Wushu will be included among the invitational sports at The World Games in Cali, Colombia this summer from July 25-August 4. No, not the “Wushu World Games.” THE World Games.
According to Wikipedia, “The World Games, first held in 1981, are an international multi-sport event, meant for sports, or disciplines or events within a sport, that are not contested in the Olympic Games.”
As an invitational sport, Wushu will be part of the games, but no medals will be awarded.
The official site of The World Games states that this is the second time wushu has been included. The first time was in 2009 in Taiwan.
Wushuzilla takes a look at the new wushu staffs. Check out his blog here where he has more videos, photos and info on prices and production.
Wushu is probably one of few sports where apparatus aren’t mass produced and instead are made (mostly) by the athletes. Is this type of standardization necessary for the sport to grow? Will the price of the new weapons be a deterrent for new athletes?
Wushu has popped up in the news recently in regards to the Olympics and the decision to cut wrestling from the 2020 Games. It’s a surprising decision considering that wrestling was one of the original sports of the modern Olympics and has been a part of every Summer Olympics except for one since 1896.
IWUF Presentation to the IOC Olympic Programme Commission
(Lausanne, Dec 2012) - The IWUF has presented its proposal to include Wushu in the Olympic Games in 2020 to the Olympic Programme Commission of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on December 19th, 2012 in Lausanne, Switzerland. The Olympic Programme Commission will evaluate the candidate sports and make its recommendation to the IOC Executive Board.
Our team has presented the evolution of our organization and the added-value that we would be able to bring to the Olympic Movement if Wushu were included in the Olympic Games. We laid out the structure of the events that we would like to propose to the IOC, as well as how we can guarantee a fair play. A World Champion told her personal story and expressed her eagerness as an athlete to participate in a real Olympic Games competition. Our presentation started with a 5-minutes video, followed with a 15-minutes presentation and ended with a 10-minutes Q & A session.
The IWUF presentation team was composed of, from the left, Athlete Representative Ms. Daria Tarasova (RUS), Referee Representative Mr. Byron Jacobs (RSA), Vice-President Mr. Raymond Smith (GBR), President Mr. Yu Zaiqing (CHN), Vice-President Mr. Anthony Goh (USA) and Technical Representative Mr. Luc Bendza (GAB).
All the International Federations of the IOC short-listed sports will be invited to do a second presentation to the IOC Executive Board in May 2013. After which, the IOC Executive Board will propose one of the sports to the IOC Session to be held in September 2013 in Buenos Aires, Argentina for its approval. The other six sports on the IOC short list are: Baseball and Softball, Wakeboard, Climbing, Roller Skating, Karate, and Squash.
As only one of the seven sports will be selected for the 2020 Olympics, the IWUF is fully aware of the challenges that lie ahead of us. The IWUF will continue its best efforts in presenting Wushu to IOC and its relevant committees, ensuring them that Wushu is a mature and qualified sport for the 2020 Games.
“FORMER world junior champion Tai Cheau Xuen continued her meteoric rise in wushu when she bagged the women’s nangun (southern staff) title at the Asian Championships which ended last weekend in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.”
“Perseverance paid off in a big way for Diana Bong Siong Lin, who joined fellow woman exponent Tai Cheau Xuen in flying the flag high for Malaysia at the just concluded Asian Wushu Championships in Ho Chi Minh City.”
“The three gold medals belong to Nguyen Manh Quyen in the men’s Nangun (Southern cudgel) performance. He scored 9.72 points compared to 9.68 points of the silver medal winner, Cho Seung Jae of South Korea.”
Wushu has emerged as an international competitive discipline that is exciting to watch, fun to learn and with tremendous cross-over appeal. Wushu can be seen in action movies, TV programs and advertisements, and now it is also the main theme of a colossal MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role playing game) called AGE OF WUSHU, that allows users to relive more than 2000 years of Wushu/Wuxia traditions.
Recently, the internationally acclaimed action film star and Wushu champion Jet Li has signed a two-year contract to promote the game, which is already very popular with more than 20 million users in China alone. Li will make appearances, be featured in a TV commercial and endorse the game, which features the martial arts style for which he first became famous.
Moreover, Snail Games officially launched the International server for AGE OF WUSHU in London during the 2012 Olympics hosting a public demo event as part of their initiative to help promote the inclusion of Wushu into the Olympic Games program.
Game Description
In your journey to master the ancient Chinese art of Wushu, delve into your character’s unique story, face the consequences of every action, and fulfill your destiny. No two character stories will play out the same, as your every action determines your fate.
Key Features
No Levels, No Classes: Learn your opponents’ true strength by fighting them. Proceed with caution! That beggar on the street may be a traveling Grand Master.
Random NPC Encounter System: Every encounter and event is determined by how NPCs in the game world perceive you. No online guide can tell you what each encounter and quest will entail.
8 Martial Arts Schools: Choose a school to build your craft. Seeking insight not offered at your current alma mater? Invade another to steal their secrets, or befriend a Wushu master for help.
Counter Combat System: Modeled after the traditional martial art, combat rewards those with the greatest skill, anticipation and execution. Never let your guard down!
Aerial Combat: Remember Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon? Jump onto rooftops and fight your enemies in the air!
32 Guild Sites: Upgrade each guild site to mobilize and defend what you worked so hard to build.
5000 Equipment Types: Unique Wushu ways to enhance your ever-growing ancient skills.
17 Professions: Learn a trade to complement your fighting prowess.
30 Offline Activities: Not online to train? Keep your ‘character’ progressing as an NPC. A true master never sleeps!
6 Unique Story Lines: Become the protagonist of your own story, not some insignificant bystander.
Here is the USA Launch trailer of the game:
And a very interesting Behind-the-Scenes featurette:
Text: Emilio Alpanseque SOURCE: Courtesy of Snail Games USA
You may not know her name, but you know her dance. For several months, one could argue that Erika Dufour was the most popular wushu woman in the world (or, at least the world wide web). Her “Jian Sword Dancing” video has racked up nearly one million views on YouTube. Gawker called it “The Year’s Best Internet Video.” That was followed by a music video for Major Lazer, a musical collaboration between Diplo and Switch.
Or main man Y Chan gets the scoop behind the videos and the woman behind the videos, Erika Dufour.
Y: tell us a little bit about yourself and the type of projects you typically get involved with— or just tell us what you did last thursday:
Erika: My projects differ from day to day, which I have designed to keep my life entertaining. My primary work is photography, I shoot beauty, fashion, product, portrait, photography for magazines and advertisement and sometimes just for the sheer pleasure of it. I enjoy my work as it fulfills my curiosity to examine people and things more closely. About a year ago I began doing motion capture modeling for NetherRealm Studios as they needed a female butt kicker for the latest Mortal Kombat and we are now working on a new project (can’t tell ya what it is, heheh).
Recently I started working on a cooking show called “You Can Cook Stupid!” geared towards dudes in their 20s who have no clue how to cook and are too afraid and intimidated by the foodie shows. My name in the show is Lil Erika and she talks like a little girl but curses a ton and drops sexual innuendo here n there. alongside Lil Erika is Lil Marc who is a sock puppet played by my brother. He seems like the sane and calm one on the show. Besides that, I cook, I walk my dog Ninja, I listen to tons of podcasts - Radiolab, Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders, Stuff You Should Know, The Moth, and to lul me to sleep Astronomy Cast. Y: haha! since you won’t give us details on Mortal Kombat— do you study wushu, or would you say you play wushu?
Erika: I play Wushu for sure, I studied for 6ish years, and then took a break because of injuries, work, life in general, and needed to relax for a second. In the “Jian Sword Dancing” video, I’m farting around, flippity flopping it around. I noticed on the comment thread some comments about my lack of skill, I thought it funny that it was taken so seriously, because the video is so dang funny, its not supposed to be a skill showoff video. Kyle n I just wanted to have fun. Y: speaking of kyle, how would you finish the following sentence: like his balisong, kyle is…
Erika: tiny
Y: now that you’re famous in the wushu community, i think people would like to know why and how did you make the jian dance video? will there be more?
Erika: The Jian sword thing happened when Kyle and I were chatting at a friend’s wedding about his previous video “Balisong Dancing”, I told him that I had a sword that I can flip around too and that it would be hilarious to add me to the mix, so the dancing duo was formed. He came to my photo studio and I choreographed the dance the day before, then I scooted out to Midlothian (suburb of Chicago) where his great Aunt Carol (the old lady in the vid) lives. Y: how did this major lazer thing happen?
Erika:The Jian Sword Dancing vid got to 600,000ish views and the Major Lazer guys saw the video and contacted Kyle about making a similar video for their new song Original Don. So, Diplo flew over from Puerto Rico about 3 weeks later and we filmed. Y: what’s up with great aunt Carol and the kwan dao?
Erika: When Kyle and I were talking about the Major Lazer video, I thought about what the most ridiculous weapon in that environment would be, so of course the Kwan Dao. I knew I wanted Kyles Great Aunt Carol to hold that thing, I’m not sure what it is about elderly people holding giant weapons, but it’s hilarious. Kyle at first wanted it to just sit precariously in a corner untouched, but knowing that if she started walking around with it, people would wonder what would come next.
Y: can you tell us an interesting story about the dog? it cannot involve peanut butter.
Erika: We noticed that in Jian sword dancing that tons of people were responding to Reggie (thats his name) nearly smacking into my sword. When shooting the Major Lazer video, I was spinning the Kwan Dao, and at the last minute saw him bolting towards me, and thought OH FUCK!… then I thought FUCK YEAH! knowing that that would be the take as it would be the perfect sequel to him almost getting hit in the first one. For the animal lovers —- he looks a lot closer than he really was due to the camera angle, The dudes at Major Lazor were trying to use a different take and Kyle refused because of lil reggie’s bolt of bravery.
