Question on stepping

[Badhabits]

Simple question on stepping. You're in a front stance, fighting stance whatever, one foot forward. When you take a step do you
Use your front leg to pull your body forward or
Push off your rear leg to propel your body forward
Both?
This obviously applies to stepping through while attacking also
Just curious, had different instructors who stressed one over the other.

 

[Dirty Dog]

Both, or neither. As with pretty much everything, it's situational.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

Simple question on stepping. You're in a front stance, fighting stance whatever,

First you should not use "front stance (70% front, 30% back)" as a fighting stance.

- Your opponent can sweep your leading leg.
- You front stance has no "forward spring power" (because your back leg is straight).

The best fighting stance is a stance that you can spring forward with your back leg. So, your back leg has to bend. It can be 3-7 stance (30% front, 70% back) or 4-6 stance (40% front, 60% back).

 

[isshinryuronin]

Another one of those basic things I do without ever thinking about it.

Now that I've thought about it, and stepped thru a few times to feel what's happening, this is what I found:

From a basic guard position (about 50/50 weight distribution) the initial power is a hip assisted push off the rear leg. About 35-40% thru the step, the front leg starts to pull and at 50% thru the step (it now becoming the rear leg) pushes to the end of the step.

It feels to me that the transition period (40% thru 55% of the way) is the crucial part for continued acceleration and power development in delivering body mass. There is probably some slight variation depending on whether the step is intended to merely to close distance, or to deliver a strike:

Another consideration is skill level. I'm stepping as an advanced practitioner with many decades of experience and hundreds of thousands of steps. A beginner's stepping process is likely different - it's hard for me to recreate it so I can only describe my current stepping. (The way I do it may not be good for beginners to emulate. There is a step-by-step process the body requires to train itself.)

It would be interesting to do a scientific kinesiologic study to confirm the muscular sequence I described. It's possible what I'm feeling is different from the physiologic reality.

 

[Sammy Naur]

Simple question on stepping. You're in a front stance, fighting stance whatever, one foot forward. When you take a step do you
Use your front leg to pull your body forward or
Push off your rear leg to propel your body forward
Both?
This obviously applies to stepping through while attacking also
Just curious, had different instructors who stressed one over the other.

It's a blend, I would recommend hopping around a room to get the feeling. All directions, to become comfortable with your own body weight. All day long until you can move around like a cobra, mongoose, elephant.

Keep in mind most instructors have never been in a situation to use whatever it is they train or teach. So they are limited to very basic, or even naive responses to attack.

You see this all the time with "X vs MMA" where the X person gets hammered because the MMA person is using footwork and timing based on actual hand to hand combat, and the Xer is someone who does things based on what they were told vs what they internalized.

Boxing and wrestling same thing. Those people don't BS about stuff, they hit or be hit, pin or be pinned.

 

[Sammy Naur]

Both, or neither. As with pretty much everything, it's situational.

Very true, and something I find funny is all the striking martial arts often fail against basic boxing, but still make fun of boxers "dancing" around like the better way is to just stand there like a stationary target. As if bobbing weaving and feinting are bad?

Whereas the grappling arts even better know that if someone isn't moving, it's an easy takedown.

 

[drop bear]

Push from the rear leg to go forward.

Push from the rear leg to go backwards.

 

[isshinryuronin]

Very true, and something I find funny is all the striking martial arts often fail against basic boxing, but still make fun of boxers "dancing" around like the better way is to just stand there like a stationary target. As if bobbing weaving and feinting are bad?

I take it you are not a striking martial artist. I don't know any who make fun of boxers. A good karate fighter may not hop around but is certainly skilled in moving off-line and angling in for a counter. While we don't bob and weave (as we don't want to get kicked or elbowed in the head which are not allowed in boxing) we use feints extensively. So, I believe you're wrong on most of your points - now, that's funny! It seems you are using this thread (which you really haven't responded to) to trash striking martial arts. That's not so funny.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

make fun of boxers "dancing" around like the better way is to just stand there like a stationary target.

Fire strategy (dancing around) and earth strategy (standing still) both have its place in combat.

 

[Buka]

I use front stances, side stances and everything in between. It depends on what I’m facing, what I’m doing and what mood I’m in.

Same for stepping in any direction.

As for getting swept, the same goes for whom I’m facing. I like to sweep.

 

[Haruhiko]

Simple question on stepping. You're in a front stance, fighting stance whatever, one foot forward. When you take a step do you
Use your front leg to pull your body forward or
Push off your rear leg to propel your body forward
Both?
This obviously applies to stepping through while attacking also
Just curious, had different instructors who stressed one over the other.

Depends on the martial art really.

For example in kendo, pushing off with the back foot's balls launches you forward, and as far as I know that's very standard.

Other older arts will have you change your footing depending on your kata/kamae. Some HNIR kata will emphasise the opposite - even though the intention is the same (i.e. intention being to gain the initiative/lure the opponent in, for you to then shift body weight, footing, as well as a number of other things).

TSKSR (to my shallow understanding of it) will also emphasise different things to HNIR, such as controlling the centre (of engagement), and with this comes changes in footwork as well.

Iaido, and the koryūha of iai are so diverse due to the philosophical underpinnings of each kata. Some koryū kata begin in standing and a variety of seated positions, then because of the genesis of the kata's purpose (i.e. reason for being within the school's curriculum), require a myriad of footwork transitions, alignment, and the such.

And this is only Japanese arts I've mentioned. CMA can been appreciated as being more "dynamic", especially some schools of Kung-Fu (northern styles particularly).

When I competed in TKD, I was taught to have a more dynamic approach to footwork due to it being a sport; we were encouraged to plant our back foot at a 45° angle to allow for a quick transition to back kicks or spinning kicks.

All in all, **it depends**.

What do you practise in?

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

Push from the rear leg to go forward.

Push from the rear leg to go backwards.

This is why your rear leg need to bend. This is why straight rear leg front stance is not proper for fighting.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I use front stances, side stances and everything in between. It depends on what I’m facing, what I’m doing and what mood I’m in.

I like to use front stance to bait for my opponent's foot sweep. When my opponent sweeps me, I can grab his sweeping leg and ...

 

[HighKick]

Simple question on stepping. You're in a front stance, fighting stance whatever, one foot forward. When you take a step do you
Use your front leg to pull your body forward or
Push off your rear leg to propel your body forward
Both?
This obviously applies to stepping through while attacking also
Just curious, had different instructors who stressed one over the other.

A more complicated question than you might think. At face value and most often, the rear leg generates most of the power to move forward.

If your weight is 50/50 on each leg, And your body does not move, you will not be able to generate much power with the front leg relative to stepping forward. Leaning the body or shifting at the waist changes the fulcrum point, and the front leg can generate some forward motion in concert with the shift in weight.

Much of it is also style dependent. If you use deep stances, the back leg is more important for forward motion. If you use shallow stances (like WT TKD) you are drilled to be uni-directional at all times.
These could be called the two extremes of the question dynamic. But there are countless variables in between the two.

 

[Badhabits]

It's something I hadn't put much thought into either until a few years ago. Past instructors had mostly emphasized pulling the body forward by gripping the floor with the front foot until feet are even then pushing forward(I think this is mostly due to crescent stepping). Current instructor does not use the crescent step. He's never mentioned pulling forward, it's only been using the rear foot to propel forward. I combined the two- pulling forward with front foot while also propelling forward off the back foot, which ended up being one of those Aha! moments. Stepping this way produced a faster, more powerful forward movement than either method on its own.
I've been sort of going back to basics lately, putting some things under the microscope I haven't thought about in awhile so y'all will probably see more of the types of questions.

 

[Badhabits]

A more complicated question than you might think. At face value and most often, the rear leg generates most of the power to move forward.

If your weight is 50/50 on each leg, And your body does not move, you will not be able to generate much power with the front leg relative to stepping forward. Leaning the body or shifting at the waist changes the fulcrum point, and the front leg can generate some forward motion in concert with the shift in weight.

Much of it is also style dependent. If you use deep stances, the back leg is more important for forward motion. If you use shallow stances (like WT TKD) you are drilled to be uni-directional at all times.
These could be called the two extremes of the question dynamic. But there are countless variables in between the two.

Current style uses shallow stances meant for high mobility in all directions. Our fighting stance has weight slightly forward, not a 50-50. Propelling off the rear foot makes sense for this since we're already "primed" for explosive forward motion.

 

[Badhabits]

This is why your rear leg need to bend. This is why straight rear leg front stance is not proper for fighting.

Our fighting stance is a sort of front stance, it's just not extended forward. I think it's technically a half front stance with the upper body facing roughly 45°. Execute say a reverse punch, the rear leg locks out, upper body rotates, front knee moves slightly past the toes of the front foot instead of being right above them. It's a high shallow stance.

 

[Badhabits]

Another one of those basic things I do without ever thinking about it.

Now that I've thought about it, and stepped thru a few times to feel what's happening, this is what I found:

From a basic guard position (about 50/50 weight distribution) the initial power is a hip assisted push off the rear leg. About 35-40% thru the step, the front leg starts to pull and at 50% thru the step (it now becoming the rear leg) pushes to the end of the step.

It feels to me that the transition period (40% thru 55% of the way) is the crucial part for continued acceleration and power development in delivering body mass. There is probably some slight variation depending on whether the step is intended to merely to close distance, or to deliver a strike:

Another consideration is skill level. I'm stepping as an advanced practitioner with many decades of experience and hundreds of thousands of steps. A beginner's stepping process is likely different - it's hard for me to recreate it so I can only describe my current stepping. (The way I do it may not be good for beginners to emulate. There is a step-by-step process the body requires to train itself.)

It would be interesting to do a scientific kinesiologic study to confirm the muscular sequence I described. It's possible what I'm feeling is different from the physiologic reality.

It's something I hadn't thought much about either until the current instructor. He's been a real stickler about the quality of a person's basics and it's caused me to reexamine some very basic things like stepping. This guy has put more emphasis on perfection of technique than past instructors. Alot of it is very boring but at the same time it has resulted in improvement in areas I hadn't thought about in years.

 

[Badhabits]

So I'm seeing everyone say to push off the back leg. Has anybody specifically been taught to pull forward with the front leg just for a simple forward step through?

 

[Badhabits]

Push from the rear leg to go forward.

Push from the rear leg to go backwards.

Dude I'm trying, but having to start the backwards movement by pulling with the rear leg lol. Different feeling than pushing forward......