the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

RobP3 wrote:Do you guys really relax your whole hand/fist/ wrist when you punch?

Of course!

wayne hansen wrote:In fact true structure only appears when realaxiation is paramount

+1

Exactly!

The body wants to stretch and make itself upright. This is how the body, with all of its muscles and nervous system, works all by itself when you relax and really let it work by itself.

wayne hansen wrote:Structure and relaxation aren't mutually exclusive things
In fact true structure only appears when realaxiation is paramount

A couple comments from a MMA forum on the subject.

Imagining you're shooting your fists out of a cannon, or throwing them like a baseball. Like your fists are just projectiles and not something you push out with arm strength.

When you're apexing (or impacting) it's important to have the muscles turned on in one direction, not both directions. Becoming tense at the moment of impact activates the muscles in both directions. "Apexing" is about having the right drivers on at the right time, the arm is pushing through the punch, the core is driving the shoulders around, the legs are driving the hips around... but there's no tension like there would be if you were making a muscle with your arm (pulling both directions).

Bao wrote:

RobP3 wrote:Do you guys really relax your whole hand/fist/ wrist when you punch?

Of course!

wayne hansen wrote:In fact true structure only appears when realaxiation is paramount

+1

Exactly!

The body wants to stretch and make itself upright. This is how the body, with all of its muscles and nervous system, works all by itself when you relax and really let it work by itself.

Have you ever hit anyone for real? Genuine question.

ttps://www.facebook.com/groups/2145224 ... 801507798/

It would be very fair to say that the forearm tendons are tight during that strike (see below). In fact when you examine the footage the entire arm is tensing as is shown in his bicep activation as well as forearm etc.

Moment of impact here:



This is a parlour trick and requires no training to achieve.

I dont tend to deliberately tense my fists on the moment of impact but i agree with Rob that there is, and has to be, some tension to even hold a fist or align properly.

Of course it is also dependant on the type of fist ... I would like to see someone strike with a Pheonix Eye fist with no tension at all in the fist.

I dont tend to deliberately tense my fists on the moment of impact but i agree with Rob that there is, and has to be, some tension to even hold a fist or align properly.

This is an interesting f-in question. I think the words relaxed and tensed are unclear because they're relative. Nobody can possibly mean relaxed like a noodle, or tense like uncooked spaghetti.

I have hit people barehanded and have broken some knuckles. I learned that it was important not to tense my hand up too much at the point of impact, especially if it was the head. There was absolutely no necessity or reason to tense the hand up much at all beforehand. However, in competitions where gloves and maybe wraps, the hand was already in a clenched position. But, I still clenched more when punching. Anyway, fwiw.

Afa the other fist shapes, I have to think that all of them require some amount of tension. Now, I think that spearing with the hand are the closest techniques where the hand can be almost completely relaxed and rely totally on structure.

Here is an ILiqChuan version of the board breaking while holding an egg demonstration:

RobP3 wrote:Have you ever hit anyone for real? Genuine question.

Yes. A couple. I remember a couple of times punching with a closed fist but it had less effect and a couple of other times with better effect. But that was before I had learned to punch properly. Many years ago I hit a guy with the back of the palm on his cheekbone, leaving a nice bruise that lasted for six month. I just more or less put the hand there very relaxed with no intention to harm him. I would never hit someone with a closed fist in the head though. Better use a palm for hard targets, and a hard fist for soft targets. No need to be stupid.

Yes I have

Here is an ILiqChuan version of the board breaking while holding an egg demonstration:

They should have left the Egg demo out. But other than that, nice soft hits.

One thing i would say though is that if a hit of this power (not particularly that much) requires that much mental focus and build up to achieve it is probably not embedded enough to be useful in a fight. Hopefully they dont need such a build up to punch someone in the face. If trained well those breaks should have been like scratching their nose ... no abnormal focus, no build up.