Explosive Forward Movement (use your head!)

[Ian]

Revisiting some old exercises this week, I had a "why didn't I get this before" moment (wouldn't call it an epiphany...)

The drills were medium distance butterfly (swimming) and sprints (running).

Basically, if you swim butterfly for, say, 1km, you can either tire yourself out by using upper-body strength, or you can use a full body wave to flick/kick and throw your hopefully relaxed arms forward (also great for striking). If you're doing this for any sort of distance, the wave is a must. To generate the wave, you need to get your head above the water surface and dunk it. The head initiates the wave.




Sprinting - not much to say here. Try 20 x 100m at your own pace to see what I mean.




Anyway these are just different ways to discover whole body movement and use muscles you don't normally use.

It's obviously NO substitute for proper IMA drills, but if you already understand a bit about your style's shenfa, it can be helpful I think.

[GrahamB]

All i can do is talk from my own experience. My experience of 'leading with by head' in sparring is that it's a bad idea. I tend to leave the rest of my body behind and get hit in the head.

[RobP2]

I was thinking that leading with head in response to something is basically a flinch? The trick then is to let the movement develop. Ideally you should be able to lead or start the wave with any part of the body, whichever one has to move at the time

[Bhassler]

Leading with the head doesn't necessarily mean the head is out in front of the rest of the body. It's pretty much hardwired neurologically and mechanically that the head has major impact on organizing the rest of the body, so if someone wants to be at all efficient, that person had better have a method of integrating their head into the rest of what they're trying to do.

[Ian]

Leading with the head doesn't necessarily mean the head is out in front of the rest of the body. It's pretty much hardwired neurologically and mechanically that the head has major impact on organizing the rest of the body, so if someone wants to be at all efficient, that person had better have a method of integrating their head into the rest of what they're trying to do.

thanks! I couldn't have put it better myself.

[I-mon]

did you see those sumo clips i posted in the vids section? i've been checking out what i can of basic sumo training, and their basic exercises seem to be the stomp, a side to side slapping of a pole to develop their version of the external harmonies, and then a thing where they place both fists on the ground and explode forward for several steps staying really low. then they do the same thing but slamming into someone standing in a forward weighted bow stance and push them from one side of the ring to the other without slowing down. it looks fucking awesome - those guys would be great in a rugby scrum.

[Chris McKinley]

Bhassler has head-butted teh correct. That said, Graham's point is valid with regard to sparring...gotta keep the general at the back of the line, not up on point. The solution is simple, if not easy, in that you almost never move in with whole body commitment until you've created/opportunized on a hole in the opponent's defenses. Usually, if you're starting from scratch, that comes from better fencing skills with your hands/arms. If the opponent does something, and in the process of your counter you create an opening, you may then engage in a whole body movement for the squash.

Always moving with whole body movement is one of the worst bugaboos for neijia guys who start sparring against other styles' practitioners. A guy who starts from longest range and moves with whole body commitment is a breeze to spar for anyone with even an amateur level of sensitivity and footwork. Neijia guys almost always have to go through the 'aha!' experience of learning to create openings first before they can spar with any degree of success against practitioners of styles known for sparring. Once they (the neijia guys) do, it's not a guarantee of success, it just buys them the opportunity to use their other skills. If not, they often never get a chance.

Nowhere is this more glaringly illustrated than when neijia guys attempt to go empty hand versus a training knife. They very quickly learn that a policy of 'whole body movement only' or 'always maintain zhong ding' is suicidal tactically against a blade.

[GrahamB]

Bhassler has head-butted teh correct. That said, Graham's point is valid with regard to sparring...gotta keep the general at the back of the line, not up on point. The solution is simple, if not easy, in that you almost never move in with whole body commitment until you've created/opportunized on a hole in the opponent's defenses. Usually, if you're starting from scratch, that comes from better fencing skills with your hands/arms. If the opponent does something, and in the process of your counter you create an opening, you may then engage in a whole body movement for the squash.

Always moving with whole body movement is one of the worst bugaboos for neijia guys who start sparring against other styles' practitioners. A guy who starts from longest range and moves with whole body commitment is a breeze to spar for anyone with even an amateur level of sensitivity and footwork. Neijia guys almost always have to go through the 'aha!' experience of learning to create openings first before they can spar with any degree of success against practitioners of styles known for sparring. Once they (the neijia guys) do, it's not a guarantee of success, it just buys them the opportunity to use their other skills. If not, they often never get a chance.

Nowhere is this more glaringly illustrated than when neijia guys attempt to go empty hand versus a training knife. They very quickly learn that a policy of 'whole body movement only' or 'always maintain zhong ding' is suicidal tactically against a blade.

Chris McKinley has double-head-butted teh correct. That said, I wonder if what he's (perhaps) talking about is not a problem with "whole body" movement as such, but a problem with "over committed" movement. I tend to still think you can whip out an uncommitted explorative jab or parry a strike quickly and effectively using the "neijia" concept of movement, it's just that there's more to the concept of using the whole body than just doing an impression of a stiff Robbie the Robot with perfectly connected hand, elbow, shoulder, hip, knee and ankle moving in perfect robot harmony.

Thoughts?

[Chris McKinley]

It doesn't have to do with whether or not you are stiff, which implies muscular tension, or not as you move in. It has everything to do with inertia. Even if the neijia guy is loose, if he's moving his center of mass toward me and he hasn't created a momentarily irreparable opening in my defenses, he's gonna get clocked. While he is in motion, my limbs can move around his center of mass to find the opening in his presentation faster than his center of mass can adapt and close that opening.

[BruceP]

explosive forward movement leading with the knees

[RobP2]

Or the hips!

[Chris McKinley]

Wow.....leading with a Time Warp pelvic thrust, naughty bits heralding my triumphal approach, and shouting, "I am the superior cocksman!" Sounds like an advertisement for Balls-Out Jeans.

[GrahamB]

It doesn't have to do with whether or not you are stiff, which implies muscular tension, or not as you move in. It has everything to do with inertia. Even if the neijia guy is loose, if he's moving his center of mass toward me and he hasn't created a momentarily irreparable opening in my defenses, he's gonna get clocked. While he is in motion, my limbs can move around his center of mass to find the opening in his presentation faster than his center of mass can adapt and close that opening.

I don't know... the more I learn about this "neijia" stuff the less 'cumbersome' it becomes - until you can move your hand just as quickly and easily by moving from your centre as you can moving from your shoulder. It's all getting a bit theoretical now though, almost like arguing over semantics. Let's get back to exploding knees - that sounds much more like fun

[BruceP]

Well...

The hip is used explosively to lead forward movement in quite a few contact sports, and to good effect. Rugby, footbal, hockey. And then there are the ways it can be used in a fight.

The flying knee is one example of explosive forward movement while leading with the knees, and has racked up more than a few KOs in MMA.

Knowing how to explode forward while leading with a knee or hip is a damned good thing to train. The applications and their successes are based on some irrefutable truths of human nature, and the tendencies of animals in general. Aside from the sound tactical methods and the serious core strength needed to execute them, there are some very good internal lessons to be learned along the way.

But, yes, let's go back to exploding knees - that sounds like much more fun

[Bhassler]

Well...

The hip is used explosively to lead forward movement in quite a few contact sports, and to good effect. Rugby, footbal, hockey. And then there are the ways it can be used in a fight.

The flying knee is one example of explosive forward movement while leading with the knees, and has racked up more than a few KOs in MMA.

Knowing how to explode forward while leading with a knee or hip is a damned good thing to train. The applications and their successes are based on some irrefutable truths of human nature, and the tendencies of animals in general. Aside from the sound tactical methods and the serious core strength needed to execute them, there are some very good internal lessons to be learned along the way.

But, yes, let's go back to exploding knees - that sounds like much more fun

Keeping with the head, it might be interesting for someone (who was, uh, interested) to explore driving forward with the hip or the knee but to do so by first moving the head. What movement(s) of the head (ducking, tilting back, tilting sideways, rotating) seem to add the most pop to the projecting knee? What movements make it less effective? What's the best timing to move the head in conjunction with the knee-- before, simultaneous, after? Does moving the head somehow steer the knee, giving it a more oblique or head-on impact?

I'm just talking out of my armchair, here, being strictly a taiji for health kind of guy, but it seems that this sort of exploration might have some limited value as it relates to maybe some sort of clinch or maybe getting hit or something.