Ceremonial Bow

The Ceremonial Bow is a common component in any martial arts training.

In the kung fu school where I trained, we started and ended each class with a ceremonial bow.

While training our forms, we also preceded our practice with a ceremonial bow, and concluded our practice with the ceremonial bow.

The bow is a form of respect to our teacher, our teacher to us students, and our ancestors who trained before us.

In the video below, you will find a brief demonstration of the most common ceremonial bow employed where I trained.

Below that video, is a step by step description of how to perform this bow.

The process laid out on this page, video content plus a step-by-step description of the movements, is how each technique is presented in the training here at Practical Kung Fu.

Lastly, it is highly recommended that you maintain a notebook for every single technique you learn.

Ceremonial Bow – Step by Step

First, the foot work.

1. Begin with your feet together and hands down by your sides.
2. Step out onto your right heel.
3. Rotate on the right heel until it turns to a 90 degree angle to the right.  As you set the foot, draw the left leg forward and finish by setting the left foot on the ball of the foot.
4. At this point, the hips should be turned about 45 degrees to the right.
5. Turn the hips back to the front.
6. Step back onto ball of the left foot to its original position.  As you set the heel, draw the right foot back into its original position.
7. Maintain a slight bend in the knees and waist as you complete the previous step.
8. Straighten the legs and waist, and you are back in the starting position.

Now we add the arm movements…

1. As you step out onto the right heel, draw both arms up in front of you, with your right hand closed into a fist, and your left palm open and touching the right fist.
2. As you rotate to the right, the left hand closes over top of the fist.
3. Rotate that hips back to the front, while maintaining the arm and hand position.
4. As you draw the left foot back, open the hands into Tiger Claws.
5. When you set the left heel and draw the right foot back, bend at the waist and knees, drawing the Tiger Claws downward.
6. While maintaining the bend in waist and knees, former fists and and project back knuckles forward and down.
7. Straighten the knees and waist, and draw the arms back into a chamber position.  End of bow.

A note on the chamber position for future training… pull the elbows back as far as they will go, and squeeze them together behind your back so that you feel tension.

That is a proper chamber position for practicing your strikes and blocks going forward.