Wushu Staff - Rattle Knock

Wushu Staff - Rattle Knock

In this lesson you will learn how to do the wushu rattle knock (in Chinese: "Dian Gun"), a technique frequently performed in modern wushu staff forms. This looks very simple, but a lot of timing is required to do this fast. Common mistakes are: Moving the hands away from the body, moving the chest too much, twisting the upper body and holding the staff too firm. Find more wushu staff lessons at staff main. Practice the wushu rattle knock technique as follows.

Execution

  • Stand in a horse stance (see horse stance lesson) and hold the staff with the right hand in front of you. Put the left hand over your right hand like if you would do a back twirl (see back twirl lesson) and look forward (slightly down). The upper body is pretty vertical and the hands should be in front of the solar plexus. (upper abdominals) The thin end of the stuff point up (2 third of the staff). The thick end points down.
  • Knock the top of your staff on the floor next to your right foot and look slightly down to where the staff hits the floor. But don't move your head too much. As you knock the staff to the right side, elevate your left elbow so that the left upper arm is horizontal and lower the right elbow so that the right forearm is vertical and the elbow is right in front of the belly button. At the same time you can move slightly to the left so that the right leg is extend a little bit more (but not too much). When you do this, you twist the shoulders slightly and move the hips slightly to the left. But the chest should stay exactly on the same spot !!! Keep the hands right in front of the upper abdominals and pretty close to the trunk.
  • Let the staff bounce off (your staff should be pretty flexible) and whip your hands at the same time. This makes the staff even faster. Then knock the top of your wushu staff next to your left foot. Now the whole thing is done the other way around. Elevate the right elbow and lower the left elbow, etc., etc.
  • Again let the top of the staff bounce off and swing it back to the right side. Keep in mind that the chest stays on the same spot while the hips can move slightly from left to right. The head stays at the same height always. The hands stay pretty close to the body.
  • Keep knocking the staff as fast as you can. The knocks should sound like a machine gun.

Advice

  • Start knocking your wushu staff slowly and then speed up. Knock the staff as fast as you can, but be careful, don't hit your own feet.
  • Avoid practicing the rattle knock on concrete, because you could break your staff in just a few hits.