“Organizing the kickboxing, he really didn’t call it kickboxing in the beginning but he said we’re going to learn to kick and our kicking is going to be like a boxer. At that time, he felt that a lot of systems, they slugged with the foot. He says you want to fence with your foot. You want to box with your feet like a boxer. You don’t want to use it. So almost 80% of his strikes were with the front leg and the front hand because he felt if you’re right-handed, that’s your most powerful punch. If you’re right legged, that’s most powerful kick.
Since the left hand was weaker, he would put the left hand back for more power and because in boxing, he analyzed that the jab scored so frequently but could not put the person out of commission.
It just added up a lot of points. So that’s why he put the left hand back for more power and he felt that if you put the strongest hand forward, at that time, whether if you’re right-handed or left-handed — then it’s going to be more powerful.
For him, it worked beautifully because he had the power. He worked on it. His three-inch, pound for pound, I think he punches. He’s like the hardest punch that you would ever meet, you know. He’s like a miniature Marciano. You might look at his boxing form and you say, “Well, that’s not maybe the most polished boxing form you see.” He would be like a Marciano, a miniature Marciano or miniature Frazier, you know.
Although he had admired Mohammed Ali because he liked the left hand to score frequently. That’s why sometimes he would drop his knee. Sometimes people said, “No, he’s dropping his…” When we’re talking about Mohammed Ali lead, he dropped his knee. That’s what Bruce Lee did. He dropped his right knee because he said the jab coming up is hard to see. This is some of the reason why he developed it.
His kicking was like fencing in boxing. He wanted to score frequently, make it very, very sophisticated. Later on, we started taking away the shin guards. We started taking away the body protector. We started taking away the face mask and then just all we used was the boxing headgear, and that became kickboxing.
At first, I coined the term Chinese kickboxing. He says, “No, just call it Chinese boxing,” because Chinese boxing is what he wanted to be called.
Then later on, we start using the word Chinese kickboxing and then kickboxing or Jun Fan Kickboxing on kickboxing. Bruce, he researched a lot of different systems at that time, the known systems at that time. He would observe them. The thing he liked about the Muay Thai was the rear leg power. He felt though that the front leg wasn’t active enough at that time period. You have to look at the time period that he was in and why he made these things.
A lot of it came from Donn Draeger.
Well, I don’t know if you’re aware of Donn Draeger but you know and he classified the Thais’ as saying, “Well, the uppercut is non-existent.” Of course that’s what Bruce Lee did his research and at that time, Muay Thais’ did an uppercut. The reason why they don’t uppercut is because the knee is in the same range. So the knee took care of the uppercut.
He says but he liked the elbows of the Thais’. He said, “Well, that’s a powerful tool.” In Donn Draeger’s book, he mentions about the jab was not seen very much, almost non-existent, okay. That’s the reason why because they foot jab with their foot. So you have to look at why he came to this thinking at that time period.
They said the hook was almost non-existent and the reason why on the title, the Thais’ used the elbow because the elbow was in range, in tight.
They don’t have to use the overhead because the tight hook is in the same range in the elbow and the elbow will cut the face up more. It’s more punishing than sometimes the left hook. The kick, referred to the Thai boxers as the John L. Sullivan with the leg. Now all this is true depending who you’re watching at that time but if you look at the Thai boxing now. They jab, they cross. They have good hands, supplemented with devastating knees, devastating elbows, devastating kicks.
So what he was looking at and observing form and taking his reaching form is what Donn Draeger was saying and what he had seen. He felt that they weren’t alive, that there was no broken rhythm but that was true. Might have been true maybe in the 60’s and in the 70’s but it’s not true here in the year, by coming into 1980, 1990, 2000 because things evolve. The other thing he took from was Savate.
Now, many other writings and many of the literature said he did not take from Savate but I know different because I was there when he researched it. I was there when he actually kicked and looked at the Super 8 of French fighters of those French…
So what he was looking at and observing form and taking his reaching form is what Donn Draeger was saying and what he had I don’t where you even got the take of those French champion and Savate. He was watching it on Super 8, an eight millimeter film, and he analyzed it and he said, “Oh, I like this. This is a very punishing kick.” Coup de pied, which is the kick when they lift up you know. He says, “This is really good.” He liked the way they use their legs because he said, “Savate people will box, we’ll say from Savate. They box with the feet.” That’s what he liked and he liked boxing. So he started to put all these elements together and then
he took the kicks he thought from northern system and from southern Chinese systems to see how they work, and that became Jun Fan kickboxing.
It fit him. For us, we might have to find another path but for Bruce Lee, that was a path he chose. Elements of Thai boxing, elements of Savate, and he liked the headbutts of the Burmese boxers. So he incorporated that into his own personal system. I don’t care what anybody writes about him and all the books and all the magazines, he did have those elements in it. Many people don’t know. They said, “Well, he only take it maybe from Wing Chun” which is a strong at that point.”