The swinging motion of the arm, also known as the “haymaker”, is the most common attack from inexperienced fighters on the street. This is because most people do not understand the concept I previously explained and how a straight punch is the most shocking and hardest to predict and therefore more effective.

In this instance, the person pulls their arm back in preparation to swing towards your head for either a slap or a punch. The move used to prevent this is called ‘Fook Sau’, meaning ‘bridging arm’, one of the most useful moves in Wing Chun Kung Fu. This is because the arm is positioned in the shape of a bridge in this move.

Fook Sau is ideally used as a block or cover in Wing Chun when attacks are coming either to the head or slightly lower than head height. The inside of your wrist is used to guide the punch past the body. The hand is folded over the top to control the attacking hand and stop it from being pushed higher to hit your face. It is very important to keep the elbow in, just like at the start of Si Nim Tau. With the elbow kept at the right position, you will have no problem deflecting these sorts of strikes.

The hand is thrown forward in front of your shoulder to hit the opponent’s arm with your forearm. Ideally, you are aiming to block at their bicep or upper arm, as this guarantees fully stopping their arm. If you make an impact on their forearm with your forearm, it may come down to strength, and if they are stronger, they could keep pushing forward and still hit your face. The move would finish with the arm looking nearly the same but simply just further forward. Since this does hit the bicep of your opponent, they will receive a sudden shock and a wave of pain, alongside possible bruises to their upper arm.

If attacked on the street, it is most probable that this technique will save you since the chance an attacker attacks in a swinging motion is extremely high; Therefore, you must drill this motion to perfect the movement as much as possible.