recoil dynamics

[Admin]

comparison of structural rigidity and compressive alignments in dealing with inherent force reflection (3rd law of motion).

[Admin]

anything you hit, hits you back just as hard.  with some practice you learn to manage this, and eventually you don't notice unless you fuck up and bend your wrist, jack your shoulder, and knock yourself down with your own attack.  

basic postures and some fine tuning tend to put you in the ballpark to absorb your recoil.  things like bend the knees, keep the elbows tucked,  shoulder packing, etc.  

one of the main things that people do is to tighten up either on, or well before impact.   this gives your structure the added rigidity it needs to keep your posture and balance intact, so you can keep your stride.   and you can get very sophisticated with this, intermixing it with various degrees of relaxation, and refining it until you are only really tensed out just as you hit.  and then you can 'whip' and have a nice, crisp 'pop' to your strikes.

and that is definitely one way to do it, and the choice of most.

[Admin]

the other choice is not so well known, or popular, obviously. and that is the use of compressive alignments.

compressive alignment comes about from deep relaxation and a precise line-up of the body relative to the target or force that 'grounds' your movement..i.e. recoil

in the simplest terms, you let the force 'pass through' your body and if channeled correctly, it will 'hit' ground. if this sounds odd consider that your feet are in contact with the ground, and are how you generate movement to begin with. then consider a structure with the correct positioning so a 'line' can be formed from your hand to your foot, and the only effort involved is just enough to maintain your structure upright. '

so, in the case of punching, for instance, when you hit there is no momentary locking of the body, no snapping/whipping, or other kind of tension. the recoil is handled entirely by the body alignment.

if you tense up anywhere, you impair the recoil transfer, and this has direct effect on the power of your strike.

intellectually, the concept is pretty easy to understand. execution, however, is a different story. I have demonstrated relaxed striking on many occasions..the difference is obvious. the reason why people don't do it is because it goes against, once again, the ingrained need to tense up or otherwise brace to produce power. people enjoy the feeling of 'strength', even though relaxed power is demonstrably better. relaxed power is not something that is trusted to be effective. it just doesn't feel right.

and don't get me wrong, somebody can knock the shit out of you with a good 'loose-tight' strike...it does work. but there are qualities associated with relaxed compressive movements that make it superior not only in force transmission but other areas as well.

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