No, seriously, there’s some post by the Bak Mei people in Vancouver outlining their training of boiling the hands and stuff and I don’t think that’s a very good idea.
But what do I know, I’m not in Bak Mei.[/QUOTE]
I know the Sifu in Vancouver you’re talking about, and I think you’ll find that he probably said, they used to do things like that for the iron palm training but because of the results, they no longer will.
He has one of the old school iron palm recipes but he will no longer pass it on or make it because he has students who have ruined their hands. Now, they are a pretty hardcore lot, and when he says that, you have to listen.
[QUOTE=Yum Cha;727009]I know the Sifu in Vancouver you’re talking about, and I think you’ll find that he probably said, they used to do things like that for the iron palm training but because of the results, they no longer will.
He has one of the old school iron palm recipes but he will no longer pass it on or make it because he has students who have ruined their hands. Now, they are a pretty hardcore lot, and when he says that, you have to listen.[/QUOTE]
The thing that I found that seemed the worst was ‘iron fist’, training the closed fist by banging it into things (makiwara, sand, whatever), which seems to cause a lot of stiffness. I don’t recommend that to anybody.
When I was at World Oyama Karate, they used to pound on the makiwara and posts, and really built up their knuckles with callouses, and that’s just wrong, IMHO.
Anyways, somebody said NASA is actually developing some sort of bone density machine that pounds on the bones a little bit because in zero-G the bones lose calcium because of lack of stress. That should be interesting if it actually does come out.
Yea, I read about the NASA research. Something important for long term space travel.
On a similar note, they found that for the old girls that get oestioperosis (sp?) a bit of impact aerobics improves bone density.
So, I think it rings true, use it or lose it. Stress increases bone density. Theoretically, stressing them should increase the amount of bone as well, theoretically. Over how many years? etc, etc…
I think the issues come in when tendons and cartlidge begin to get the same treatment. And I think slow and steady seems to be the best solution, like Jing Wu man mentioned earlier on in this thread. And there are tradeoffs, even at lower level.
But still, you have to ask yourself, why? So you can hit hard stuff? Boiling (well, not BOILING, but using heat and salting your hands) is something boxers and bare knuckle boxers did to keep from cutting up their hands in a fight.
Simple physics tells us, mass times the speed of light squared equals energy. Iron palm does not make your hands faster or measurably heavier, thus, there is no more energy released.
Its about pain/endurance, and psychological.
Heavy bag training works up the wrist muscles, teaches you to focus your energy and aim.
My philosophy is aiming for vulnerable targets is more efficient than smashing at hard targets.
[QUOTE=Yum Cha;727026]
But still, you have to ask yourself, why? So you can hit hard stuff? Boiling (well, not BOILING, but using heat and salting your hands) is something boxers and bare knuckle boxers did to keep from cutting up their hands in a fight.
[/QUOTE]
No, not so you can hit hard stuff, but when people wrap up their hands before fighting because they worry about breaking their hands, it’s always kindof funny.
But salting up their hands and all that, I don’t know about that. It seemed like the boiling the hands before the tournament thing was a bad shortcut. But I’m not in Bak Mei, so I don’t know.
in a nutshell, wolf’s law states that consistant and gradual stress placed upon a bone will increase its density. This is where your iron palm and nasa studies meet. The hot water is only one part of the component, to increse circulation, which is why tcm does not advocate rice but heat and massage. cold causes stagnation, slows healing and exacerbates the injury. callouses are not the goal of makiwara. These are simply pioeces of the puzzles. look at them. put it together. it’s all there.
Yum Cha, your definitely right about the psychological aspects of Iron fist/palm
training. The way my teacher puts it, the training is to not mind the pain and shock that comes from hitting a target, so that when you do need to use it, you can just belt out a heavy strike and not hold back anything for fear of damage. You can just beat.
