What martial arts does Jet Li know?

Jet Li is one of China’s biggest stars and is best known for bringing martial arts into mainstream movies. He also played the role of Ip Man who was a Wing Chun legend. However, away from the big screen, what martial arts did Jet Li know, and was he legit? The answer is yes. Jet Li had elite Wushu skills during his prime before retiring from competition to become a film star. This is a Chinese style that incorporates a lot of different disciplines. Read on for more information.

Wushu

It’s no secret that Jet Li’s most famous martial art is Wushu. This is a Chinese art that involves all sorts of striking and other methods of combat. Because of this, it’s sometimes hard to nail down what exactly Wushu is. For example, you could include Shuai Jiao as Wushu which is Chinese wrestling. It’s fair to say that Jet Li’s form of Wushu was not wrestling and there’s no evidence of Jet Li being a wrestler either.

Instead, what is known about Jet Li is that he won the youth Wushu Championship title aged 11 in China. This was awarded to him just three years after starting the martial art. As a teenager, Jet Li continued to compete and even beat adults in competitive Wushu. He eventually retired aged 19 after winning practically everything and pursuing a career in movies. After this, Jet Li became known as an actor more than a martial artist and obviously incorporated his martial arts background into his movies.

Sadly, injuries have followed Jet Li’s career. He was famously quoted as saying “I’m in pain but I’m not in a wheelchair yet” which was a nod to his injuries over the years. For instance, during shooting in 1986 he suffered a fall and broke his ribs and fractured his ankle. In more recent years, his appearance has seen him lose weight and look significantly older too. With this in mind, although Jet Li was undoubtedly a skilled martial artist in his prime, sadly like all of us age has caught up with him and he’s not the fighter he once was.

Changquan

One form of Wushu that Jet Li was known to practice in his younger days was Changquan which a lot of people would describe as Shaolin Kung Fu. In English, it translates to ‘longfist’. Here, you’ll see similar stances to those used in Kung Fu and Karate, such as the mantis position amongst others. Changquan is based on athletic striking and involves spinning kicks and jumping strikes.

It should be noted that although Jet Li practiced this martial art, it is not known whether he did this without contact or not. Some forms of Changquan are judged without opponents. This is similar to Olympic kata forms in Karate and each person does an individual presentation of movements that are judged. It’s possible that Jet Li won his titles in this form of Wushu but it’s unknown. Talking about contact, this is a question mark that has remained over Jet Li’s head throughout his career. Some people judge the effectiveness of his skills based on whether he fought people or not. However, we may never know the truth.

Fanziquan

Fanziquan is yet another form of Wushu that Jet Li used in his prime. To the untrained eye, there are not too many differences between this and Changquan Wushu, but they’re actually quite different. This means ‘tumbling fist’ which obviously has different connotations compared to Changquan. Basically, this style often involves lots of crouching stances and requires great flexibility. It also trains with weapons such as long staffs and can also include the Jian sword (more on that later).

This style is considered to be looser than Changquan and is better up close rather than range. You could assume a martial art named ‘longfist’ would be better from range though.

Jian

The Jian is a sword that dates back to the Han dynasty era and is basically a form of sword fighting. With this said, it isn’t a form of Kenjutsu as it’s not Japanese. Nonetheless, it still involves swords and would have been used regularly back then. Of course, this martial art is not really a thing anymore as obviously – sword fighting just isn’t as common or popular anymore. Nonetheless, Jet Li is fluent in using the Jian. Therefore, if you count the Jian as a form of martial arts then Jet Li is skilled in the art of sword fighting.

Conclusion

Jet Li was born in the early 60s when the landscape of martial arts was drastically different compared today. At this point, Karate was yet to go mainstream, whilst Muay Thai was still an obscure art barely known outside of Thailand. Elsewhere, arts such as Brazilian Jiu jitsu didn’t even exist. At this time, Jet Li was also born in Beijing which at the time would be where Wushu was taught.

With this in mind, Jet Lit was a product of his environment. He was someone that learned his most local martial art in Wushu and excelled at it. By making a name for himself as someone with fast hand movements and using inspiration from Bruce Lee, he moved into the film industry and went from there. Overall, it’s fair to say that Jet Li is an expert in certain forms of Wushu but eventually dropped this a showbiz career.

Check out this book on Wushu if you’d like to learn more.