Timpah Sebelah

Hey everyone. 
This article will cover the Timpah Sebelah its name is a little vague but means something like hitting with hammerfist and then backhand in an "X" or in our case a horizontal figure eight (This is one of the Cimande seated jurus and is often performed standing. Whilst it comes to us as Cimande students from this source, its movements are found in most Silat systems and for those doubting the adaptability and destructive power of its movements one only has to see what Guru Eddie Quin of Silat Fitrah, as done with these movements in his "Approach" series
"The Approach"

I won’t demonstrate this as Eddie does it far better than I could.

For more information on Guru Eddie Quin and the “The Approach” see http://www.the-approach.com/

I want to add here that Timpah SebeIah is a valid Cimande juru practiced in many styles of Silat and this article is not meant to plagiarise Guru Eddie or his work in “The Approach”.

I teach this juru in its formal setting at first to familiarise the students with its movement which needs to engage the whole body not just the arm to be most effective. Also I teach it like Guru Eddie with heavy blades to help with the hip engagement and shoulder conditioning and then move to wrist weights, Shaolin Rings and then double heavy lump hammers and double handed with heavy sledge hammer. Once student as gotten to this stage he will have the movement properly memorised into his muscle memory and his now ready to incrementally pressure test this, culminating with full contact sparring with protection of course ;)

Practitioners of Pukulan Cimande will notice that "our" Timpah sebelah juru is different in that we use a double handed single blow I personally have done and teach both, but find the Timpah sebelah practised my most other Cimande schools to be far more practical and versatile (just personal preference) and I teach this movement pattern out of the Kera besar (Great Ape or Orang-Utan) subsystem of the Monyet animal mannerism as I’m sure the ape like movement swinging arm movement is fairly obvious.

You'll notice from the clip that the beauty of the movement is that anywhere on the course of the figure eights path you will intercept it as it enters your "trapping window" and in fact the movement also works well against kicks. Also the movement makes an excellent entry method for smashing your way through an attackers limbs and with no change in movement you can close smash him to bits and with simple langkah apply a takedown all with the one simple pattern of movement. Also the way in which the movement engages the rest of the body means its forward energy (As you advance) smothers him and turns his axis such that he as very few options in counter, with the added bonus that the movement is very easy to learn and apply you have a winning combination. The only draw back if any is that the movement needs confidence to work effectively, using it in a tentative or passive way will not really work so trust in the “ Eights” drive forward and go Ape!