to him by Sifu Dan Inosanto. Included in the video is also a short clip from Sifu Tackett teaching in his Garage (in Redlands, California) as well as an overview of how the Wing Chun set (and the JKD set) came to be in Chinatown JKD.