Try this out

[Tigerwarrior]

The other day I got a training idea. So I tried it out. Basically doing boxing or kickboxing shadowboxing low speed with the minimum tension needed to throw whatever punch or kick you are doing. Try to keep your arms as relaxed as possible with minimal tension, tell yourself no tension(which I don't think is possible, but it will get you doing this right) basically going at like a tai chi type thing. Slow but good form, and relaxed muscles. I'm not sure if this has any benefits outside of improving your form, but alot of people tense up more than needed when striking. I'm hoping if you did this once or twice a week it would stop over tensing when punching or kicking. Also I've heard of this on speed bags before from a kung fu instructor, I know for a fact that method works I've tested it myself before. Now I'm interested in if we can get the same benefit of that training drill with no equipment and shadowboxing. Let me know what you think and if you've ever did anything like this before.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

I always start my bag routine with lower power, low speed. I concentrate on form. Hips (koshi) generating power, feet planted, fists relaxed until the bag closes them into a solid striking surface upon impact. There is still power, but minimal muscle involvement.

Slowly at first, with good technique, then slowly turn up the power, which also increases the speed. I keep my shoulders loose, relaxed, and I keep my breathing under control. I'm settled in my stance and relaxed as I can be. Knees bent, sunk into my stance. Everything in alignment and tenses only at the moment of impact (chinkuchi).

Power increases and I make the heavy bag dance. I never wear bag gloves; if it's too much for my hands, it's too much.

I stop several times and reset from lower power to high power over again.

I keep my hands up and guard my head even when punching the bag. I don't lead with my face.

 

[Buka]

The other day I got a training idea. So I tried it out. Basically doing boxing or kickboxing shadowboxing low speed with the minimum tension needed to throw whatever punch or kick you are doing. Try to keep your arms as relaxed as possible with minimal tension, tell yourself no tension(which I don't think is possible, but it will get you doing this right) basically going at like a tai chi type thing. Slow but good form, and relaxed muscles. I'm not sure if this has any benefits outside of improving your form, but alot of people tense up more than needed when striking. I'm hoping if you did this once or twice a week it would stop over tensing when punching or kicking. Also I've heard of this on speed bags before from a kung fu instructor, I know for a fact that method works I've tested it myself before. Now I'm interested in if we can get the same benefit of that training drill with no equipment and shadowboxing. Let me know what you think and if you've ever did anything like this before.

That’s a good exercise to have in your tool box. And it can be used equally well as a warm up or a cool down.

You can also use it as part of mirror work if that option is available.

You can also do it multi-directionally. Not just going predominantly forward, but straight back and backwards while evading and stepping out on either side. Or circling.

A few schools I’ve trained at also do it using this scenario - you’re a foot taller than your imaginary opponent so shadow box with your hands held with that height difference in mind. Or if you’re the one that’s a foot shorter.

I’d also suggest doing it with either side forward if that’s comfortable for you.

I used to live in Boston, so we’d occasionally do that exercise outside in the winter. Not to be rough tough guys, but to familiarize ourselves with the slippery surfaces we experienced on a lot of days, especially while wearing our every day footwear. It makes for shorter steps and different balance requirements. (It also sucks)

But, yeah, I think it’s a really good drill.

 

[drop bear]

Whenever you walk in to a new gym. Work all the bags at once.

Yell "multiple attackers"

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

basically going at like a tai chi type thing. Slow but good form, and relaxed muscles.

I like to train as I fight.

One drill that I like is to coordinate my punch with my leading foot landing (my back foot is in the air for simplicity). I want to make sure that my heavy bag punching sound and my foot landing sound is together as 1 and not 2 (grenade method).

Another drill I like to train on my heavy bag is to punch as hard as I can and as fast as I can. I will punch like a mad man non-stop until I'm totally exhausted. Last time, I counted the number was about 75. When I do this, I'll totally ignore my hand and foot coordination (machine gun method).

 

[Holmejr]

Good flow, good breathing. I like it. I do this with the weapons also. Very meditative…

 

[_Simon_]

Yeah a great drill and something I do often. Connecting with that relaxed natural feeling is important. And slowing everything down you can pay attention to and engage things much more consciously: where your weight is placed and being transferred, sinking your weight, moving from your centre, kinetic chains, synchronised whole body movement, realising connection between certain body parts, breathing etc.

I have even have sessions at home where I'll set a timer, say 10-15 minutes, and I will just... move. Often it looks like dance haha but inevitably martial arts movements make their way in there. It's about breaking out of rigidity, exploring new movements and ranges of motion, connecting with and exploring different principles, honing in on even the essence and origin of movement, what actually produces movement, stuff like that, I highly recommend it! Don't worry if you feel or look silly doing it, do it when alone and just enjoy the movements and movement patterns you discover. You learn alot about your body and mind, and all the ways things are connected. Sometimes I even find myself on the ground rolling around, spinning, pushing off walls, crawling, Ido Portal sorta stuff too.

Even in the dojo we will do something called yawara kumite, which is veeery slow motion kumite. You're trying to simply flow with everything really slowly and in a relaxed manner, and trying to override your need to 'win' and get a shot in (which is very very challenging actually! You notice those moments where there's an opening and you unconsciously speed up to hit). Key is to go slow so you actually give or offer your partner the chance to react to it. Forces both people to hone in on not doing that staggered start-stop-start movement, keep constantly moving, creating openings and looking for them, and on learning, feeling body connection and in staying calm.

Thanks for the reminder @Tigerwarrior , I may just do that today!

 

[Tigerwarrior]

Whenever you walk in to a new gym. Work all the bags at once.

Yell "multiple attackers"

This reminded me of an old youtube video I saw years ago. I don't even know if it's still up. The title was like "master Joe doing what he loves, hitting stuff!" He was teaching karate out of his living room, he had like 4 or 5 of his students all holding mitts, and they said go and he just unloaded on them at one point he hit the one to his left with a right cross or right hook, the one in front of him with a backfist, the one to the right with a karate chop, and the one behind him with a donkey kick. He was fast but I wasn't impressed other than the fact he had good speed. In real life they all would of mauled him. They would of piled up on him like when someone gets tackled in American football and the whole team jumps on them. It looked like a fun time though. I sometimes do stuff with no benefits just for fun. But I've done what you described I just didn't yell what I was doing, the whole gym was empty and I had it to myself, my teacher had so many heavybags and other bags hanging it was like a maze. I just went through hitting as many as I could and ran through. Probably little practical value but it was good fun. And I had the gym all to myself. It made me feel like daredevil from the comics

 

[Tigerwarrior]

I like to train as I fight.

One drill that I like is to coordinate my punch with my leading foot landing (my back foot is in the air for simplicity). I want to make sure that my heavy bag punching sound and my foot landing sound is together as 1 and not 2 (grenade method).

Another drill I like to train on my heavy bag is to punch as hard as I can and as fast as I can. I will punch like a mad man non-stop until I'm totally exhausted. Last time, I counted the number was about 75. When I do this, I'll totally ignore my hand and foot coordination (machine gun method).

The first method you described sounded like xing yi, and I think we talked about it before. Is there striking in your style of kung fu? I know it's a wrestling style but I've seen you talk alot about striking. Is there punches and kicks in that style or did you train in other stuff for your striking? The second drill you described I've done that in boxing training before my coach called it "bag sprints" it's a hell of a workout! I know of a few boxers who swear by it to improve their punch count when they fight in the rounds. We would do everything in the gym then we would all do this before we left to go home. We used it as a finisher, but you could totally do this as a hiit workout. Like you could do 20 seconds all out 10 seconds breaks then repeat 3-4 times. I do alot of Tabata and hiit stuff.

 

[Tigerwarrior]

Good flow, good breathing. I like it. I do this with the weapons also. Very meditative…

I especially like doing this with bastons man that rattan hitting the air is so relaxing.

 

[Tigerwarrior]

Yeah a great drill and something I do often. Connecting with that relaxed natural feeling is important. And slowing everything down you can pay attention to and engage things much more consciously: where your weight is placed and being transferred, sinking your weight, moving from your centre, kinetic chains, synchronised whole body movement, realising connection between certain body parts, breathing etc.

I have even have sessions at home where I'll set a timer, say 10-15 minutes, and I will just... move. Often it looks like dance haha but inevitably martial arts movements make their way in there. It's about breaking out of rigidity, exploring new movements and ranges of motion, connecting with and exploring different principles, honing in on even the essence and origin of movement, what actually produces movement, stuff like that, I highly recommend it! Don't worry if you feel or look silly doing it, do it when alone and just enjoy the movements and movement patterns you discover. You learn alot about your body and mind, and all the ways things are connected. Sometimes I even find myself on the ground rolling around, spinning, pushing off walls, crawling, Ido Portal sorta stuff too.

Even in the dojo we will do something called yawara kumite, which is veeery slow motion kumite. You're trying to simply flow with everything really slowly and in a relaxed manner, and trying to override your need to 'win' and get a shot in (which is very very challenging actually! You notice those moments where there's an opening and you unconsciously speed up to hit). Key is to go slow so you actually give or offer your partner the chance to react to it. Forces both people to hone in on not doing that staggered start-stop-start movement, keep constantly moving, creating openings and looking for them, and on learning, feeling body connection and in staying calm.

Thanks for the reminder @Tigerwarrior , I may just do that today!

Yeah I learned this method of training from Adam chan. He uses it when he has new guys who tense when punching. He would put them on the speed bag and tell them flow with no tension. They would do this for a few weeks and once their body got used to not tensing they would hit faster and even stronger. In the tao of jkd bruce talks about tensing at the last minute right before making contact on your punch. I'm working on it. When I first started a long time ago well a long time for me anyways haha I used to always tense when throwing my punches. Yeah they hit hard but they were slow, now I'm much faster. I like your idea of just flowing and making it playful. I think that's an important mindset to have, if training isn't fun sometimes we burn out.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

The first method you described sounded like xing yi, and I think we talked about it before. Is there striking in your style of kung fu? I know it's a wrestling style but I've seen you talk alot about striking. Is there punches and kicks in that style or did you train in other stuff for your striking?

My primary styles are long fist and Chinese wrestling. I also cross trained praying mantis, Baji, Zimen, WC, Taiji, Xing Yi, and ...

I don't like slow training. One day I trained my long fist in slow speed, my long fist teacher told me that if I don't feel like training, I should just rest. If I feel like training, I should put 100% power and 100% speed into my training. I agree with him totally. The reason is simple. I don't want to develop a bad habit. When my opponent stabs his knife toward my chest, that will be full speed, and I need to get used to that kind of speed.

Fast speed training makes me feel young. Slow speed training makes me feel old. I do know that I don't belong to the mainstream, and I don't expect people to agree with me on this.

 

[Argus]

My primary styles are long fist and Chinese wrestling. I also cross trained praying mantis, Baji, Zimen, WC, Taiji, Xing Yi, and ...

I don't like slow training. One day I trained my long fist in slow speed, my long fist teacher told me that if I don't feel like training, I should just rest. If I feel like training, I should put 100% power and 100% speed into my training. I agree with him totally. The reason is simple. I don't want to develop a bad habit. When my opponent stabs his knife toward my chest, that will be full speed, and I need to get used to that kind of speed.

Fast speed training makes me feel young. Slow speed training makes me feel old. I do know that I don't belong to the mainstream, and I don't expect people to agree with me on this.

I don't know. I have mixed feelings on this.

It depends on the purpose of your specific training session.

If I am trying to make something functional at speed, then sure, I agree. Train the way you will use it. You're right there.

But if you are trying to improve the form or be conscious of what muscles you are/aren't tensing, for example, you need to slow way down and rewire your brain. As your brain and body begin to be reprogrammed and it starts to come out naturally, you build the speed back up, all while being very conscious that you're training the right thing.

I don't know anybody who can fix a bad habit training at 100% speed and power.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I don't know anybody who can fix a bad habit training at 100% speed and power.

IMO, slow speed is bad habit by itself.

Some people like to fix problem in slow speed. I like to fix problem in fast speed. To be able to deal with speed is more important than to be able to do it right.

 

[Argus]

IMO, slow speed is bad habit by itself.

Some people like to fix problem in slow speed. I like to fix problem in fast speed. To be able to deal with speed is more important than to be able to do it right.

I think both form and speed are important.

I've met a few (often not that experienced) individuals in Martial Arts under the impression that speed is the most important thing to develop, above all else. In all cases, they were very fast, but they had poor form and structure -- and often poor control. I found that I could shut down their speed very quickly by applying pressure and good structure, which breaks their poor structure. Being fast doesn't help you if you're doing everything wrong and don't have good structure behind it all.

Form and pressure are actually one way to deal with/shut down speed. Now, the more pressure you feed someone, the more that force might be used against you, too. But people who are overly focused on speed tend to not be sensitive enough to take advantage of that.

A lot of this is even more important in weapons based arts, where speed and athleticism becomes less of an advantage compared to empty hands, and subtle mistakes can get you killed a lot easier.

An example of this is even modern firearms training. Shooting accurately under stress is very hard. You have to walk that fine line between fast enough, and accurate enough, while under stress. While I've never been in a firefight -- and you might laugh at the example I'm about to give -- I'm very good at this. I used to play a lot of Airsoft. I often had instances like this: I was once rushed by four guys who coordinated well, and ran out all at once to flank me while shooting. I wasn't able to get behind cover, so I stood my ground and quickly but accurately put several rounds on each of them. I wasn't the first to shoot, but I was the first to hit each one in succession. Only one round grazed my clothing, which I treated as a hit per the rules, but in reality would not have even grazed me. That kind of thing happened a lot in airsoft, and if you read accounts in Jeff Cooper's books and the likes of real fire fights that his students got into, it happens a lot in reality, too. The person who shoots first, and faster, is very often not the one who wins. Accuracy and shot placement are much more valuable under pressure than people generally realize.