Hung I-Hsiang

Biography Hung I-Hsiang was born in Taiwan into a wealthy merchant family in the Dihua district of Taipei. He commenced his training of martial art in elementary school during the Japanese colonial period studying kendo and judo as well has the Southern Shaolin style of Crane Boxing passed down within his family. This cemented his lifelong interest in and commitment to training. As a teenager, his father arranged his study with several local Southern Shaolin stylists. His first exposure to internal martial art was Yang style Taijiquan under Master Tu (Chinese: 涂師傅), a Taiwanese teacher who had studied in Mainland China. He subsequently studied with Chang Chun-Feng , a master of internal Chinese martial arts from Northern China.

With the mass exodus of mainland Chinese to Taiwan in 1949, the Hung family compound became known as a refuge for destitute martial artists. In the decade following, Hung Yi-hsiang was exposed to the teachings of these fighters from various styles.

When Chang began teaching in the northern part of Taipei, his first group of core students included the three Hung brothers: Hung I-Hsiang, Hung I-Wen, and Hung I-Mien. According to the Hung family, Hung I-Wen specialized in xingyiquan, boxing theory, longevity exercises and Chinese medicine, Hung I-Mien was the baguazhang specialist, while Hung I-Hsiang mastered the 3 internal arts of xingyiquan, baguazhang, and taijiquan.

Hung I-Hsiang internal arts training program included xingyiquan, baguazhang and taijiquan, Shaolin kung fu, and qigong. He suggests that students learn Shaolin kung fu when they are very young, progress to xingyiquan to learn how to develop internal power, and then progress to baguazhang and tai chi to learn how to refine the power. This is also the teaching sequence used by Hung's teacher, Chang Chun-Feng. Hung believed that in practicing the xingyiquan five elements as an introduction to the internal martial arts, the student can clearly understand the way the body should be trained to move in the internal styles. If the student starts out in tai chi, it is very difficult to develop and understand internal power.

Many of Hung's students dominated the full-contact tournaments in Taiwan. One student, Weng Hsien-ming, won the Taiwan full contact championships three years in a row. Although he was thin and short, but won through his clever use of internal martial art skills. Another, Huang Hsi-I, also usually won his all-Taiwan full contact tournaments with knock-outs.