We recently had a BJJ session with a very young coach who put together a great session for us. He really is a young man and is tiny, weighing only 50 kilos. His assistant told me how strong the coach was despite looking like he wasn’t. I mentioned that no-one would like to be hit with 50 kilos. It’s an important point but is often forgotten when considering how to increase punching power. When...
In professional sport the use of vizualisation or imagery is pretty widespread. It’s usually used to imagine successful performance of a particular technique, race or whatever. Sport Psychology categorizes imagery into internal and external types, from the of perspective of the person imaging, i.e. you are either observing yourself performing the technique or actually doing it. The recommendation is to get the images as vivid as possible and to be multi-sensory, to include sight,...
Increasing Punching Power by Opening and Closing The waist area is packed with muscle and potentially will add substantially to your power punching. In karate Senseis often tell you to use your hips but they should really be interested in the waist. After all the hip is no more than a joint between leg and pelvis. There is a lot of muscle working across and around this joint which can contribute to the power...
Speed and quickness are generally important in martial arts in terms of movement and striking; footwork and speed punching/kicking training drills are common place. Attempts to address punching speed at the initiation of a strike are less common. Steve Morris tackles this area in a number of ways, one of which involves reading cues and beating the incoming punch. I don’t want to say it’s impossible but I’ve not managed to beat him to...
Steve Morris talks about the inherent movement patterns underlying human action, and importantly how these should form the basis for all martial arts movement. In fact not just martial arts movement but movement in all sports. He is referring to the successful actions that occur across a variety of sports and physical activities. An obvious one is running, one arm pulls as the other pushes or as Steve might say, one part zigs as...
This is the first of two posts that describe the wonders of the human response to stress. Many people in martial arts refer to the stress response (or freeze, fight or flight) in a pretty negative manner. ‘Adrenaline dump’ is a term used to highlight a detrimental natural phenomenon that needs to be overcome during a self-defence situation. In fact, the stress response involves a complex integration of the body’s systems involving a powerful...
This post takes a look at the role the deeper core muscles play in connecting the top and bottom portions of the body, i.e. the torso and the legs. This connection is critical if the full potential of power generated is to reach the intended target, because often it is not. Muscles of the Core Muscles are arranged in layers, particularly in the middle of the body, commonly known as the core. At the...
In the last post I discussed the wide range of motion possible at the foot/ankle complex of humans. This is derived from the mobility achieved from the 28 bones, comprising 25 joints, contained within this essential yet underused body part. That last assertion might sound a bit daft but it’s not made without foundation. Of course, we use our feet everyday, even the laziest of us has to walk about a bit, thereby rendering feet essential...
The first freeze-fight-flight post described the physiological events triggered when threat or danger is perceived by humans. This post continues with the theme that the response is an essential part of evolutionary survival. We can think of the stress response as being responsible for surviving external threat, while the immune system counters internal threat. In both cases the objective is to protect the system from threat by rearranging resources as appropriate. While an internal...
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