Shi Mei Lin

Shi Mei Lin is a teacher of Wu Style Tai Chi Chuan. She is the adopted daughter of Wu Yinghua and Ma Yueliang.

A Wushu and Tai Chi champion in the 1970s and 1980s, she toured with Chinese Wushu teams internationally, including the United States in 1974 when she was part of an elite Chinese Martial Arts Delegation that also included Jet Li (Li Lianjie). She is a graduate from the Beijing Sports and Cultural University in Chinese Martial Arts and was a member of the Shanghai Wushu Team. In later years she coached Wushu in Shanghai and later the Taiwanese Wushu Team in 1994.

In 1986 she won the Chinese National Tai Chi sword competition as well as becoming the Wu Style Tai Chi Champion. Shi Mei Lin often represented Wu Style Tai Chi with Grand Master Ma Yue Liang and Grand Master Wu Ying Hua at martial arts demonstrations, competitions and conferences in China. She also co-authored the book "Wu Style Tai Chi Fast Form" with Grand Master Ma and Grand Master Wu.

In 1988 Shi Mei Lin emigrated to the Netherlands and then later New Zealand where she now lives and teaches Wu Style Tai Chi and Wushu. She also has students in Europe and the United States.

Wu style Tai Chi was created by a Manchurian named Wu Quanyou (1834 – 1902). Wu was a student of Yang Luchan, (founder of the Yang style), and Yang Banhou. Wu Quanyou’s son, Wu Jianquan (1870-1942), studied under the tutorship of his father. After 1912 he developed the teaching of Tai Chi Chuan at the Beijing Sport Research Society, gradually refining his father’s style. His two sons, Wu Gongyi and Wu Gongzao, were his first students.

Wu Jianquan’s eldest daughter Wu Yinghua (1907 – 1996), started studying Tai Chi Chuan with her father at a very young age. In 1935 Wu Yinghua was also appointed deputy director of the Jian Quan Association in Shanghai. She married her father’s student, Ma Yue Liang (1901 – 1998), and throughout her life she taught with her husband all over China. Both Wu Ying Hua and Ma Yue Liang were very highly regarded in martial arts circles.