Mae Geri

Well I was talking with Sensei today and she made a great comment on something that has bothered me for a while on mae geri kicks. The tendency is for people to hunch over as they scrunch and tighten their stomach muscles while kicking. This is really crappy body mechanics.

The difference is in the body posture. If your back is relaxed and you have bad posture the result is you moving your shoulders from behind your hips to forward with the kick you then scrunch with the stomach movement.

Instead start from a front stance with your stomach pulled in your core muscles engaged and your torso directly over the hips. Moving the leg can be done with zero effort from your upper body and speed comes directly from moving the leg only engaging your hip flexor and thigh muscles. Try both ways several times and you will notice the difference.

The importance of keeping your body connected.

So in talking with a Sensei at the dojo we talked about his training were he had learned about the importance of keeping your body connected in every move. What we discussed about that is connecting your hara in each move in karate. When you have this connected movement your body moves in a coordinated fashion. Much more like a fluid dance that has a very discrete starting position and ending position. I will be coming back to this post over time adding in more observations as I learn them myself. Currently what I must do is break down each basic karate technique and relearn it in being connected AND with the absolute minimal effort. Than take that technique and reapply it in every kata or kihon technique and than learn to chain those movements together.

Random thoughts in no particular order

• Connected means your hara ties the movement and strength of your legs to your core and your upper body to your core as well. Everything moves as one unit.
• You must have low stances. High stances can make it difficult to engage the correct muscles. Sensei does not tell you to lower your stance for no good reason.
• You must have good posture with your tail bone tucked in. I having had bad posture learned this very late in my karate life. If your posture is incorrect your hips and shoulders WILL BE disconnected. Think of a rubber band you can push on it even if you think it is tight and it moves. Your core body must be one unit of connected muscles from hip to shoulders.
• Movement. Shift your weight before picking that foot up and keep low.
• Watch that pelvis when moving the tendency is to stick the butt out or shoulders out of alignment between stances. That makes it three times more difficult to snap your body back into alignment at the end of the movement.
• Remove all the extra movements you add into your technique.
• Always, always, always have your core muscles engaged. Even if resting in stance it is your core that holds your body into alignment. Now many other muscles probably should be in a relaxed state and that is good.

Well that's my thoughts for now. It is the greatest thing when you get it as your kime becomes crisp and powerful with less energy.

Kiba dacha

Worked on Kiba dacha this week. The obvious problem was that my kiba dacha was not a strong stance. Looked ok but, my legs were not rooted down like iron. Lots of wobble if i tried moving them with my hands.

Progress was made when I tucked my pelvis in, tightened my glutes, and last my quads. This did seem to help out. Some more practice time punching in front of the mirror should help.

Mae Geri

Well in an effort to refine my Mae geri keagi I took some video of my kicks. Working with my Sensei several things became obvious when I analyzed what we were doing with slow motion video.

1. I have seen two separate ways to wind up for the kick. Method A with the knee forward and up and the foot directly below the knee. Think 90 degree angle. Method B was to wind the foot up tight against your butt. The later is definitely better.
2. Don't start moving the shoulders back before pivoting the hips.
3. Don't crunch the shoulders inwards in an effort to bring up the kicking new.

So after spending some time thinking on this I believe that method "A" in item #1 contributes to a multitude of sins when performing this kick. As you bring your knee upwards with the leg hanging underneath it you are sending your momentum in a pendulum arc towards the target. Instead with method "B" your foot is tucked tight under you and shoots out straight towards the target. This directs your energy directly into the target all the way from the beginning of the wind up.

Secondly I think method "A" is more likely to have you pivot early around your hips and move your shoulders backwards past your center of gravity (CG) before your kick. Try it out. The faster you bring that new up the more your shoulders want to lean backwards. If your aware of this you might compensate by crunching down in our abs which causes you to curl the back and shoulders inwards. Now try method "B" you can engage your core from the start of the kick and bring the leg under your bum than as you extend the kick outwards and through the target the hips will pivot (see photo). Notice the nice flat plane of the back and shoulders down. Ah if my kick only looked this good!

Last item is in the pull back. I noticed that I would start dropping my knee early and this caused my foot to swing down. Instead my knee needs to remain high during the complete pull back. I think dropping the knee causes the snap back to slow down and what happens if I need to double kick. Hhhmmm...

One last thing to play with. Bring your knee up to method "A" now try and engage your hamstrings and calf muscles. Now do the same with method "B". Quite a difference.

Well I will play around with this kick for a month or two and see what comes of it.

Oh so that's what my hara is all about!

Well sometimes your not ready to learn something until your ready to understand. Seems a weird concept but, that was true for me when I finally understood the concept of the hara.

Hara in karate is the point through which all movement comes. Using the region between your pelvis and rib cage to connect and drive your action is the difference between punching with your arm and connecting your whole body into one fluid cohesive movement. Unfortunately, understanding does not immediately translate into application. So it will be something I will need to retrain my muscle memory for every move in karate. When you get it right though it is a beautiful thing.

Well that is the enduring thing about karate training. What was old now becomes new.

Nidan Training Starts

Well this Sunday was the official start of my Nidan training. Probably about 12 months in advance. Still only 85% recovered from my ankle surgery and still fighting to get that last 15% of flexibility back.

Great technical training today. Had one of those ah-ha moments moments when I realized finally where the center of technique should be from your hara. It's just one of those things that you are not ready to understand until you are ready to understand. I think it will take a long time to now learn and apply this to all of my karate techniques.

Sparing Stance

Stance

- Weight 60/40 – more on front leg to avoid a sweep and help propel you forward (easier to push off when more weight is slightly on front than back)

- Feet should be almost shoulder length (not width, but length). The sparring stance is really quite short.

- Feet should be shoulder width apart. Make sure back foot is pointing forward, as much as possible.

- When close to opponent, keep front-most hand (if left leg forward, then left arm/hand) closer to the body to close the target opening. When farther away from opponent, this hand can be lifted slightly higher and further out

- Hand that’s drawn back (if left leg forward, it’s the right hand) should be against the stomach (in case an attack comes in, the attack will hit arm and not body). Hand should be rotated 45 degrees towards stomach.

Tekki Sandan

Chinte

Jitte

Bassai Sho

Kanku Sho

Gyaku zuki

Uraken uchi

Oi gyaku zuki

Oi zuki

Punching - Rotation Timing

So doing some karate training with a friend from CA when we went over timing of rotation during punches. What we discussed is that many students, including myself, rotate too early on the punch on the way out and  too late on the retraction. Doing this dramatically slows down the punch as the rotation switches you from using your biceps and lats over to the forearm muscles.

Give this a try. Punch slowly with no rotation to the very last second. Now in the reverse of this process rotate your hand immediately before pulling it back. Quite the difference.

Key to unlocking blocks

So I came across an article that talked about the process of creating fluid quick blocks. I was always concerned that my gedan barai was more like swinging a crow bar. All muscle and slow. I worked through the write up in the article and was amazed by the difference in my gedan barai. I will be working on incorporating this technique into my other blocks over the next several months.

The Snap of Karate (Scott Langley)

Half Step

Half step is used in many kihon techniques but, I do not believe people correctly understand the mechanics and the reasons on what the karate student should be attempting to do during a half step.  I was quite guilty during my color belt years of over stepping during my half step in an effort to either speed up my techniques or cover more distance.

So what do I believe the correct use of the technique is? First the goal is to take the back foot and bring it forward directly placed under your hip. The feet should still stay shoulder width apart. You should be able to blindly fast bring your back foot directly underneath you in the correct spot without changing your balance on the front leg or causing any change in your open hip position or upper body. Back foot should be point at least 45 degree but, as forward as your ankle flexibility allows. If done correctly your back leg should now feel compressed like a spring and your hip muscles fairly torqued. But, fear not when done in kihon at normal speed you will only be in this position for a fraction of a second.

The idea behind this proper foot placement is the following. 1.) Maintain your hip open technique so that you have hip rotation available for the following technique to come. 2.) Your CG stays exactly the same meaning your not fighting inertia going in any other direction put in the direction of the technique. 3.) You can now maintain the same height 4.) Your back leg is a tight spring allowing you to generate a powerful second attack driving all the way from your back foot. 5.) Speed, speed, speed. Watch some one doing kihon with an incorrect half step and you will see the tempo is one-two-three. Instead you will now be able to make the half step part of the next attack with no pause in between.

Tell tale signs things are not right.
1.) The dreaded over step. If you over step you will raise your height and have that sea-saw effect in your technique. Up,down,Up,down. Oh and by the way you will be slower as you have no drive off your back foot.

2.) Over step causes you drive your next technique down into the floor instead of linearly straight towards your opponent. Root cause see #1

3.) Under step. If you hardly move the back foot than you may seem fast but, unless your opponent moved back only 3" your next technique covers no distance and you lose all power. An under step does not allow for full hip rotation nor the leg compression to allow a huge drive starting from the foot through out your hips and core.

4.) The boat anchor. Students who do not rotate their back foot to point as forward towards the opponent as possible. You will see students have their foot perpendicular to the direction of movement and drag their foot behind them after each technique. It is not obvious but, if your do not rotate your foot you no longer are using your quads, calves, and hip flexors to drive with the leg. Instead you are dragging it with the hip. Give it a try and see the muscles that are no longer active with under rotation of the foot.

Gyaki Zuki - 1" punch

So I had heard second hand that those high ranking black belts training with Shihan Funikoshi could generate tremendous force when punching only an inch or two from the target. It was not until last week that I understood how "in theory" this can be done. I will use gyaki zuki as the example.

If you step back and think about gyaki zuki you really should be generating all of the force and kimae of our body in the last 2" inches of the punch. Before that point it is all interia of your arm or arm+body moving towards the target. It is not until the last 2" inches that you apply kimae. Now what do I mean by applying kimae? I will use gyaki zuki as an illustrative example.

• back leg exerts tremendous push forward. Heel is buried driving power straight to the hip
• hip starts rotation from open to closed position
• your core tightens transferring the kinetic energy from the above through the arm
• front leg tightens cementing stance to be rock solid
• last as energy transfers up the arm rotate the wrist 

What I believe students due normally is confuse inertia of moving into a gyaki zuki with kimae. Secondly hips are rotated far to early. By the time your supposed to be tensing the body at the time of the punch the hip rotation is lost. Last I am still working on the idea on moving forward into zenkutsu dachi and how the movement can impact your hip rotation.

Last I believe this theory of kimae is applicable to so many techniques. Try practicing this technique back and forth in the mirror. Only doing the the last 2" and you will find this is much harder than expected :)

Gyaki Zuki

First I would say take a few minutes and find what a proper gyaki zuki
should feel like. Always be aware of your own body/joint limitations
as you may have an ankle/hip/knee injury that does not give you the
full range of motion. 

You should have low stance, knee over tow, spine straight (that means
your tummy is pulled in), shoulders slightly pinched and exactly over
your hips. Hips parallel to target. I think many people may need to
fuss with their stance to find exactly how wide and long it should be.
1 inch to narrow and you may be binding up your hips. One inch to wide
and you start disconnecting your legs from your core making it hard to
move. 

The best description I have heard for delivering proper technique is
to visualize a wave of power starting from the back foot heel (firmly
planted not rolled) traveling up through your leg, hip, than your
core, and last through to the arm and kimae at that last second. Also
remember that hip rotation. If the hips do not start in an open
position or rotate to a closed position to early you lose the energy
from the legs. 

I personally find that if I keep low with proper posture and drive
with my hip on the punching arm side  that works for me. 

Chicken Winging Syndrome (CWS)- This is the where as you punch your
elbow leaves the linear path to the target and sticks out from the
body. Soon as this happens you disconnect your arm from your core body
and all you have going for you is the shoulders. Give it a try. Try
engaging your lats with your chicken wing hanging out there. 

A main cause of the CWS is early rotation of punching hand. Early
rotation of the hand causes the elbow to swing out and away from the
body. Instead rotation should be held to that last inch of travel. 

Another problem is leaning in to the punch, moving your shoulders
forward of your center of gravity and breaking your body kinetics. Not
sure why you want to lead an attack with your face but, don't do it.
remember proper posture and visualize driving with the hips not the
shoulders. 

How bad posture robs your technique

It is surprising how bad posture in karate can have such a large 
impact on your technique. We have all heard the instructions coming up 
through the ranks of tuck your stomach in, don't stick out your butt, 
etc. The difficulty is that it is harder to see bad posture in the 
mirror while wearing your gi top. Also the tendency is for technique 
to deteriorate as you try and speed up. 

What should good posture be? 

1. First you need to have a straight vertical spine. 
2. Shoulders need to be directly above your hips. 
3. Stomach should be tight. Think about lifting your rib cage or  tucking tummy under the ribs. 
4. Pelvis needs to be rotated to be under your torso. This is a hard one to get correct but, try tucking that butt in and under your hips. 

Now practice this in front of mirror preferable with your gi top off
so you can see your body posture. When you run a hand up the back of
your spine and it is straight you probably have got it right! 

Now given the above points on what good posture is what does bad
posture lead to. This should help give you the warning signs. 

1.) Typical student would have either their butt, sticking out, their
shoulders back behind their hips, or both 

2.) Bad posture causes the student to loose the connection of his
lower body to his upper body since you cannot engage your core muscles
to stitch the top and bottom together

3.) Because of #2 you punch only with your shoulders and arm muscles.
Possibly leading to rolling your shoulder (that feeling when you
shrug)  Weakening your technique.

4.) Your center of gravity (CG) gets messed up and is not over your
hips. This makes it hard to move into the next technique.

5.) You may also it difficult to stick a technique. What I call the
jello effect. Why because your core muscles are not engaged and
helping to lock muscles from foot to hand when you kimae.

6.) Power comes from the hips. Well that this is true, if posture is
not correct allowing your core to be engaged as you move forward your
upper body lags behind. With good posture and a strong core your CG
stays over your navel as you move through the technique increasing
speed, balance, and power. 

Ushiro Geri - Part 2

Ok so now that you can identify when things go wrong but, how do I do it correctly.
Mentally understand that this is not a spinning Ura Mawashi geri kick. The only rotation is in the hips pointing towards your target. Everything else is a linear kick straight at your target. Get that set in your noggin first.


For these steps assume that your kicking the appointment with the left
leg.
1.) Rotate your body 180 degrees so that your almost doing a niko ashi dachi (cat stance)
stance with the left foot.
2.) Look at your target over left shoulder
3.) Hips should be parallel with the target. Do not over rotate. Over
rotation = rolling hips
4.) Keep the ball of your left foot on the floor. You should be
able to do a Mae geri from this stance. At your level as you kick you
will automatically tuck the leg up and under your butt as your kick.
No reason to raise the knee up.
4.) Back straight! Do not rotate shoulders. You need that rotation
later. And you should feel a slight pinch between your should blades.
That means you are not rounding the shoulders and disengaging your
back muscles.
5.) Hands should be up in a defensive posture close to body. Farther
out means more work for you to counteract their inertia when you
rotated in step 1.
6.) As you rotate in step #1 you should think of a screw being driven
into wood. As it rotates it lowers into the wood.
7.) Now also another tricky bit but, key to this whole thing. You
should feel that you are tucking in your left hip under your body as
you rotate. Almost like you were going to start sitting in a chair.
This helps with step #6. It is also where much of the speed comes from
as you whip the hip around 180 degrees and tuck it under you as your
lower. This also helps start to pull the kicking leg in the linear
path towards the target vs. in a circle.
8.) Kick STRAIGHT BACK. Think like a donkey kick.The knee and leg will
just naturally tuck under your but, as it goes straight backwards.
9.) Arch your back.
10.) How to Kimae and drive power in the kick. Requires a wave of
contraction from your body as your left leg is shot out in a straight
line towards your opponent. Timing is everything. Kick the opponent,
left arm coming back, right arm tucked close to your side, back
arching towards the opponent. Than at the last second your left leg
impacts squeeze both pinkies, your butt muscles, and tighten the core
and back. If you followed the above you should be able to get all of
these muscle groups tightened.
a.) Blocking arm (left) has to be tight and over the leg. Squeezing pinky allows you to tighten the arm -> shoulder-> back -> chest muscle ->
b.) Right arm squeeze pinky. Completes a.) chest muscle -> shoulder -> arm
c.) Pinching shoulder blades means you are arching into the opponent
and allows you to engage the mid back muscles.
d.) Arched back allows you to engage core muscles.
11.) Last snap that sucker back quickly. Depending on the technique
that may mean you recover back towards your supporting leg or maybe
into another technique were you my need to roll the leg so the knee is
up and you are purposely off balance forward but, in a controlled
manner

Ushiro Geri - Part 1

First I believe that done properly this is an easy kick to execute
properly. The difficulty comes from the teachings of the technique as
you rise through to black belt. First are the common things that
students usually do incorrectly and the results. Second than is to refine
what is the essence of the proper technique.
All those bad habits and things that go wrong.
1. It may seem counter-intiutive but, bringing your foot up and knee
high as you spin around for a wind up has two bad side effects. One in
the contraction to bring your leg up fast you will most likely do the
following
a.) Straightening the supporting leg - The inertia of raising the leg
tends to lift you vertically. This = straight leg = pulled hamstring
b.) Your whole body moves vertically up raising your center of gravity
when if fact you should be doing the EXACT OPPOSITE and lowering your
center of gravity
c.) Hunching back / shoulders using your core and back to pull the
knee upward
2.) During the spin the knee comes up and is already traveling in a
circular motion like an ice skater in a spin. This causes the knee to
spin around the body in a circular motion instead of a linear path
towards the target. Result rolled hip and kick looks more like a side
kick and telegraphs move. Easy to recognize as toes are not pointed
down in the kick.
3.) During the spin the arms flail out like an octopus on crack. In
fact you again do the EXACT OPPOSITE and keep the arms in close to
the body. Good for defense, speeds spin, and it is essential for
proper kimae as I will speak to later. Last, the inertia of the arms
will cause the shoulders to spin early and where the shoulder goes so
to will the hip start to turn in the same direction.
4.) Head dunking towards the floor like one of those glass bird toys
that bobs up and down. Hey, over half you body weight is in your trunk
and if you send all that weight plus that big melon of a head over
yours is sending all that body mass and therefor energy in the exact
opposite direction.
5.) Blocking arm (same side as kicking leg). What and where is it
supposed to go. Believe it or not it is tremendously important and I
think most likely to be a mystery to the student.
6.) Kick has no power. Every thing that detracts from the proper
technique, robs it of power. If you have no power you have no
technique.

Kizama zuki / half step / gyaku zuki

Kizama zuki / oi zuki

Gyaku zuki / step forward / gyaku zuki

Gyaku zuki / half step / uraken uchi

Oi zuki / half step / kizama zuki

Oi zuki / half step / uraken uchi

Gyaku zuki / oi zuki

Gyaku zuki / kizama zuki / gyaku zuki

Gyaku zuki / kizama zuki / oi zuki

Kizama zuki / oi zuki / gyaku zuki / oi zuki / gyaku zuki

Mae geri keage / oi zuki

Mawashi geri / oi zuki

Mawashi geri / gyaku zuki

Ushiro geri / uraken uchi

Following other posts on Ushiro geri make sure that you after kimae on the kick you snap the leg back hard as you rotate around your CG. This hard snap back and pulling the kicking hip back under neath you will greatly speed the turn.

Mawashi geri / uraken uchi / half step / gyaku zuki

Yoko geri keage / uraken uchi / half step / gyaku zuki

Ushiro geri / uraken uchi / half step / gyaku zuki

Mae ashi yoko geri keage /gyaku zuki

Mae ashi mae geri /kizama zuki

Kizama zuki / gyaku zuki / mawashi geri

Stick gyaku zuki and leave punch arm forward. Feeling is your grabbing a bar and pulling yourself forward into the mawashi geri.

Mawashi geri needs to have a straight wind up vs. the normal rotate around the outside. With a normal mawashi geri there will be to much momentum going in the path of the kick to allow the body to quickly recover.

The difficult section of this technique is the gyaku zuki FOLLOWED by the mawashi geri.

See kizami zuki 1/2 step gyaki zuki for first part of this technique.

Gyaku zuki / mawashi geri / gyaku zuki

Mae ashi ura mawashi geri

Ura mawashi geri

Ushiro mawashi geri

Mae ashi mawashi geri / ushiro mawashi geri

Mawashi geri (back leg) / Ushiro mawashi gerii