The Practical Tai Chi group breaks off towards the end to practise sword forms, which I have no interest in. With all due respect to those of you who practise weapon arts, it's just highly unlikely that I'd ever be able to use a Chinese sword in a self defence scenario. Even if I did, they use those flimsy and super light weight Wushu swords. I tried using one tonight and with each powered thrust I had the blade wobbling all over the place like a bowl full of jelly. The idea of using this kind of sword in actual combat is just laughable. I didn't learn any sword forms in my old Tai Chi school, but I know that some of the more senior students who did used fully weighted metal swords, or similarly weighted solid oak swords... not these flimsy aluminium blades.

So tonight I asked the head instructor (who teaches Yang Tai Chi to a separate group, whereas the Practical Tai Chi I do is Chen Style) if she wouldn't mind if I came and joined her group from next week when the Practical Group goes off and does their sword work. Thankfully she agreed. She did warn me that they do a different style of Tai Chi, but I said that I'd rather do a different variant of bare handed combat forms over a sword form. It'd probably be more practical for me.