One of my kung fu teachers is nine feet tall

I refer, of course, to my dragon pole, pictured below.

Father, daughter, and dragon pole (circa 2007)

In principle, a weapon is simply an extension of the body.  In practice, it takes a lot of intelligent  and diligent practice to attain that kind of mastery.  [I'm working on it...]  In the meantime, training with a weapon, especially a large weapon, is a valuable source of feedback for developing efficient body movement.  Weapons are great teachers.

There is also a conditioning effect.  Look at the picture: talk about torque!  Repeatedly working through the hung kuen dragon pole set, or even individual movements as a drill, soon becomes a demanding workout.

I like to practice the dragon pole movements not only with the big stick, but to a lesser extent with a 6 foot bo, and also with no stick at all.  After training with the dragon pole switching down to a bo feels like a toothpick!

Nowadays we don't travel around armed with our preferred weapon, so ideally you want to be able to improvise by picking up whatever comes to hand.  While giant sticks are hard to come by -- and don't make great indoor weapons, anyway -- bo-like brooms and mops are relatively common, so practicing with shorter sticks makes practical sense.

Dispensing with the weapon altogether leads into an exploration of the relationship between weapon techniques and empty-handed body movements.  This is valuable.

Don't do this in a judo competition

Kani basami is judo's flying scissors throw, and was banned from competition because of the risk of breaking one or both of uke's legs.



It's a fun throw, and requires a strong breakfall from uke.  In learning this throw it is helpful to put one hand on the floor, but it's much more satisfying to do it in mid-air.

In wrestling you'll sometimes see the even more spectacular and dangerous flying head scissors variation, performed here (at 1:20) by Scarlett Johansson's character in Iron Man 2.

That's not allowed in competition, either!

Variations

For a bit of a change I taught a class built out of variations. Starting with our first leg throw (o soto gari) and the related ninth (o soto otoshi) I led the class through about 8 variations. We repeated the dose with around a dozen related hip throws and variations, all emerging from our nfirst hip throw (uki goshi).

Because we practice osoto gari and uki goshi so much, even for the beginners this was viable. The related principles form a bridge to the variations. It is not a case of learning something completely unrelated, but rather building on what you already have. At the same time, learning a new variation is not just accumulation; there are distinctive points and refinements to be learned and most everyone runs into a particular variation that poses problems that need to be worked through.

After this tour, we went back to some rapid-fire throw-for-throw practice on the first leg and hip throws with a variety of partners, which were -- gasp! -- now a bit better and more robust thanks to the exploration through the wider world of variations.

It's a bit like a chef experimenting with all sorts of flavors, but then going back to his speciality and making small adjustments, leading to significant improvements.

A few reliable techniques, or a smorgasbord?

I say both.  Despite our large syllabus, we spend most of our time practicing the fundamentals, both techniques and drills.  The higher techniques are practiced less often, but build on and compliment the principles instilled in the fundamentals.  This maintains interest, adds scope, and reinforces the fundamentals (example).

At first only the basic techniques will be sufficiently internalized to pull off under pressure, but over time one's applicable repertoire becomes richer.

An analogy is learning another language.  Maybe you only learn a handful of words and phrases by rote at first -- traveller's French (or whatever) -- but if you are serious, in time you will want to develop a richer vocabulary, a sense of the grammar, idiom, etc.  Even learning those first few phrases may be really difficult (at first), but it is not clear that restricting yourself to a small set that intensive practice of a small subset will lead to better results than a serious, broader study.

Of course, if you don't have the time/dedication to pursue a broad and deep study of a language (or a martial art) attempting to do so will lead to shallow and disappointing results.

How do we defend against kick-boxers and armed attackers?

Our self-defence requirements include scenario training against differently trained attackers, and armed assailants.  That said, I think that intensive training in weapons and in a fist-and-foot style helps a lot in comfort and expertise in those kind of scenarios.  And that takes training time, whether in one art or many. 

I have trained in ken-jitsu a little bit, and I like it.  In people who have done a lot of sword-work you can see it reflected (positively!) in their jiu-jitsu.  Similarly, as I make progress in chinese boxing, I am finding all sorts of cross-connections with jiu-jitsu.

Real combat, especially when weapons are involved, is of course extremely dangerous.  Personally, I'd rather face a kick-boxer than an attacker with a sword.