The Wu Kong lineage comes through head coach Ali Walmsley.

Chen Style Tai Chi

I have been studying Chen Style Tai Chi since 1996 under a number of Chen Family Grand Masters (Chen Zheng Lei, Chen Xiao Wang), their off-spring (Chen Bin, Chen Yin Jun), and senior students (Wang Hai Jun, Yue Liming). But most thoroughly I trained with Master Liu Yong, formerly of Lianyungang and now of Wu Zhi Shan (Five Finger Mountain) Hainan.

I was an indoor student of Master Liu Yong for 10 years and lived by his side full-time during a period spent in Lianyungang, China from 2007-8. One of the inspirations for the Wu Kong club name is that this is where you find the infamous Hua Guo Shan (Flower & Fruits Mountain) that was home to the legendary monkey king Wu Kong.

If you haven't come across Chen Style Tai Chi before, a quick google should suffice to tell you how important it is in the development of Tai Chi as we know it today. Simply put the Chen Village is it's birthplace. I've been fortunate to visit and train there several times since my first visit in 1997, and to train intensively with the descendants of the Chen family in the UK, Australia, and China.

Classical Qi Gong

My Classical Qi Gong lineage is fundamentally from the Internal Intent school headed by Roy Jenzen. He teaches the 'other' Chinese internal martial arts of Xing Yi and Ba Gua alongside Classical Qi Gong (or 'Dao Yin' as he would put it).

Having spent half a lifetime intently pursuing Chen Style Tai Chi, I somewhat stumbled across the Internal Intent lineage in 2010 and feel honoured to have done so. Roy is an incredible teacher, healer, and martial artist, with a devoted following. He holds multiple important lineages to China, Hong Kong, & Taiwan.

His work is what I term Classical Qi Gong and it is the 'sine qua non' of all internal martial arts - meaning 'without which, nothing'. Once you have the principles of the internal Intent school properly 'burned into your ways' they will blend into your daily life, and into all your movements of Tai Chi, Xing Yi, Ba Gua and of course Qi Gong.

Another inspiration for the Wu Kong club name came from the Internal Intent teachings. In the 5 animals Qi Gong form, the monkey is learned last, and in the final part the monkey steals the peaches of immortality, but humbly offers back what he has stolen. You can see this in the club logo and it represents those who have learnt these arts and go on to teach what they have learnt.

If the forms of Tai Chi, Xing Yi, and Ba Gua can be likened to guns, then the work of Classical Qi Gong (by which I include Zhan Zhuang, Nei Gong, Nei Dan, Dao Yin, and more) gives you the bullets.

An Honour, Privilege and way to make good connections

I've given up much to study these arts for many years, and would like to pay tribute to many other teachers, friends and students current and old, who have shared their path with me and added to my 'syllabus' along the way. I'll come back to that here or elsewhere on this site.

It is considered an honour and a privilege to enter into both of the main lineages of the Wu Kong school.