[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1299471]that one drill he taught me once and I remember he mentioned use the side of the bone not directly on the shin bone. later I was working with one of my Present day Shifu’s students and showed him the drill and he thought we should use the shin bone for contact, thinking about that it makes sense, cause in sparring with now kicks it is the shin bone that sometimes makes contact in blocking kicks and needs to be strengthened.[/QUOTE]
For the drill in the gif, we tell the students specifically not to hit the shin bones together. And don’t hit the shoulder bones together for the chest/shoulder strike. And don’t hit the elbows together for the tricep strike. And don’t hit the hip bones together for the hip strike.
The point is to condition the fascia with relaxed sinking strikes, and learning how to deliver and rebound powerfully the force of the strikes. Most people are too rigid, don’t use proper body mechanics, and try to do brute force smashing.
We don’t do the conditioning for in case of accidental strikes. There’s already too much intentional stuff that needs to be trained.
If you’re kicking someone, you intentionally are going shin/instep/heel against calf/thigh/sciatic. So those areas have to be trained and conditioned to rebound force.
That said, we do have a different conditioning exercise where you kick straight forward into the other person’s shin. That one is for toughening the shin, but it is not shin on shin contact.
To me, just do round house kicks on a hard heavy bag or sand bag. You have to kick the bag anyway, so you get your shin conditioning at the same time. Even the cheap 80lb Everlast bags are good. People complain that the bottom gets too hard because the sand sinks. But that’s perfect for this application.
If you don’t have a bag, you can put on shin pads and kick a steel pole. I’ve done that too.
[QUOTE=-N-;1299571]
If you’re kicking someone, you intentionally are going shin/instep/heel against calf/thigh/sciatic. So those areas have to be trained and conditioned to rebound force.
[/QUOTE]
sure I know how to do a roundhouse kick, but in all my prier karate days and even kunf fu days when I was younger I would mostly kick waist and above. now because of the current training I’m doing, age and past injuries I find myself mostly doing low kicks in sparring. the shin on shin in blocking and being block is my concern. sure you can use shin guards which we do but seems the body should be able to handle such stress if used in real life. yes I have done some research and most Thai boxers say use a heavy bag and even sparring with shin guards helps. my main purpose in this thread is does anyone or has anyone seen the shin bone to shin bone contact drill.
the reason I’m asking specifically about this drill is a previous teacher showed it to me, but if I remember correctly he said to use the area to the right side of the bone. then in training with one of my Shifu’s younger students he mentioned, we can hit the shin bones directly. this got me thinking what is the purpose of conditioning next to the bone when the shin bone is the area that needs conditioning if blocked by another shin bone, or being used to block a low roundhouse kick.
[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1299573]this got me thinking what is the purpose of conditioning next to the bone when the shin bone is the area that needs conditioning if blocked by another shin bone, or being used to block a low roundhouse kick.[/QUOTE]
It’s a reasonable question, but at the risk of repeating myself I believe if what you want to do is to condition the shin for hard impacts (which amounts to two things, trying to get greater bone density there so it doesn’t break, and killing nerves so you don’t feel as much pain), then do just that in the most efficient way possible, not through a bunch of random knocks while ruining another type of partner drill. For example, you can bang away on your shins with a wooden stick all day.. gritting through the pain like a warrior, booyah. while sitting on the bus, whenever you want, and have it under control. And then you can use your partner training time to do something worthwhile.
[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1299573]in training with one of my Shifu’s younger students he mentioned, we can hit the shin bones directly. this got me thinking what is the purpose of conditioning next to the bone when the shin bone is the area that needs conditioning if blocked by another shin bone, or being used to block a low roundhouse kick.[/QUOTE]
I would listen to the teacher before the younger student.
TCMA tends not to rely on direct force against force blocking like strip mall karate.
If you begin to take a hit, whether directly to the bone or not, you roll the contact so you don’t take it all on one spot. You sink at the same time and use that force to redirect the attack vector into the ground.
It’s more important to train the tangential intercept, rolling, and sinking than it is to train ability to take direct impact. The latter is last resort if your other skills fail.
We make fun of the students that take the brute crashing approach and say that at least they might survive until they have a chance to develop real skill.
Boxers know to roll with the punch. And rolling to dissipate force of impact is how parkour experts can jump off a roof and land on the ground without getting hurt.
Conditioning the area next to the bone is so you can use it for the initial intercept and use explosive tension and rolling to rebound/redirect the attack.
Heavy impact bone on bone contact can contribute to bone cancer, and many muay thai fighters in thailand have died from bone cancer as a result of doing it. Granted, the extreme shin conditioning they do also contributes to deaths from bone cancer. I don’t know about kicking the side of a person’s shin, but I think it should at least be less risky than going bone on bone. If you want to insist on kicking the side of someone’s shin, I would stop if you or your partner fell pain, rest until it goes away. Once you can do it without pain, you can gradually increase how often you do it, but no more than 3 times a week, allowing for at least a day of rest in between. Not “Oh, I can stand this” but doesn’t hurt. Peace.
[QUOTE=phantom;1299770]Heavy impact bone on bone contact can contribute to bone cancer, and many muay thai fighters in thailand have died from bone cancer as a result of doing it. Granted, the extreme shin conditioning they do also contributes to deaths from bone cancer. I don’t know about kicking the side of a person’s shin, but I think it should at least be less risky than going bone on bone. If you want to insist on kicking the side of someone’s shin, I would stop if you or your partner fell pain, rest until it goes away. Once you can do it without pain, you can gradually increase how often you do it, but no more than 3 times a week, allowing for at least a day of rest in between. Not “Oh, I can stand this” but doesn’t hurt. Peace.[/QUOTE]
yeah I only make light contact when doing this drill with a partner ,and don’t do it more than a couple of times a week. But I like the idea of making direct contact with the shin opposed to the side of the shins[that just seems pointless]. We got a hard heavy hanging sandbag which I stated to do light shin kicks to also condition the shins based on thai methods, even though all my roundhouse kick are done with the instep.
[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1299890]But I like the idea of making direct contact with the shin opposed to the side of the shins[that just seems pointless].[/QUOTE]
The point is to train your ability to minimize effect of your opponent’s shin bone against your sciatic nerve when he tries to kick the side of your calf(or thigh), and your Kun Lun and San Yin Jiao points when he tries to take out your base.
[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1299890]We got a hard heavy hanging sandbag which I stated to do light shin kicks to also condition the shins based on thai methods, even though all my roundhouse kick are done with the instep.[/QUOTE]
Use shin bone for close range low round kicks when you run over your opponent. That is one of the real teachings of stance transitions in forms. Same thing as what you see Buakaw do all the time to his opponents while he’s punching them.