Hi All

Following on from Pete's question about punching power, where lots of people discussed exercise and strengthening. A question popped in to my head; what is the science of the strike?

To deliver an effective strikes (kick, punch, elbow etc) that have penetrative power on an opponent, is it:
• Acceleration with clean stop.
• Timing
• Accuracy
• Weight
• Muscle strength.
• Something else?
I ask because I have sparred with people what have caught me clean and the punch has had no effect. Whereas other times I’ve been hit and the punch has shaken my whole body. I’ve also felt this with a couple of leg strikes (once with a taekwondo guy and once with Thai boxer’s knee) both seemed to cut through to the bone.

Any thoughts?

I think this is a realy complex question which deserves a complex answer. I can only share from my limited knowledge a couple of my views. Sometimes a strike feels just right. Practising 500 punches and 1 just realy finishes with a CRACK! I put it down to being well grounded in a perfect stance and delivered with speed and accuracy. It took me a long time to grasp that speed is power. A bullet thrown at a wall will bounce off, but fired out of a gun will penetrate with ease.

Would like to hear more on this though. Good topic.

Yeah its an excellent topic.

I like what your saying about the speed element ROO...

Striking force assessment by means of simulation

We have a student who for his sports science degree has decided to do a project on ''Strinking force assessment by means of simulation''.

We are going try and set up a simulation to assess the striking force produced by either a hit with the stick or with the naked fist. The aim is just to try and record the effect of actually hitting ''obstacles'' in terms of damage made to them. We will start with easy objects like boards made from wood, plexiglass, etc. and then in the end try to model a human body (focus on the head). We will need substantial material data though, since the stuff we have found so far is somewhat deficile. We have some recorded data (static lab tests) for boxing punches to use as a reference for calibrating the model (lh = lead hand, rh = rear hand):
Beginner: lh 1604 +/- 97 N rh 2381 +/- 116 N
Intermediate: lh 2283 +/- 126 N rh 3722 +/- 133 N
Professional: lh 2847 +/- 225 N rh 4800 +/- 227 N

A scientific project with sensors fitted to the inside of boxing gloves quotes different figures:
Professional Super Middleweight: 866.6 N (average, no tolerances)
Light Middleweight: 1149.2 N (average, no tolerances)

These values were recorded during fighting and the weight was found to have next to no influence on the punching force. The difference in values between measurements (in our opinion) reflects the fact that the in a fight, the punch has to be delivered from where you stand, not from where and how you would ''LIKE'' to stand. Anyone feeling inspired to help with cad models, materials data or anything is more than welcome to do so.
Also due to our group being involved in Arnis. We will try and do tensile and bending tests on a rattan stick and Padded sticks ? But the testing equipment will not be free until the middle of summer.

Any thoughts, reflections or the like?

Best regards,

Pike
http://www.balintawak.co.uk http://www.balintawakarnis.eu http://www.balintawak.biz

Ronin1185 listed timing as a factor, but I don't think it's gotten its fair due in this conversation. Boxers only get knockouts when their opponents are moving into the punch -- just as head-on vehicle collisions are worse than rear-endings. And it's the reason why super-heavyweights hit "harder" than lightweights: the target is moving into the punch with more mass. (And more speed, too, since both masses are converging.)

Pike, I don't know if there's a good way to quantify this in your study, but I think it's a very important element of striking power in general.

Can't help myself. I'm going to suggest reading my newest book, "Martial Mechanics." This is exactly the kind of thing covered in that book while it also pokes some good-natured fun at the reader...

Yeah I can vouch for that.

We will be having a Phill Starr interview and book review coming up real soon!

Hi all

So far what I have taken from the posts is as follows:

Timing is important, particularly if the target is moving, but how doses it create a penetrative stike rather than a glancng blow?

Weight is not a factor in penetrative power,

pstarr knows something to put in a book but does not answer the question.

I return to my orginal question, because developing muscle may increase penetration power but what is the link? Doing a 1000 push-ups may not make your strike any harder.

How important is stance in delivering the strike or is it something else?

Ronin1185 wrote:
Timing is important, particularly if the target is moving, but how doses it create a penetrative stike rather than a glancng blow?

Weight is not a factor in penetrative power,

Weight (mass) is a factor. I would rather get hit by a pillow at 20kph than by a train at 20kph. Timing doesn't affect the direction of impact (i.e., penetrating straight in, versus glancing at a tangent), but it affects the power of impact. (Recall Newton's F=ma.)


I return to my orginal question, because developing muscle may increase penetration power but what is the link? Doing a 1000 push-ups may not make your strike any harder.

How important is stance in delivering the strike or is it something else?

Generally speaking, more muscle = more speed. I guess that's why they called those 1970s gas-guzzling hot rods "muscle cars," eh? More speed = more power. (Again, recall F=ma.)

Doing 1000 push-ups may not help as much as being able to do 10 reps of an exercise that's 100x harder, but the 1000 push-ups can help in a couple ways:

1. You'll still gain muscle, even if it's not in an optimal manner, and

2. You're training your neuromuscular system to fire in a manner similar to throwing a punch. One might argue that it would be better to train the actual punching motion for this, though. In any case, when your neuromuscular system functions efficiently for the execution of a punch (i.e., good technique/body mechanics), you improve your acceleration as well as the amount of body mass behind the punch.

A good stance is a necessary component of good body mechanics. Some styles use a rigid stance, others a more active stance. But at the moment of impact, all styles strike from a strong, rooted stance that involves a whole-body power chain.

Power comes from good body mechanics.

However, "good body mechanics" means different things to different people. In professional sport, generally what works best is proven through competition, however, martial arts is often shrouded in mystery and hidden/special moves.

For me, striking hard means that the body moves slightly before the striking tool meaning that it drives the strike. From a stance point of view, I need to be in a position where my movement is driven by my hip rather than slowed down.

A lot of traditional martial arts are based on aesthetics and the movement of the body and the striking tool happens at the same time. This is not a natural movement and you don't get full power and low stances make this worse.

Think about throwing something. How do you do it? You naturally drive with your hips and this fires your arm out. Now try throwing using a motion of a traditional karate/tkd style punch. How far does the object go? Do you feel your front/walking stance inhibiting your hip rotation?

Now look at body mechanics from professional sport.

As far as boxing is concerned, a lot of knockouts occur simply from the angle that they hit. A hit to the front of jaw may have limited effect, but the same force to the side of the jaw, rattles the brain and has more of an effect.

Also in boxing, boxers are moving, bobbing and weaving and slipping. Many knockouts occur when a technique is thrown at the end of a bob, where the body has moved and the striking tool follows.

SteveBruce wrote:
Think about throwing something. How do you do it? You naturally drive with your hips and this fires your arm out. Now try throwing using a motion of a traditional karate/tkd style punch. How far does the object go? Do you feel your front/walking stance inhibiting your hip rotation?

Your post implies that in TKD, you do not lead with the hip, and the walking stance prevents good hip movement. In fact, this is how I was taught to punch in TKD: Lead with hip, get body weight moving, land fist. Arm only solid at the moment of impact, with the body only stopping when the fist stops. That's how you can get your body behind it. The walking stance has always given me a perfect base to whack out some really powerful hip movements and thus really powerful punches. Like what tonyli was saying with Newton's law F=ma, you use your hip in TKD to make sure your body is moving in the same direction as your fist as you hit, you your body weight is the real force giver, rather than arm weight and strength.

This is what I had always considered to be a traditional TKD punch style to be, and it works really well in my experience.

Firstly I don't doubt that f=ma, what I would query is the best way to get the m and a into the strike.

Okay, lets look at the walking stance. Where is your rear foot pointing? Is your heel on the floor?

If your toes are pointing out at about 45 degrees and your heel is on the floor then I really think that you can hit harder by changing your stance. In this stance, my hip twist is constricted by where your rear leg is and this inhibits my acceleration and my putting weight into the punch.

This is what I have seen in about 95% of reverse punches in TKD or karate that claim to use hip twist.

For me in general I think my feet should point in the direction of where I want the power of the strike to go.

I don't doubt that you can hit hard, what I'm suggesting is that perhaps you can hit harder and giving you an idea of something to try. What have you got to lose? Get a mate to hold a pad and strike it using your current technique and then try with the way I describe in the link below.
http://www.martialedge.net/forum/martial-arts-training-and-fitness/building-punching-power/12/12/

The link below is Peter Costerdine showing the double hip. Watch carefully how his body moves and when his arm moves. Also it's worth thinking about the pivot point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRqfYwhsQdQ

The link below shows Russell Stutely showing waveform strikes which is similar to double hip. I did a seminar with him about 3-4 years ago and it helped change the way I hit. He hits incredibly hard with very little effort. The highlights at the start show the body movement in different angles and strikes. There is a reverse punch at 1.05 that shows the body motion and the foot position.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG9gq6b5Pcw&feature=related

Looking at waveform and double hip and then drilling my natural body motions really helped me increase my striking power.

Just some thoughts that will hopefully help someone.

Steve