 A fight's 30 seconds or less. I believe all martial arts are effective. Hitting people in the head is just as satisfying. Why, what happened to Wing Chun? Why does it get so much hate on the internet? So he apparently shipped fentanyl to my condo under my name. They wanted 18 years of my life. Wow. How can Asians combat the stereotype of being viewed as kind of weak? And also, does that mean all Asians should train MMA? And does Wing Chun actually work in the streets? We got a Chinese-American martial artist that's going to be revealing the truth. Yeah, joining us today, we've got Jeff Chan, MMA Shredded, about 600,000 subscribers on YouTube. You're going viral right now for showing Wing Chun and real life sparring, you know, scenarios. I see you pop up on my feed. And I'm not just saying that because you're here right now. What's up? Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure because I've been following you guys for a very, very, very long time. Big inspiration for a lot of Asians growing up. Me and all my friends watch you growing up. Yeah, thank you. Thank you, man. Real quick, for the people who are not familiar with who you are, what you do, why don't you let them know? OK, my name is Jeff Chan, Chinese guy. I'd like to say I'm just an average martial artist who trains martial arts. Kind of got into it when I was young. I believe 15 years old. And I just really never quit. Now, I coach full-time. I've fought professionally. I try to share my knowledge online and try to help as many people as possible. I'm trying to relate to as many people as possible because I believe there's a lot of people out there that can be in the same position I am in. All right, everybody, if you guys are ready to hear us address a lot of the burning questions you have about either Chinese martial arts or advice for Asians and self-defense, please hit that Like button right now. And we're going to get into it because I think we have a lot to talk about. But first of all, I do want to point out, man, check out the self-defense championships. That's a whole series you did with a bunch of other self-defense and martial artists on YouTube. I thought that was really cool. It showed you guys all together. And you have just so many, so many videos out there, man. Yeah, and you were the only Asian that was there as part of these self-defense championships, right, where they basically got all the martial artists or teachers or fighters on YouTube to come together and almost like do a reality show, right? Yeah, it was pretty cool. There's a karate guy. There was an ex-swat police officer. Oh, sure. There was a keto guy. It was me and who? I'll say this, man. It was almost like physical 100, but instead of just being buff, it was just like punching each other. There's a lot of that. And kneading each other in the nuts. There was a lot of that. Yo, I didn't know that they allowed the groin hits. I was like, oh, man. A lot of stabbing, too. No, that's real life. Groin hits are real life, right? Yeah, yeah. Headbutts, too. You know, one thing I notice about you is you always say, you know, I like to hit people in the head and I like to get hit in the head. Can you explain that? Because a lot of people, I'm not going to lie, Andrew. Even when you hear martial artists talk, they don't always say that. Bro, that is such an unchinese thing to say. Hitting people in the head is just a satisfying. Right. It gets you going. I mean, who doesn't like hitting a heavy bag? And hitting a moving target, even more fun. But you guys aren't surprised about that. You guys are probably wondering, do I actually like getting hit in the head? It's something about getting into the zone, getting into the matrix, and trying to dodge those punches. And when you get a good shot on you, it kind of motivates you to want to get them back. Or if you eat a good low kick, it kind of, you want to feel more of that low kick. And if your thigh is conditioned, it kind of just, it gets you in it more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You always see that in movies sometimes, too, when the guy's got the blood dripping on his knees, like, yeah, it's a real thing. It's a real thing. It's an adrenaline, dopamine, serotonin, endorphin release. That's the right way to say it. So do they have to want to get hit in the head to be a good martial arts? Maybe we'll talk about it. But we got a lot to talk about here. So I want to quickly get into your personal background. That'll set the stage for a lot of the things that you talk about, the perspective, and the stories that you share. And it's very, you got some really crazy stories, but real quick, I just want to set the tone for the audience. The two viral videos that you have pop up on my feed recently was one where you are applying real life wing Chun chain punches in live action sparring, right? That's going pretty viral for you, right? Because you don't see a lot of wing Chun techniques done in real life. And the other one is you just put on headgear and you let people in central part of it. No, no, no, no headgear. Oh, no headgear. I'm sorry. You just let people in Central Park try to punch you in the head and you're just dodging them. Yeah, I'd like to say what my channel is about is authenticity. And if people are not actually trying to hit me and it looks fake, who's going to watch it? No, and you show the people that hit you. Like, you don't just cut the highlights out. Like, literally, it's just a videotape of you sparring. Sometimes you get hit. You get them back. And that's what I like about it. Yeah, it would just be unrealistic if I never got hit. It would literally be unrealistic. And in terms of the wing Chun video, I love as I get more and more experienced into the martial arts world, I'm more curious about learning different disciplines. And you know what? I believe all martial arts are effective. And eventually we're going to talk about the effectiveness of wing Chun. But I believe all martial arts work. And I'm out there trying out new moves, new techniques, new martial arts, and letting you guys know my opinion on whether I think it works or not. And the way that you're revealing the truth is that you're actually putting it into practice and you're sparring with it. But I guess real quick, man, go tell us about your background, man. You're from Canada, actually, from Ottawa. And just get put it on. OK, so I started training Muay Thai when I was 15 years old. OK, so did not start off with Kung Fu or a traditional Chinese martial art? Went with the Thai martial art, right? Well, funny story is when I was younger, I would say elementary school slash high school. I was kind of indirectly bullied, kind of not bullied, meaning I hung out with, say, a hockey friend named Matt LaFleur. Shout out to him, a really good friend of mine. Friend, he's American? Yeah, he's a hockey player. And he'd kind of shove my shoulder and be like, hey, Bruce Lee, or like, hey, Jackie Chan. And then kind of tease me. And then that would kind of make me want to fight him. And we'd play fight a lot. And I've always kind of enjoyed fighting. And because. So you're saying, if I'm your teacher when I'm young, I can see it. Like you're different from the other kids. You have a special inclination for physical contact, doling out physical contact, not in a malicious way, but you like it more than an average person. I would say I was pretty athletic, pretty athletic. And then that led you to what, high school? You kept doing it, college? So I joined Muay Thai. And to be honest, I joined just for fun, just for fitness. What does your mom think? Oh, she hated it. She hated it. They think it's too brutal. They think it's bad. 100%, 100%. But it was my coach, actually, who kind of pushed me into competition. And he called me young Masato. Masato's like a K-1 Japanese superstar. And he'd be like, he motivated me to fight. So you had some natural ability for it, though. 100%. Clearly showed that you were kind of good at it. Yes, yes, yes, in good. Usually, that's what happens when someone tells you you're good, you're like, what? I'll give it a shot. And then I took one fight and eventually racked up a bunch of amateur fights. And this whole time, I'm actually trying to gain some law enforcement. So for me, I had no plans on becoming a professional fighter. I actually want to be a professional fighter or train martial arts to add to my resume to being a police officer. So I'm actually quite a conservative guy. I've always wanted to be a police officer because it's a safe job. And it's not like in America. In Canada, being a police officer is actually a really good job. It's a prestigious job. You're a Canadian Mountie, right? Yeah, yeah. Are you a Mountie? RCMB, Federal Police, yeah. I guess we got to give some context for people because police in America, I guess, it's kind of like, I don't know, the reputation got real shaky recently. But in Canada, I guess let's just say it's more like being an FBI agent. I'm not saying that it is in terms of the work because I know the FBI does completely different. Let's just say it's better than America. It's just more higher status. Higher status. I do want to iterate that before you went into the police academy and to become a police officer, which you did for a short stint of time, you were kind of like, you tried to go the traditional Asian route, right? You're like a failed accountant. You just couldn't do accounting, right? So you're a failed nerd. To be specific, I failed statistics two, two times. And I was like, I had enough of this. Can't do it. What else am I going to do? When you're not smart in high school, you're athletic. And you don't know what you want to do. And you're fairly tall. I mean, you're tall for an angel guy. I either go into the military or policing. And at the time, I had my spiky hair. I didn't want to cut it. So I decided to not go to the military, because you had to shave your head. I decided to go policing instead. OK. So then I guess then you're in police training because after you graduate from college or you don't graduate from college? I graduate from college. So I did go back to school. So I dropped accounting. I went into college. I got my police foundations diploma. Then I went back to university and got my criminology degree. I'm actually not dumb. Right, right. But you just you got the brain for the things that the Asian parents don't want you to study. 100%. 100%. So my parents did support me in going into policing because, again, in Canada, it's actually it's not bad of a job. It's a good job. Right, right, right. With that said, at the time, I guess 2025, it was very difficult to actually get in, especially with my life experience. So because I couldn't get in, the police officers that I hooked up with, they would all tell me like, you got to build your resume. You got to volunteer. So all I did was volunteer. Oh, martial arts looks great on your resume. So you should definitely train martial arts. And so then my mind is like, OK, I'm just going to keep becoming a better martial artist. Oh, maybe life experience. Maybe if I'm a professional fighter, that would make it look good on the resume. So that's why when I got offered to fight professionally, I was like, yeah, I'll do it. So my mind was never to be like, hey, I want to be a professional fighter. Although I thought it was kind of cool to be a professional fighter. I thought, hey, that will add to my resume. How many police officers have a have a professional fighting experience? So you went in a professional fighting to be the best police officer that you could be. That pretty much a different reason for a lot of people. A Canada only story, because I'd never heard that in America. Pretty much. So in this whole time, nobody's bringing up. Maybe you should just stick with pro fighting. Like literally you just thought I'm a be a pro fighter to stack the resume portfolio points to get a job as a Canadian police officer, which you as you have said before is very difficult to secure. I mean, I've been told to pursue professional fighting multiple times for my coaches, multiple, multiple times. They don't want you to become a cop. No, no, no. Be stable in the fight world. In fact, the only reason why I kept fighting was because people kept motivating me to fight. But the truth is I don't like fighting. I love training. I love sparring. I don't like fighting. Fighting is a total different game. You know, way cut. I've always wanted to be a little bit more jacked. I always had to keep at a lighter weight class because I'm not trying to fight guys that are six feet tall. Right? So there's so many reasons to not fight, right? You go through fight camp, fight camp sucks. It's not like regular training, right? You're sore, you're tired every day, you're stressed and you still got to train hard. You're losing a lot of brain cells. It's you don't make a lot of money. People think that because you're a professional athlete, it's different than being a professional soccer player, a football player. Being a professional fighter, you're poor until you become Francis Eganu. Right, like only the top one. It's a little bit like maybe like being a full-time stand-up comedian. Only the big, big guys make it. Everybody else, the distribution is very pyramidal. You know what it is in basketball terms? We have this term like Hooper and basketball player and you just like to hoop in this sense. You like to fight. You like to spar. You don't love all the politics and the preparation and all the things you have to do for a fight-fight, right? Because there is specific things. It's not like you can just put all your gloves on. Let's go at it, right? That's not how it is. You got to put in the work. So if you like to just fight, it's like you just like to hoop and you just want to go out there and play ball. 100%. I mean, I think everyone's like that. And you need the work, I think. You need to put in the work to fight. You can't just fight. In fact, your coach won't just let you fight because they're worried about your health. If you're not in shape. And I mean, I'm in shape. Above average. But I'm not in shape. Right, you're not in fight-fight shape. I'm not in fight-shape. You're not in pro-fighter shape to go put your life on the line against other guys who have trained their entire life for this exact moment as well, right? I want to round it out. So police academy, how come you're not a police officer right now? So pretty much what happened was I moved to Toronto for greater job opportunities because Ottawa was a very small conservative government city town. And Toronto, there's a bunch of different police services. So I moved there for better opportunities. During that time, my father had passed away. So I used his insurance money to buy myself a condo. And coincidentally, like five, six months later, I landed a job finally in a city called Waterloo, or town in Waterloo. And I'm pretty much going to tell you like a really crazy story that happened to me. So essentially, I had an acquaintance who moved from my hometown Ottawa to Toronto, and he needed a place to stay. So it was like a perfect timing. Hey, I'm going to move to Waterloo to work my job, but I didn't want to completely leave Toronto. I want to stay there and party because I was 24, 25. So I decided to rent out my condo to him. And the deal was, hey, you can have the one bedroom inside, but let me crash any night if I ever come back on the weekend. So that was the deal. I came back one weekend and I found police officers raided my condo. And my roommate, he was already in jail. So pretty much I lost my job after spending 10 years of my life trying to get into it. Right, so you finally become a cop in Waterloo. You have a acquaintance that you rent your crib out to, but it's kind of like a homie agreement on the rental side. And he, how does he get you, how does he mess this whole thing up? So he apparently, apparently shipped fentanyl from Belgium to my condo under my name. Yo. So you didn't do it, you were not involved. Of course, because it's your name, it's your address. You get knocked for a little bit, but you don't really go to prison. But so what happens when you try to explain your side of the story to the authorities? Me being a very naive person and being a person with authority. I was a police officer. I decided to tell him everything I knew. That obviously backfired and they kind of used it against me. But anyways, the only evidence they had was that drugs were shipped to my condo under my name. And with that little evidence, that's the only evidence they had. They literally turned my life upside down. And it's not like a slap on the wrist. Like, hey, you can go to jail for two years. They wanted 18 years of my life. Wow. That's crazy. 18 years of my life. Were you like, man, I just became a cop to protect Canada. And now Canada is like, well, at least the Canadian governmental system is turning on me. That's pretty much what happened. And don't get me wrong, I'm talking about it very freely right now because it's been five to six years and I've grown and learned a lot from it. But it was a very, very scary experience. Very sad, depressing experience. Like I'm someone that can say that I've had suicidal thoughts. Right, yeah. All right, well, I want to use that as a segue because you have, the stories that you've told already are a little bit, I guess, atypical for a lot of Chinese kids. Right, I'm not saying like we all grew up I would say for any kid, but let's just say double for Chinese kids. Yeah, I mean, we grew up doing some martial arts, not like you didn't like to fight as much and obviously didn't want to become a police officer and did not have that thing happen. But let's talk about Asian male stereotypes because we're all Asian males here. Real quick, we got to tell people. So how'd you come out of that? Because a lot of people are like, what? So what are you? So I was under house arrest for two and a half years waiting for trial. Trial was supposed to be two days and or sorry, it's supposed to be three weeks that ended up being two days because they had zero evidence on me. So they pretty much put me through all that stuff just to be like, oh, well, we don't have evidence on you. And they can't put you away for 18 years because at the end of the day, you're not guilty. They had zero evidence. So they still hit you with something, right? What would even hit me? Yeah, yeah, I was proven innocent. So you're proven innocent. Let's be clear here. MMA Shredded had a not guilty verdict. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But I'd be in jail right now. Right, but in that period of time, they got you in house arrest during the trial. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And then this is the transition to the whole channel. Yes, and I guess the reason why I want to share the story was because in hindsight, this is what led me to doing what I'm doing right now for a living. And for those out there who are going through not similar, hopefully not similar, but like hard places in their life, when really shitty things happen in your life for absolutely no reason, it's usually a way of, it's a sign of God. I'm not religious, but like after this whole thing, I believe there's a higher being and I believe things happen for a reason. That's all I wanted to say. How crazy is it? And this is just like a funny note that Waterloo in the fentanyl came from Belgium. That's in Belgium. Waterloo is in Belgium. Is it? Yeah, the battle of Waterloo. The original battle of Waterloo that Canadian town is named after. That is funny. That's funny. Sorry, just a little geography thing because me and Andrew have been to the battle of Waterloo because we did a little brand deal back in Belgium. But yeah, Andrew, moving on to the next topic. Yeah, Asian male stereotypes. I guess let's just attack it head on. Let's waste no time. We're all guys who like sports and athletics and have been around different types of people. It feels like Asians are just seen as like weak or Asian guys. Let's just focus on Asian guys for now. A lot of Asian males, it is seen that we lack testosterone. Maybe we're not always as tall as other people. I guess how do we like through your experience because you've met so many different types of people. You fought different types of people. You've been in the actual octagon with people. I guess like what is your whole perspective on it and like how, where is it at? And by the way, we're not talking about you and your friends. Yeah. You're in the fight world. You know, you guys are professional fighters. You guys, you probably get what I'm talking about though, right? Like as a overall, I guess Asian men, specifically I guess more so Chinese or Chinesey living in Western countries, that's the stereotype. I would say I don't have the right answer for you but I can tell you with my experience what kind of gave me my ego slash confidence, right? I was telling you as a elementary school person or high schooler, I believe, I felt I got bullied. I was called like Wing Chung, Ching Chung, whatever. I didn't really let them get away with it. I'd like fight them back, you know? But I'd say that I didn't have the most closest friends in high school because they were white and they bullied me and I hung out with a lot of Asians outside of my school. And then my Asian friends also went to schools that were white schools, but they hung out with Asians outside of, you know what I mean? So we all kind of stuck together. And one of my friends, Andrew, actually, he kind of had my back. He's like a Vietnamese guy, super jack guy. I remember we were sitting on a bus and there was a little tight spot on the bus. I tried to squeeze myself in and I kind of like, I guess hit the guy's knee and the guy's like, just looked at, I can't really recall what happened but he basically gave me attitude. And my friend being the gutsy guy he is went up to him and literally slapped in the face. And we're 15 years old and everyone on the bus just like looked at us, shocked. And the guy didn't do anything. And I'm like, damn, like we pulled that off or he pulled that off. So that kind of gave me a bit of ego and kind of like, oh wow, I got a cool friend. He's got my back. And that kind of gave me a bit of confidence. And he's that same guy that brought me into Muay Thai. Would you say though that what that situation taught you was that aggression worked out? Like there was a guy who was getting attitude with you. He was talking crap. And then I guess, I mean, I guess some people would argue don't, he shouldn't have done that, but the violence, the slight, the amount of violence worked out. So that kind of encouraged you to be like, okay, well, like this can help me. Yes. Now I want to clarify, I would never recommend that especially now, especially at our age, but we were 15 and there's less consequences when you're 15, you know. Right. I mean, even back then it was a different time too. Yeah. Like I'm also in Canada. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good point. Not, not, not, not, I don't need some danger. But I think the clear point is that like, it's just not what an Asian parent would have wanted to happen, but it did essentially like, provide an outcome for the situation. Funny story, my mom, when we were younger, always told me to stay away from this friend. But I guess to be honest, I feel like it's really important to have friends sometimes that are from a different background and have been taught to respond differently. And then I feel like it's really important that you can kind of like mix and match and like see different responses. So you don't only see how your mom would want you to respond. Yeah. I mean, I would, I feel like overall, like a lot of Asian people are just seen as like lacking aggression, especially in a country like America where things pop off. There's all different types of people. There's obviously lots of guns, lots of altercations. Like it is kind of a violent country. I would, anybody can try to debate me. I, it's not wrong. This place for a developed, it's the most violent developed country in the world. It is violent out here. So I guess what I'm saying, like do Asians, and this is just your opinion, of course, and I know that you don't all have all the answers and I'm not looking to you to solve all the issues for the Asian community, of course, but just to have your opinion, do Asians need to be more aggressive throughout their regular life to prepare? Because it is true that like Southeast Asians, I think they get picked on in aggregate less than Chinese people do, right? Because they get targeted less. They get targeted less because people feel like there's going to be a higher likelihood of repercussions back on them. It's going to turn into a war. I think it definitely helps. I think going back on my story, how I got bullied kind of, but kind of didn't get bullied. I think I got bullied less because I was a type to fight back. In a not such a real fight way, but like I'd push them back and I'd make fun of them back. So like I got bullied, but I also bullied. That makes sense. Right, right, right. You basically are lobbing shots right back at them. Well, you basically showed them that you were not going to take it and that you were a formidable opponent. Whether or not you guys actually fist-fighted, obviously you guys were more exchanging like verbal exchanges, but you let them know, right? You barked back. 100%. So I do think aggression helps. For sure, for sure. So I guess, do you recommend that everybody train MMA? How do you get more aggressive? How does a kid who is studying... But the right type of aggression, right? Not the type that gets him kicked out of school. I don't want to be biased because I do this for a living, but martial arts is for everybody. Everybody, every kid. I would be more picky with which specific martial art, but martial arts is good for everyone. Not fitness, confidence, building a community, friends that kind of back you up. The discipline, the self-defense, the skill set, the list goes on. Right, so you are a proponent of martial arts. I guess this leads us into our next topic. Which martial arts should they pick, Jeff? Yeah. Are you going to be loyal to the Chinese and pick it, say Wing Chun, or are you going to say something else, man? Jeff, Jeff, I know. It's a strange one to know. Jeff, so your Chinese roots are from Southern China. You know what else is awesome from Southern China. Wing Chun, baby. So I first want to start off by saying that I believe all martial arts work, but I would recommend Muay Thai. And a grappling art like Sambo, BJJ, or wrestling to begin with. Those are the most practical martial arts that allow you to be very dangerous with a very short amount of training. So what I mean by that is, if you put a guy into boxing for one year, versus a guy who does Wing Chun for one year, I guarantee the boxer is going to win. If you put a guy in Wing Chun for 30 years, boxer for six months. Okay, the numbers are skewed there. My point is the Wing Chun guy will probably win. I believe that more traditional martial arts require a lot more skill and dedication and time put into it before it's effective. Whereas boxing, you go into a cardio kickboxing class, you learn a jab cross. You go on the street, you throw that on someone. If you have natural power, you knock the guy out. Right, right. That requires a little more eye coordination. Right, because you almost have to see their attack. It's much more advanced. And I would say the same about karate. I used to hate on karate because people put their hands down. They fought with their hands down. I'm like, why would you fight with your hands down to hop with your hands down? You're gonna get knocked out. And I stayed away from karate. And obviously, I've been influenced from watching Jorsten Pierre and Lito Machida. I got interested in karate. And now I've developed a style. I've dropped my hands all the time. It's not because I'm dumb. It's because I manage my distance. But that skill to manage the distance takes a lot more skill and a lot more dedication and time into the art. Right, right. And seeing as like, let's just put this in. I know everybody always likes to use street fight scenarios, right? I guess boxing, throwing a punch. If you throw the first punch or first two punches and they're good, that's probably oftentimes gonna end the fight. A fight's 30 seconds or less. You're saying most real life fights that happen in the street are 30 seconds or less. So you don't have time. It's almost just strike first. You don't have time to block 10 times in Wing Chun. You know what I mean? Right, right, right. I mean, that is the reality of, to be honest, most of the fight videos that you can just cruise on Instagram and see on Instagram. So I do wanna address though that Wing Chun, and let's just focus on Wing Chun because we also have a friend who's very into Wing Chun and we always have conversations with them about it. And I have trained Wing Chun with a couple of different teachers. And I like one more than the other. And I see more practicality in one than the other. But I would say like, I guess like why, what happened to Wing Chun? Why does it get so much hate on the internet? You can go on any fight video. And first of all, there's a ton of fight videos showing like old Wing Chun master gets beat up in 30 seconds. The guy doesn't look like, the guy looks like trash, right? I think the issue is that Wing Chun fighters or practitioners train with other Wing Chun practitioners. And they start in that stance where their arm is crossed. And unfortunately a fight doesn't start that way. But if you are trained in different martial arts and you know how to fight on the outside before getting into that close quarter combat, then it can be applicable, right? Maybe you're on the outside, maybe you're using karate or Muay Thai. And then the guy rushes in and then you keep him back, you frame off with your arm and then boom, Wing Chun, pop, pop, pop. But you can't start from the outside. That's the issue. Oh, because yeah, Wing Chun is based around close combat. So it's like, how do you even get close combat or how do you even know like safely get close enough to hit them? Yes, I'm a big believer in Bruce Lee's statement, which is take what works for you, throw away what doesn't and mixed martial arts. So for example, I train Muay Thai, I've developed the karate style and I use Wing Chun myself, not a traditional Wing Chun, but I will start from the outside. I'll hop forward to close the distance and I'll trap an arm and I'll throw a cross. That's technically Wing Chun. So it works. It's just, if I'm being completely blunt, you can't train Wing Chun on his own and be effective. You need to train other martial arts. But I'm not saying that for just Wing Chun, I'm saying that for Muay Thai as well. If you're gonna stand super tall, light on your Lee foot and just bounce Muay Thai style, someone's gonna double leg you. Right, right. You're saying every style of martial arts may have blind spots or areas of improved martial arts, weak spots like that you can attack. Every martial art, like even karate, if you're gonna hop around from the outside, if someone closes the distance and shoots for a double leg takedown on you and you don't have the ground game or any grappling, well then you're screwed. So I can actually back up Wing Chun because Wing Chun actually does a bit of grappling. So I heard Muay Thai, they do clinching. So they have a bit of grappling. Karate, no grappling. From my understanding, I don't know. Right, because it was like some of these things, they're even designed as sports. So that's like disallowed by the actual official way that you score points. Would a lot of Wing Chun probably, you know how there's different lineages and different forms of it, it would probably change and a more effective style would come out of it if people just sparred more, like cooperative sparring, like literally actually sparred with some hits and contact. 100%, I think that is what's missing in traditional martial arts. I don't know enough history about Wing Chun but I can say for, say Kung Fu. Kung Fu has a bad reputation because of the watering down of schools. Essentially, Kung Fu is one of the first martial arts to ever be popular, right? Right, like Bruce Lee, Kung Fu in general. So people start opening gyms and the truth is nowadays, we're just getting weaker and weaker. Like thinking about the gladiators back in the day, we're like modern day gladiators, back in the day they're even crazier, they're fighting with knives and swords. My point is we're getting weaker and gym owners are, they need to make a living. So they have students and the student is getting hurt from sparring or from breaking bricks or doing real training. So the owner's like, okay, well let's not break bricks anymore, let's break this wood. Someone got hurt, okay, how about let's just break this piece of paper. You get your black belt and I need your money. And so the watering down of Kung Fu schools has begun. And I recently met a Shaolin Kung Fu master, Sifa Greg, I went to his gym and he's legit. Like back in the day, he's fought, he's had over a hundred fights, he's actually really good. But unfortunately before meeting him and before sparring with him, I thought Kung Fu was absolutely bullshit. And I stayed away from it because of the stereotypes and because of the bullying of people calling me Kung Fu and Wing Chang Chang. Right? So I stuck with the Western boxing and yeah. Well, but the Muay Thai was Eastern though. Yeah, yeah, that's why I paused. I was like, but Muay Thai is actually not Western. Muay Thai is Eastern, but I feel like Andrew, it doesn't get viewed in the same way as cause it's not as decorative and I guess what theater, dance, movie like, like even Muay Thai movies are super brutal. Like with like sub-cracking somebody's skull open, like pop, pop. And it looks very practical. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess like, you know, a lot of people will say, oh Wing Chun, you can't spar with it because you need to like do throat shots and groin shots. And that in sparring doesn't, you have to hit them in the face and you can't wear big gloves because wearing gloves is gonna mess up your sparring and Wing Chun, that's just not what it's built for. You can't trap, right? And it just allows for haters to say like, oh well, you're doing it cause you're scared and you're just always making excuses. And the truth is if you can train, if you can find a way to train it practically, which you can in Muay Thai and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and wrestling and everything else, it becomes effective. Why do you think like there's such a big disagreement about Chinese martial arts in particular? Because like we said, it's one of the oldest martial arts around, but people feel like it hasn't been updated. It's been theatricalized, you know, through movies and once upon a time in China and it looks so great when you do it in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. But it's just like people just in the fight world, by the way I'm talking about the fight world versus the movie world, in the fight world, people just don't believe in it. I think the legit guys kind of passed away. Okay, yeah, that makes sense. Maybe, maybe, I think, I don't know. So do you think there needs to be like a Wing Chun renaissance? And by the way guys, we're focusing on Wing Chun because we're Chinese and I obviously, it's Wing Chun is this highly debated thing on the internet. If you're wondering why we keep focusing on it because I think we already know Muay Thai does work. So I guess, but Wing Chun is debate, do you think there needs to be a renaissance or some type of revolution or some type of remarketing or tweaking? Like what can we do? Let's just brainstorm for like two minutes about how to bring Wing Chun back to glory. It's possible. I think more people should replicate my Wing Chun Blitz video there. Right, we'll play it underneath right here so it's running. Yeah, yeah, just try to use Wing Chun in sparring. Right. Use it on Muay Thai guys. I literally use it on Muay Thai guys and they were surprised and got hit. I'm sure they could have countered me because I'm not very good at it, but I also only learned it for like one day. I believe it can work. Yo, I thought that your Wing Chun sparring video was cool because that was like one of the first times I had seen it applied in a modern context like in, you know, like fighting, fighting. Yeah. Why do you think there's just so much online debate about the tribalism and martial arts? Like people are, it's almost like back to 1900 Yo, your master versus mine. Yeah, it seems like people treat martial arts like their identity, right? Like, no, I'm this guy. I'm a Muay Thai guy. I'm a karate guy. I'm a BJJ guy. There's a lot of BJJ bros and I'm a Wing Chun guy. Like, oh, Wing Chun's the best. You know, like if people ride for it, like it's like their family. I would compare it to like maybe J Cole or Kendrick Lamar or Drake fans. Like they're all like, everybody got their guy. I personally don't have that feeling. I think it's just an old school thing or it could be that, you know, BJJ guys have that feeling because they don't strike and they don't want to strike. So they're going to protect what they're good at. You do what you're good at. You fall under whatever sport that you're good at. You have your own confirmation bias from whatever you're the best at. 100%. So I used to be like, eh, I don't need Jiu Jitsu because I suck at Jiu Jitsu. And then I started getting better at it. And I'm like, I'm a BJJ guy too. Oh, okay. At least that's how I think. I don't know about everyone else. Do pro fighters like you pick tribal stylistic camps like that within martial arts or is that really for the internet guys? So it's starting. Yeah, no, it started off as MMA being Muay Thai BJ wrestling. That's MMA. If you do Kung Fu, it's not MMA, which technically it is mixed martial arts. But I believe that as guys started to come out doing karate, karate started developing its reputation. And now people are starting to see MMA as karate as well. And then we have Kevin Ho, who does Kung Fu or Wing Chun. And then now there's more UFC fighters from China who do Kung Fu and I think it's coming out, slowly coming out. But yes, there is a little tribe. Well, let's talk about pro Asian fighters. I feel like that's received a little bit more like publicity lately, right? Cause like you just mentioned, a lot of fighters are coming out of mainland China right now, right? Or just Asian in general, right? I guess previously there was Korean zombie, now there's what Song Ya Dong is. Why do you feel like there's a surge? Is it just like, well, obviously there's that amount of people out in Asia. And once they start training, some of them got to be good, I guess, because there's typically, I guess, stereotypically, maybe there is a sense like, oh, like a lot of Asians are not as strong or as powerful. Well, I think the stereotype was the Asian stay in the one championship league from Singapore and that Western people fight in UFC, right? That was that casual normie perspective, right? Fair. I would say that there's a lot of actually Chinese fighters who move to the States to get better training. So I don't know if the training in China is not as good, but it's a fact, it's a fact that the basketball training is not that good. One championship Chinese fighters from China come to America to train and same with the UFC. They come to America to train. Makes sense. When you watch them, do you see the Kung Fu in Zhang Wei Li in Song Ya Dong? And I'm sure, I'm blanking on some of the names. If I'm being completely honest, I don't see it. I just see Muay Thai kickboxing. But what I was also getting at is all martial arts are the same. It's just a little tweak in style. I think- How are all martial arts the same? I'm gonna say that. I see the internet guys. How can you say that, Jeff? How can you say that martial arts are all the same? What do you mean by that? Okay, here's an example. I don't know if you ever seen me do my running hip sweep. It's a Muay Thai technique. And I learned it from, I learned it again from Sifu Greg, who's a Shaolin Kung Fu master. And he does the exact same technique. So now we're comparing Kung Fu with Muay Thai. Right. Sambo and BJJ, it's identical. Judo and Sambo, it's identical. You can't even tell the difference. Right, just a different name, different country. Yeah, exactly. Different style. And I think at the end of the day- It's almost like noodle soup. Yeah, noodle soup, relatively, but especially if you get the chicken base. It tastes relatively similar culture to culture you go to in Asia, at least. Yeah, I mean, a beef broth and noodles with beef chunks is gonna be a far beef noodle soup, I'm saying. Oh yeah, Chinese noodles, yeah. So I think at the end of the day, they're all pretty similar once you get to a certain level. So even Kramagai, I actually learned a bit of Kramagai as well. And when you see them drill the techniques, they might look a little different. You wash them spar, it looks like kickboxing Muay Thai. So you're saying there's almost the concept of something, the art, the forms, because the forms do look quite different when you are displaying the forms with no actual combat. Would you agree with me? And I think, again, I don't know, I never did forms. I actually did Taekwondo when I was like eight, five. I quit early on. I didn't like the forms, it wasn't for me. But I believe that the forms is a way to display the beauty of the art. Okay. Right, because that's what you do as a performance, right? You do the form to get the bell. I mean, we got some belts, a shout out to Master Kim. But like, you do this and then you do this and then you bow and then it's like, that was your performance. Same with Wushu. Wushu guys are really fast with it. Obviously, is there a lot of Wushu sparring? I don't know, I haven't seen it. But like, I guess everybody has their performance art to it. So there's the performance side and then you're saying a lot of it, ultimately once it gets in the nitty gritty, it's going to start, the differences are gonna get smaller and smaller between the styles. That's what I truly believe. And this is coming from a guy, you sparred like thousands of times in your life, right? I've sparred quite a bit and I've also got the chance to spar with a lot of different martial artists. From different styles. Karate, Kung Fu, I haven't hit a Karama guy yet. Sort of, I'd hit sparred with the Karama guy with MMA experience, so that doesn't really count. But yes, I've sparred with quite a lot of different disciplines. Wow. I guess what are the factors, just so we can break it down, we finally hit it, we got to the truth, we revealed the truth. Everything is kickboxing. I mean, what type of kickboxing? Technically it is, punching and kicking. Yeah, right, everything is kickboxing. I guess though, what are the factors that people have to consider in a fight and it's beyond style? Because obviously, people know weight class matters, but for some reason, when people are arguing on the internet, they throw that out. What are the things that matter? Wait, what kind of fight are we talking about? No, we're just talking about in a street fight, for example. Like, obviously, I think that one thing either the internet guys never really talk about is how big each other are. Because that matters a lot in basketball. If you give me the same skill from a guy who's 6'6 or 6'8, and the exact same skill of the guy who's 6'1, the NBA or any pro league is totally taking the tall guy, the exact same skills. I can tell you for a fact that size plays a huge role in every martial art, including BJJ. Everyone says BJJ is not about size. Okay, if you're whatever color belt in jujitsu and you go against a white belt who's significantly bigger, you need to get your blue belt. Sorry, to get your blue belt, you need to be able to beat a guy that's bigger. That that's a credential to be able, apparently. But once that big guy learns a technique or two, he like triples in difficulty. It's like a multiplication equation, right? Yes, size plays a huge role. And as Andrew was mentioning the Ultimate Self-Divence Championship, I recently went with five different YouTubers. There was a guy named Sensei Seth, Karate guy, 240 pounds, he's a tough guy because he was the most evenly matched because he was so big and strong. Plays a big, big role in self-defense. So rule number one, don't fight people way bigger than you. You're just, the odds are against you. Unfortunately, even if you're faster, you're more skilled. It's not saying you couldn't do it, right? But it's just gonna make it so much harder. So much harder. I mean, it depends on the factors, right? Like are you, the self-defense challenge was like very like close quarter combat, right? So maybe Wing Chun would have applied, who knows? But if you're on the grass, you're gonna fight at a soccer game. You got all the movement and space you have. I'd be happy with that. But if I'm trying to fight a big guy right here on a bus, on a moving bus, that's very tough. How much can skill compensate for? So for example, like I remember when Logan Paul boxed Mayweather, I think he had like a 40 or 50 pound advantage. And Logan actually did okay relative like for the skill level gap. How much does the weight and the power and the fitness can skill compensate for? Like how many pounds? I don't know how many pounds. It really depends on the skill level of the individual. But I can say that technique does trump size, depending on if there's an opportunity. In fact, tomorrow's last episode, I have a special surprise, but basically, technique trumps size. But I don't wanna spoil too much, but basically there was an opportunity that was capitalized. And if it wasn't at that moment, someone would have lost. Yeah. Yeah, and it doesn't also matter what the goal is of the fight, right? Like, are we doing points? Is it to brutally kill each other? Is it to knock each other out? Or to neutralize, yeah. Yeah, because there's so many other factors in there. And or does it kind of remind you of basketball where there's a guy like Fred Van Fleet and you wouldn't bet on a whole team of Fred Van Fleet's being super good in the NBA. But he's like 5'11", and he's hyper skilled and he's known to attack bigs at their knees and get low. So, you know how like, he can rip the ball away from them, they can't rip the ball away from them? To your point, it's like, there's a few instances where if these undersized guys that are like at a suboptimal height in basketball, they can use it to their advantage, but it's just not like the majority of the time. Most of the time is size. Yeah, it's like most of the time, but there's a few exceptions. And sometimes these guys like Isaiah Thomas, Fred Van Fleet, they build a great career in that exception space. I think it's really funny to me because a few years ago, we did this video like, why is basketball like Kung Fu? Or something that's like a video concept that I wanted to make, right? And we have all these different ideas on why basketball is like Kung Fu or that there's, there is a lot of combat in basketball, right? You can even trap hands a little bit. You can grab them, you can push them. They're maybe not striking, but you can. I don't know which NBA player you are. You can kick a little bit or you can, there is like, I wouldn't say there's a leg sweeping, but there's like things you can do with your legs, right? And I guess what I'm saying is like, even after getting back into martial arts this last year and a half, basketball is so much like martial arts, especially Kung Fu, maybe not as much BJJ because you get thrown out for that. But yeah, there's so much body close combat and it's just so really interesting. And yeah, that's what I found really interesting. And yeah, I mean, just learning a lot basically. I guess like what do you want people to take away from your channel, man? You got all these viral videos in the millions. You continue to go viral. I love how you poached all your reps, good, bad, middle, mixed result. Like, you know, whether you lost to a guy, you beat up a guy or it was 50, 50, you post everything. Like what are you trying to show to people? Are you just trying to show people the reality and break through the internet fray or that's not the motivation? Cause obviously your channel's going viral for a reason. I'd say the main thing is to be able to reach as many people as I can, inspire and motivate as many people. You know, I get messages all the time saying, oh, like this helped me win a fight and this got me back into training and this and that, that'd be the main one. You love getting those messages. Yes. Now the vision you would say is the authenticity. Like I don't want people to think that I'm some special person. I'm being serious when I say I'm just a, I'm a martial artist that just keeps training and vlogging, journalizing my training. I show the losses, I show the success and I want people to be able to relate to me because if I'm just showing highlight reels, people are going to be like, well, of course I'm never going to be able to do that. I lose all the time. But in reality, no, I lose all the time. I get beat up all the time. Look at my ears. You know what I mean? I get beat up a lot and that's how you get better. And why is it a lot of sparring? Because well, the main message of this whole video is that martial arts need to implement sparring to be effective. And if you're not going to spar and you're just going to do tutorials, if I just teach tutorials, you're not really going to get better until you apply it in sparring. Sparring is the closest thing to a fight. Yeah. I agree, man. And you know, it's funny. I don't want to always keep bringing it back to basketball, but you know, one of the biggest issues with basketball training in China right now is that they only play like a few other teams in their region and they're not playing enough teams around the country. Because when you play a lot of different teams around the country, you play tall teams, short teams, full-core press, you know, you see all these different offensive and defensive schemes. Strategies. Yeah. But only from playing the game, you can train it like a trillion times. You don't want to be in practice, but you just never know until you see those reps up close and it's not people are trying to win and beat each other. It's a sensitivity, right? Like you can, everyone says people can study you. You have so much footage. If you ever fight again, people can study you. Although there is truth to a degree, but my argument is that you know that I'm going to throw this combination, but when I throw it at you, can you time it? It's like, we know what Connor's going to do. We know what Khabib's going to do, but once you're in there with him, it's just different. Yeah, it's different, right? I mean, I've definitely seen guys where I was like, yo man, he's hitting me with that Tim Hardaway cross. I'm waiting for it. I'm waiting for it. And then I still get hit with it. I'm like, oh man. It's very easy to commentate. Right, very easy. Yeah, all you commentators on the internet, if you watched it this far, always judging every single martial artist on YouTube. I guess that's what the comments are for though, to be honest. And that's partially why, you know, people get views. I gotta ask you a YouTube question, man. What do you think about Jake Paul? Jake Paul, I mean, Logan Paul, he's not boxing as much, but Jake Paul is fighting Nate Diaz, one of the best MMA fighters of all time, but they're going to keep it in boxing. Who's going to win? I still have my money on Nate Diaz, just because of the experience. And because he's a boxer in MMA, unlike the other guys who have, like if I went into boxing, I'd get destroyed because I'm a huge kicker, right? I love, I love- So they'd be taking away your main weapon. Yes, Nate does actually box, so I'm a lot more confident. With that said, I wouldn't take anything away from Jake Paul. He's been working really hard. This guy has the resources to train with the best. He's been training with the best. He's got potential. He's a very athletic person. And yeah, I used to hate on him, but he knows how to get the engagement. He knows how to get the views. He knows how to get the attention. Do you think it's going to be close? I'm hoping, I'm hoping Nate wins still. Right, right. But, but I don't know. I really don't know. I'd say that you gain respect for somebody when you see them fight and train, fighting, and actually put themselves out there to get embarrassed and to get hit. Is that something that you're like, you know what, I didn't really like you before. Not that I love you now, but I can respect that you went through what I went through now. Absolutely, absolutely. Like I said, the first fight, I'm like, I hope this guy gets knocked out. I'm watching only because I want to see him lose. And then now it's like, oh, I actually, I want to see how he does. And then, and then I kind of think into it deeper. I'm like, yeah, this guy, he's got the resources, he's athletic, like he trains hard. He's working, he's putting in the actual work for a why, why wouldn't he, right? Yeah, that's a good point. It's just the only reason why I'm cheering for Nate. Yeah, it's just because I'm a fan, but also because Nate's got so much experience and he's all, yeah, at the end of the day, he's an MMA guy and I'm an MMA guy, so. No, I mean, it would make the- You gotta say it was a tribe, right? Yeah. It would make the MMA world look kind of bad if he lost. Yes. Be honest, so. Right, because it would make it look like, I guess what boxing skills and MMA skills are so disparate and like disconnected, right? It would make it seem that way. Yeah, so I don't know, guys. Anyway, man, check out MMA Shredded, Jeff Chan. Thank you for coming through, bro. Yo, man, I think your channel is so helpful. You do have some older tutorials, but lately it's been a lot of sparring, but I think a lot of people learn from it and I think it's great and it's just fun to watch. And I love what you're doing. You're based in New York for the time being. Where should people hit you up if they want to get training? I'm at Glory Martial Arts in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. I'm the type of guy that also responds to all positive, not negative comments. If you DM me, I'll respond. So yeah, I'm just a regular dude. Message me and I'll respond. All right, regular dude who likes to get hit and hit people in the head. All right, everybody, guys. This is Jeff Chan. Shout out, thank you for being a hot-pot boy for the day. Maybe we should, we'll go get some hot-pots sometime, man. Or maybe we'll train. I don't know. If we have time to train after this, we'll throw in some B-roll down here. But anyways, guys, thank you so much for watching. Leave your comment down below. That was a full-on podcast with Jeff Chan. And until next time, everybody, we out. Peace.