what techniques or tools do you use to increase your speed in hands or feet?
i juggle 3, nine pound iron balls and run across the local boulder field for starters.
HIIT, plyometrics …
Ernie Moore Jr.'s Kung-Fu, Squirrel Speed Training:Feet
A lightsource opposite a wall. Do kicks between the lightsource-ish and the wall. Kick. When I retract my kickand the shadow is still on the wall though briefly, I presume I have increased the speed of that kick.
Twine: Jute twine, make a ring of jute twine smaller than your normal stepping length that your feet can step into. As you break the twine by stepping, shorten the ring. When consistantly breaking the smaller twine ring widen it again to significantly smaller than your normal stepping but near there and double the ring. As you break the double ring shorten the ring…tripple, then lengthen and shorten then quadruple I suppose. Haven’t taken it passed double but the theory for further I like.
Noose one ankle with jute twine. Noose the other ankle with the other end of your cut jute twine the distance will be shorter than your intention–Kick is longer stopping before you finish the kick, but not just a little before as there is give in your flesh and the twine tightening. Footwork is shorter where the benefit comes fromshort distance seperating of the feet sort-of-thing.
Do rising kicks in a pool shallow to as deep as you can stand. you need the support leg for a base to develope the other leg kicking and retracting muscles.
Greater weights merely damage you without the conditioning. Super light on the weights until…
Run in a pool keeping your feet/legs in the water unless it is too shallow for your knees to remain in the water given your stepping/running fast or continuous stepping technique.
No_Know
Ernie Moore Jr.'s Kung-Fu, Squirrel’s Speed Training:hands
Wrap the hand (including fingers) wrist and forearm and if you can aft arm in thin metal wire. Perform whatever kungfu form or technique. Perform until the wire loosens the keep performing. I fi it was secure you will feel improvement in speed of hands after the wire is off.
Practice T’ai Chi Ch’uan with plastic grocery bags encaseing your hands–put your hand through a strap, then into the bag, wrap the baggaround the hand then put the other strap around your hand to the wrist. There should be places where the bag and hand are seperate. The closeness sensation of your hands different from the rest of the body and the different air something blah blah blah I No_Know but I thing practicing T’ai Chi Ch’uan with your hands in plastic bags with air between is developmental~. And makes for faster hands at least.
I No_Know
so for the wire thing pretyy much wrap it like a hand wrap and use like soldering wire or would you use thicker than that?
Not thicker than soldering wire at first.
Hobby sections in a store might have a thin wire or similar to hanging pictures…
Wraped like hand wrap but more spaced out.
No_Know
not to sound dumb but i don’t know any tai chi >.<
[QUOTE=Raipizo;878432]not to sound dumb but i don’t know any tai chi >.<[/QUOTE]
don’t worry, we didn’t hear anything.
i see lol, doh!
a lot of speed is going to come from structure and relaxation … with that in mind an important tool for getting faster would be slowing everything down. take your time and perfect each movement and you’ll be surprised at the results.
also oly lifting. and squat more.
yup its proven that relaxed muscle is much faster than tense muscle so you have a point there thanks.
thats part of why taiji has slow movements.
if you know some techniques you like to practice the most, or some kungfu forms you really like, you can do like GDA says and move slowly. make sure your posture is correct, and you are moving with good structure and fluidity. You can pay close attention, or have a friend give resistance to your movements to locate muscle groups you could be using in any particular movment, but are not.
becoming more aware of what muscles are capable of being used that often are not, will not only increase your speed once the usage is more second nature, but will also increase your power.
try maybe doing your form once, slowly like a very old man, with no muscle power. spend all your attention to correct movement. then do it a second time at the same slow speed, but use the muscles in the movement. imagine the resistance, feel the resistance, activate the muscles as though there is real resistance. you can do fajing here if you like with your strikes. similar to chen taijiquan.
a lot of time when I am practicing a technique. say a right cross, or a sidekick, ill alternate between kicking the bag, kicking the air, kicking slowly, kicking my friends:p and just mix it up.
aside from exersizes, dna, and conditioning/toning up your body, just practicing your martial arts will help you get faster.
i will also try this too 
lift very heavy weights. explosively. O lifts, squats - compound stuff. plyometrics. The way to speed is neurological - you have to train your neurological system to produce faster, harder contractions.
[QUOTE=SevenStar;879622]lift very heavy weights. explosively. O lifts, squats - compound stuff. plyometrics. The way to speed is neurological - you have to train your neurological system to produce faster, harder contractions.[/QUOTE]
im a newb, but i would say its two fold … the cns’s ability to recruit the most efficient muscular contraction in combination with fluency and ease of movement.
also im very rrunkd.
[QUOTE=Raipizo;878221]what techniques or tools do you use to increase your speed in hands or feet?[/QUOTE]
Zhan zhuang training.
Relax.
There are two keys to the secret of speed in gong fu.
The first is complete relaxation. Practice a flat punch, or sun punch 500 reps at a medium speed with the arms real loose, but don’t let them fully extend. Do that every day, exhibiting the second point all the while, which is economy of motion.
When you are practicing, make sure to remove even the subtlest extra movement. Just a little extra movement here or there that isn’t needed will slow down the overall execution time.
At first, when your practicing your techniques real softly, it might feel empty and pointless, but with continued effort, it starts to get good. 
Seven is correct. As is Toby.
Also, run sprints. This will help your handspeed too because:
a) Speed is not localised: it’s a whole body phenomenon
b) Although the mechanics to striking is obviously different, sprinters have some of the fastest moving hands in coordination with their legs on the planet.
[QUOTE=uki;878240]i juggle 3, nine pound iron balls and run across the local boulder field for starters.[/QUOTE]Juggling won’t help your hands get faster except for the first couple of days before you plateau. Running across boulder fields won’t either unless you’re sprinting (although of course it has other benefits such as stability).
Speed is not like strength. With strength training you can say, “well, I want to get stronger”, so you work your way up to bigger weights and go a little bigger every day. With speed you can’t just say “I want to go faster” and move faster every day.
As I said, sprinting will help, but again, you’ll reach your plateau quickly: it’s genetic. So that’s when the HIIT and weights come in to improve your sprinting. You can do HIIT with weights or hand exercises too which helps.
[QUOTE=RickMatz;879826]Zhan zhuang training.[/QUOTE]
Is that the one where you stand still with your arms out? If so, that’s an excellent exercise, but no relation to speed.
[QUOTE=iron_leg_dave;881197]There are two keys to the secret of speed in gong fu.
The first is complete relaxation. Practice a flat punch, or sun punch 500 reps at a medium speed with the arms real loose, but don’t let them fully extend. Do that every day, exhibiting the second point all the while, which is economy of motion.
When you are practicing, make sure to remove even the subtlest extra movement. Just a little extra movement here or there that isn’t needed will slow down the overall execution time.
At first, when your practicing your techniques real softly, it might feel empty and pointless, but with continued effort, it starts to get good. ;)[/QUOTE]There are different kinds of relaxation. For punching relaxing while punching targets and moving around on your feet (be they humans, heavy bags or shields) is better for handspeed because your using the right muscles. Punching the air is teaching you to slow your muscles to protect your joints.
Also, 500 reps of anything is an endurance exercise and will not help speed as such.
You said there were two points: I only saw one, what was the other?
[QUOTE=Mr Punch;881228]
Juggling won’t help your hands get faster except for the first couple of days before you plateau. [/quote]i don’t see how you are qualified to speak of any benefits or not of juggling 9 pound iron balls unless of course, you do it on a daily basis such as myself.
Running across boulder fields won’t either unless you’re sprinting (although of course it has other benefits such as stability).
you should do it sometime. there is a place in pennsylvania, hickory run state park; the field is like 500 yards long by 300 wide or something like that. you just run as fast as you can… you literally have to plot each step as you are running, every step is a different angle-trajectory… the rocks are usually quite stable, so tripping up is do mostly to badly plotted stepping. i only ever crashed once and it wasn’t during a run, but my straight sword practice… i was halfway across the field when i stepped into a hole and went crashing, other than that i only smashed by big toe while running. it’s a very exhilirating experience(exercise).
Speed is not like strength. With strength training you can say, “well, I want to get stronger”, so you work your way up to bigger weights and go a little bigger every day.
they go hand in hand.
With speed you can’t just say “I want to go faster” and move faster every day.
why not? practice makes perfect.
As I said, sprinting will help, but again, you’ll reach your plateau quickly: it’s genetic.
in laymans terms, all those qigong(chi kung) exercises that [b]transform[/b] the body internally and such… what do you think it is referring to? think a minute… genetic transformation… mutation. why do you think all the ancient masters sought the internal to transform the external; they had an understanding of the phenomenom of genetic transmutations and cellular evolution in relation to the affects of light, energy, and bio-logical and alchemical proccesses of the human body… so what i am saying is that if you work daily on transforming yourself thru exercises, you will infact enhance and alter your DNA to make you stronger, faster, and smarter.