Allan Lawson's Fighting Arts, LLC                      -Since 1999   Holy Spirit                                                       
Phoenix, Arizona Martial Arts Schools Home Page

  Everyone reading this has unique preconceptions about martial art schools and training. Whatever yours are, they are likely so far removed from the reality of what we at ALFA are doing, that you are in a state of understanding worse than complete ignorance. You likely believe, or assume to be true, things opposite from the truth.
  If you have not already experienced this school, you have no accurate point of reference and your mind is not yet capable of comprehending. While you will surely see tangible benefits from day one, it is only after at least 6 months, or a year, that you will begin to grasp where this training can take you.

  While it is not easy to explain in words who we are, there are some common misconceptions that can easily be dispelled. Be assured that we are neither sadistic cage fighters nor are we movie or cartoon characters. Neither are we new age dabblers in pagan religion or silly philosophy.

  We are a laboratory where the interplay of physics, human anatomy, and the human spirit brings revelation, understanding and capability.

  It is not by accident that you found your way here:

      1. If you like more information first, click the links below,
      2. Schedule your interview.

Are there practical, realistic martial arts systems that work?  (Kung Fu San Soo, Jeet Kune Do, Escrima),

How will I recognize an exceptional school and instructor when I see one? (Best martial arts classes, instruction, training programs),

Can I learn anything useful in the first few months of training, or do I need to take MA lessons for decades before finding out if I developed any worthwhile skills? (ALFA training program, class schedule),

Schedule an interview and class viewing using the form at the right of any page. If you get no response withing a reasonable time, assume your message was lost on the way to my inbox. Please try again.

Martial Arts Secrets Revealed:  Did You Know...?

4. The worst, most devastating enemy we will ever have to face during our lives is our own self. The enemy within you, unless defeated daily, will surely defeat you. 

You will be unprepared for the challenges that surely lie ahead, impotent to accomplish what you should, even  helpless to save your life in dangerous times or situations, if you are ruled by emotions and behaviors such as fear, doubt, indecision, anger, hate, resentment, envy, egotism, guilt, impatience, stubbornness, procrastination, laziness, pleasure seeking and pain avoidance.

The attacker standing before you is of little consequence in comparison with the power of the formidable foe within you. Other people can never cause you the harm you cause yourself.   

Learn now how to ally with the attacker’s enemy within him, while facing and mastering your own self.  Know well those who wish to take your liberty, property, health or life, but know youself even better. 

Find where your limitations lie. Then push them further away from you.  Find and use the power, which also lives within you, to defeat the real "enemy".  092307

3.  Countless combative systems have been developed throughout the ages, practiced and honed, only to finally be lost to us in the mists of time. Becoming extinct not because of inferiority, but because of a weak link in the chain of the generations of mankind.

A lack of eager and capable students, able to recognize the value of the arts and instruction, and carry them forward. A failure of the arts’ caretakers to pass on the gift they had received, erased them from man’s consciousness, as though they had never existed.

Starting about 650 years ago in the village of Pon Hong in Guangdong Province in southern China, the monks of the Kwan Yin monastery developed and refined a temple boxing art known as tsoi-li-ho-fut-hung. This practical and effective style of kung fu, and it’s techniques, came into the possession of the Chin family in the late 1700's, was passed from generation to generation, and by the late 1800's had been used by them to gain governing control over an entire province the size of Orange County, California.

In 1942 the Japanese invasion of China had moved northward reaching Chin Siu Hung’s village. Hung, then 73 years old, was forced to answer the challenge of a regimental karate champion, or see the people of his village executed.

Against his will Hung participated in an exercise intended to be an exhibition of power, superiority and control over the conquered people. Instead he killed the challenger after about 20 seconds of fighting. He and most of his students were then in turn killed by machine gun.The art, in effect, disappeared from it’s country of origin.

Fortunately for us, this art had previously been carried to America in 1935, and was preserved there by Hung’s nephew. Chin Siu Dek, aka Jimmy H. Woo, taught classes in the art, which he called Kung Fu San Soo, to thousands of his students prior to his death in 1991.

Since his passing no one has been strong, or respected, enough to fill the shoes of the founder. The International Kung Fu San Soo Association has become defunct amidst posturing and petty bickering. In this new atmosphere, free from politics and either control or support, will the art, and it’s techniques, standing on their own merit, survive, thrive or die? Will this generation pass on the legacy so that it will be available to future ones? Time will tell.  072706

2.  The outcome of a physical confrontation is largely determined by mental factors.  While a trained body capable of the desired action is necessary, it is the exercise of the mind which directs the body to do it’s will.

Choosing good or poor strategy and tactics fixes probabilities in your favor, or against you. Inability to control emotions leads to lack of awareness, distorted perception of reality, poor reasoning, indecision, frustration, doubt and paralyzing fear.  Slow reaction and incomplete or inaccurate execution are the result.

The potential of the mind is without limit.  A correct exercise of attitude can make visualizations of desirable outcomes real.  In a crisis frail, elderly women have been known to throw tractors or cars off their husband who was pinned beneath. The mind can be unshackled to produce these results at will, as well.

In the late 1500's and early 1600's Japan was emerging from a century of civil war and strife. Armies were disbanded and displaced. Masterless samurai swordsmen known as “ronin” roamed the country, testing their fighting prowess, hoping to build a reputation which would land them one of the scarce bodyguard jobs, with some local lord.

Contests sometimes resulted in dismemberment, but usually in the death of one of the combatants.
  It was in this environment that 13 year old Miyamoto Musashi fought his first duel, killing a skilled swordsman with a blunt piece of wood in the shape of a sword.

In his The Book of Five Rings Musashi states that by the age of 29 he had engaged in more than 60 such lethal  fights. Sometimes these were honorable contests, at prearranged times and places. Many times they were against multiple assailants motivated by revenge, fear and greed, and under circumstances of surprise or disadvantage designed to ensure his elimination by whatever means available.

Never did he fail to attain victory. Through disciplined self control, unhindered instinct, innovations such as the use of two swords simultaneously, and the use of the psychology of fighting and battlefield tactics to unnerve, demoralize and confuse his opponents, he was protected against injury or death. He was able to have the advantage over dozens of opponents at a time.  He also fought in six army battles.

In 21st century America these timeless mental skills and lessons, physical fitness,and the psychology of fighting still have value and can be turned to other useful purposes more suited to our times, or can be used to preserve us when necessary. 071206

1. You can workout to increase the speed at which any particular bodily movement can be executed, through repetitious exercise of that movement. Through conditioning, new, shorter and more efficient neural pathways are developed.

These nerve pathways run from the sensory organs to the brain, where the incoming signal is processed and a course of action is selected. From there they run to the muscles, where the execution takes place through complex and measured motor movements.

The neural impulse will actually jump across the synapses between neurons progressively more quickly. At least Bruce Lee thought so. According to Jesse Glover he was able to complete a two foot punch starting with his hands at his sides in 5/100 of a second.  His slower punches were timed at 8/100 of a second.

Critics accused the Jeet Kune Do founder of using "special" cameras in the action scenes of his movies to make himself appear quicker than he really was. He did use high speed cameras which film more frames per second. The reason for this, however, was to allow the camera to capture some of the movements which otherwise would have been lost.

He then slowed down the film so that the viewer could see, and  follow what he was doing in the action sequences. His movies actually make him appear slower than he was.

Bruce Lee was a unique individual and not all of us can accomplish all the same things he did but we can decide to workout and improve our skills many fold and realize our own achievements. We can certainly surpass the vast majority of people, who do not try. Like the tumble weed, they are blown to and fro without purpose or direction.

The hardest step is the first one; choosing, becoming inspired. Taking action. 062906

Excellence in Martial Arts and Fitness Instruction and Training
  -Since 1999-

    Integrative Functional Conditioning SM     ALFA TM

Phoenix, Arizona Kung Fu San Soo, Jeet Kune Do, Escrima

"You can take my life but not my confidence." - Jimmy H. Woo

Our Martial Art School Mission:
Awakening courage, integrity and consciousness within each indivi
dual, facilitating the creation of a life of freedom, security and abundance.

Phoenix, AZ Training Center Locations:
Central - Paradise Valley, Arizona  (Tatum/Shea)
Northwest Valley - Bell Rd.

Martial Arts School Contact:

Telephone:  602-774-0282

Thank you Master Scott Leitch for the precious gift of your teachings.

Schedule Your Free ALFA Consultation Now

Sign up here to schedule your interview and class viewing at ALFA in Paradise Valley, Arizona.  This will be your opportunity to have all of your questions answered so that you can make a truly informed decision about whether this program might be right for you. 

It will be our opportunity to meet you, explore your needs and determine whether you might make a teachable student.

If you are a minor you will need to bring a parent or guardian to the interview.

Security Code: *  
First Name:
Last Name:
Zip Code: (5 digits)
Daytime Phone:
Evening Phone:

Recent Questions:

Q "Were u able to learn all the san soo forms when you were studying the system?"

Jimmy taught a new form every four weeks from the ancient books he possessed.  My teacher, Scott Leitch, trained well beyond the 11 years that are the minimum to become a Master, so he accumulated many forms.  I presently possess about 100 such form diagrams and instructions.  They take 8 or 9 years to cycle through as empty hand forms.  All the forms can also be adapted into weapons forms for use with almost unlimited numbers of weapon types.  All these can be reconstituted into many personal form variations as well.

After years of instruction and training you develop an ability to interpret and teach yourself forms you have never seen demonstrated before.  There are limited numbers of movements that the human body can do. 

The same goes for the techniques, of which 3 to 6 lessons  are commonly learned each week.  The standard lower belt techniques, which take about 3 years to progress through, are repeated over and over when you teach so they are more easily remembered. 

It can sometimes take me a few days of reading the instructions and experimenting before I understand some of the Black Belt techniques I have not seen before.  I still haven't instructed all the 15 or so years worth of Black Belt Techniques that I have in written form. 

Of course in the freestyle training, which starts after 6 months of class, you react to what your partner presents rather than by route repetition of memorized techniques.  You are creating your own responses out of all the techniques you have learned previously, perhaps combining parts from different techniques, all without conscious thought.  The possibilities are unlimited.

While the forms workouts are done in the air to improve form, balance, and timing, the techniques are the practical application.  San Soo differs from the other arts in that we are able to really do, or simulate, the lessons or techniques, which are designed to maim and kill, without being harmed.  This is because the training is not competitive.  We take turns allowing the partner to practice the technique, without resisting.  We are trained in  our workouts to react to what the partner does, and do proper breakfalls, avoiding injury and allowing realistic training. 

To someone watching, it appears that we are really fighting.  I have seen visitors turn white with shock and even quickly leave the school and never return because they were overwhelmed by the sense of potential danger and what may appear to them to be cruel indifference to the well being of the partners.

Q "I was curious if students get charged testing fees in san soo."

A  No.  Neither Scott nor I, or anyone I know did that.  I always donate a new good quality belt and a laminated certificate to students when they are promoted to a higher class or level. Conversely, in some Karate schools you will notice that some of the best students, wearing worn out uniforms, are still Brown Belts because they cannot afford to test.

Website Builder