September 2011 Newsletter
Dear Friends!
Before we proceed, KMG would like to take a moment to reflect on the catastrophe which changed the world ten years ago. Each year, our thoughts and sympathies go to the families of the victims of 9.11. May their memories be blessed.
Holiday Season
As we are approaching the end of September and the beginning of October, the Jewish calendar marks the month of Tishrei. Jews around the world celebrate what is known as the ‘High Holidays’. These holiest holidays are Rosh ha-Shana (the Jewish new-year) and Yom Kippur.
Shortly after that we’ll be celebrating Sukkot – all of these are biblical holidays.
To both our Jewish and non-Jewish friends we wish a wonderful
year – filled with joy, success and satisfaction. May you grow in knowledge and in wisdom, and may all your endeavors bear fruit.
To all our readers – may you have a wonderful, safe and peaceful year!
KMG HQ
Eyal and the Staff
Eyal in a new Clip from Black Belt
This month, a never-before-seen clip of Eyal shows how
to defend yourself and disable your opponent from the ground. It was published in Black Belt, the world’s leading Martial Arts Magazine and online resource in its ‘Technique of the Week segment.
KMG is Proud to Present the New Practitioner Level 4 and 5 DVDs!
If you are an Instructor – this is an amazingly useful teaching aid, which can help you align your techniques with those of Eyal himself, allowing you to give your students only the best!
If you are a student – this is a great resource which can help you improve and prepare for the challenge of the Practitioner level tests!
If you haven’t begun training in Krav MaGa – what are you waiting for? The Practitioner DVD set allows you to learn from the world’s leading Krav MaGa instructor while remaining in the comfort of your own home.
Order the DVDs by logging on to our website or to our online-shop, KravDepot,where you can find brand-new KMG T-shirts and other amazing products.
Krav-MaGa’s Straight Punch
The secrets, principles, theory, science and application of attacks in general and the straight strike in particular
Article by Eyal Yanilov
Introduction
In the previous newsletter I wrote some things about the history of the punch in Krav MaGa. This time I would like to analyze it more scientifically. I’ve also tried to make it clear to those who don’t have much of a background in science and physics.
I hope I’m successful
In summary, for every attack (or defense) we consider the tools, the techniques, the variations, and (at higher levels of proficiency) the tactics of executing it. The subjects I mentioned above can each be discussed in more depth in their own articles, but here we’ll focus only on the punch.
The Tools for the Straight Punch
You can deliver a straight strike with the heel of the hand or
the fist (a punch). Only a small number of people can strike with their fingers without breaking them.
The fist is the most common and natural tool for striking, especially for trained fighters and martial artists. Boys from a young age have a natural tendency to make a fist while fighting and even apes do it.
In Krav MaGa, we first teach to strike with the heel of the hand and then punch with the clenched fist.
When punching with the heel of the hand, the wrist is flexed backwards. The fingers are usually directed upwards but they can also be directed sideways (horizontally) if needed.
When punching with the fist, we aim to make contact with the large base knuckles of the index and middle fingers. The fist is firmly closed: the thumb is placed so that the side-midpoint of the first phalange (the one with the nail) is pressed diagonally downwards (towards the pinkie’s base knuckle) against the side-midpoint of the index finger’s second phalange. The fist is held vertically when punching but on impact slightly rotates inwards (about 45°). The wrist is firmly positioned so the groove between the two hitting knuckles will be aligned with the forearm’s centerline. The elbow and shoulder are aligned behind the fist.
The finishing position of the fist at 45° matches the “natural posture” of the arm in a passive stance (i.e., arms at your side and legs slightly astride). In this posture, the two forearm bones (the ulna and radius) are parallel, strengthening the structure. Additionally, this allows for efficiently striking the solar plexus because the fist has the same orientation as the edge of the ribcage, allowing Amaximum impact on the solar plexus with minimum contact with the ribs. Not over-rotating the fist (i.e., with the palm parallel to the ground) will also enable you to recoil the punch faster. The rotation also increases the impact and vibration added by that rotation. More benefits of this will be discussed later in the article.
Analyzing the Physics and the Technique of an Attack
With the example of the straight punch, several factors determine the damage inflicted on the opponent: such as the firmness of the tool (i.e., the firmness of the fist, the sound structure of limb behind it due to the alignment), the energy and momentum delivered, and the pressure and the shock wave transmitted to the target. Momentum is P=MxV, and kinetic energy is Ek =½ (M*V²), where M is the mass of the weapon and V is its velocity. (In Pic.2 the V with 2 lines by its sides is the determined value, not related to its direction). M is the combined masses of the fist, the arm and part of the body’s mass. Since Ek
depends on velocity squared, speed is a crucial factor (that is, an increase in speed will have large effects). The Ek is the main factor in your ability to penetrate and cause damage to the target. The P, the momentum or pulse, is the main factor in your ability to push and move your target. The slower the punch and the more mass behind it, the more you will be pushing the target away. The faster the strike the more damage you will cause to the surface and depth of the target area you hit. The speed of the travelling fist is the sum of all the accumulated speeds of the hand and the body.
So in other words, in order to inflict the greatest damage to the target you want to maximize both the mass and speed of the strike. Therefore, you need to send the hand, the body, the weight towards the target, while pressing your rear leg to the ground and pivoting the body, sending the shoulder in the direction of the strike. All this should be done in a bursting, explosive, powerful motion to gain maximum energy and momentum in your attack.
The Recoil and the Shock Wave
In order to easily understand the importance of the punch’s recoil, imagine firing a fishing spear gun. Once the spear is fired from the gun, it cannot be fired again until it returns and is reloaded. The same is true for the punch. By bringing back the weapon (the punch) in a fast recoiling motion, you gain a few very important benefits. First, like the spear, you are able to “fire” the punch again quickly. Second, the attacking speed of the punch is increased when you “program”* and execute its recoil. This is because the initiation of the protective mechanism that controls the antagonist muscles is delayed, and so the punch isn’t slowed (in its early stages) by these muscles contracting too early. In other words, the mind delays launching the protective mechanism that prevents you from extending your punch so hard that it would rip out of its socket because it “knows” that there is a recoil program that will prevent such an injury. The main antagonistic muscles involved in the recoil are the biceps and back muscles (around the shoulder blades): when they contract at the conclusion of the forward strike, the punch slows down its forward movement, stops and then recoils. Recoiling the punch also increases the delivered shock wave. So as a result, your attack does more damage, especially when striking the head as you are more able/likely to cause a concussion.
* By program or programming I mean implementing a conscious decision and conditioning yourself so that it becomes natural. So that every time you execute the action it includes the desired components.
Explanation of the Recoil
Examining the straight strike (with or without the recoil) we get the following graphs. “O” is the starting point. The strike then accelerates, then slows and stops at the maximum range (we’ll call this point in time: “S”) when the elbow is straight. Then the strike starts to recoil. At that point it accelerates again, slows and ends, this moment in time for our use is “E”. The strike usually returns to the same point that it started from, near the shoulder. Naturally the practitioner aims to hit the target before reaching the maximum range, meaning he or she will be able to hit and damage the target. Point “H” on the time axis is the time the contact with the target occurs.
The speed of hitting the target is called Vt. The strike then continues after the surface of the target (assuming the target moved or collapsed) the striking surface of the hand/fist continues till it stops (point “S”).
When the trainee concentrates on sending the punch and does not emphasize the recoil, the forward motion of a straight punch will slow down at a relatively early stage of its execution because of the protective mechanism, the premature contraction of the antagonist muscles – meaning, the antagonist muscles are contracted rather early. So the harder you try the slower you are, as naturally the antagonist muscles contract earlier.
The strike then begins to return to its starting position, and when it reaches completion, we call this time “E” (front hand takes about 0.10 – 0.15 sec to complete the cycle; back hand takes about 0.15 – 0.2 sec). The punch slows down and eventually stops (especially if it does not hit anything) at “S” – where it reaches its maximum range (see Pic.2, where we have “S1″ for the first punch and “S2″ for the second. Click on it to enlarge).
However (and here we relate to the second strike – the steeper one), if the performer programs himself to recoil from behind the target, from the point of the maximum reach, and executes this recoiling program, the punch will accelerate for longer time, will become faster as it accumulates more speed. It will therefore hit the target earlier with a greater speed, and of course the recoiled limb will travel back at a greater speed. The strike will then take shorter time, will hit faster and cause more damage to the target.
In the experiments we did we found that the moment the recoiling program was implemented the striking speed went drastically up. The difference was sometimes up to 40%, meaning that the kinetic energy Ek (and with it the ability to cause damage to the target) almost doubled.
What we need to remember is to avoid programming a recoil that is too short and too early. Always recoil from the maximum distance or range of the attack.
The recoil is more appropriate for straight attacks (strikes, punches and kicks). For attacks which include straightening of joints – such as a straight or hammer punch, and not like hooks, uppercuts, or heel kicks (a regular kick backwards).
The Pressure and the Push with the Back Leg
We emphasize the extended constant pressure with the back leg while contracting the abdominal (and relevant core muscles) – especially during the last portion of the strike (the impact
with the target and strike into it). This will enable a bigger and stronger transfer of the momentum and energy into the target, meaning increasing the distractive effect. During the action-reaction occurrence of impact and reverse pressure from the target to the striking hand and thus the body of the practitioner, it is important that this pressure will be transferred to the target and not lost. The way to do it is by pressing with the back leg and body in the direction of the attack for the duration of the contact with the target.
Bringing the striking shoulder above the imaginary center line which passes through the middle of the pelvis and torso, will enable a straighter line and more direct transfer of the momentum and kinetic energy into the target. If the vector (line of power) is broken the energy of the attack will be lost within the curves and corners of the body.
How a Brain Concussion Occurs
I would like to explain the process of a brain concussion in a simplified way.
The brain is floating in liquid inside the skull. The skull is mounted on the neck and spine, which can act like a spring. When a straight punch delivered from directly in front hits the head, it drives it in the direction of the strike (i.e., backwards). This creates pressure on the liquid, which then transfers pressure onto the brain. After a short delay the brain then also moves in the direction of the strike (Pic B), that is, the direction in which the head is already moving. But then the neck muscles contract, so the head springs back towards its original position (i.e., forwards). But while the skull is returning forwards, the brain is still traveling backwards, in the initial direction (Pic 4).
Since the brain and the skull are now moving in opposite directions, each towards the other, the outcome is that the backside of the brain smashes into with the inner-rear section of the skull. That part of the brain (the occipital lobes) is the center of vision, information processing of the senses, and balance (point OL in the figure). Occasionally, due to the initial movement of the head from the strike, there may also be damage to the front part of the brain (the frontal lobes, point FL) from the impact between it and the front-inner part of the skull. These impacts could cause a loss of consciousness: the brain short circuits and the “lights go out.”
Strikes from different directions have different effects on the brain. An impact that comes from underneath (such as from landing from a jump) causes the least harm, whereas a strike to the temple or back of the skull usually produces the most damage.
Variations in Delivering the Punch
Because “the street” is not as sterile as the typical martial arts training studio, the techniques we perform under realistic conditions (whether an attack, a defense, a release from a dangerous grab or a neutralization of a knife threat) will almost always be some sort of variation of the basic techniques we learned in practice. If training is only under fixed and set conditions, then it will be difficult for the practitioner to respond correctly to real-life problems (i.e., violent attacks), which are dynamic and changing, and so are usually some variation of the attacks encountered in fixed and scripted training. Because of this, KM students are first trained on how to execute the basic techniques under simple conditions. Then, using specific training methods and process, the instructor helps them understand and internalize the principles, mode of operation, and base of action of the techniques. With this acquired perspective and knowledge, students then practice how to solve “new” or diverse problems (i.e. attacks under different conditions), which really are variations on the basic techniques we practiced earlier. At the next level, we add stress and diverse environments (e.g., multiple attackers, outdoors, confined areas and other locales, low illumination, different types of clothing, etc.). The purpose of this training is to simulate as close as possible all the many situations students may encounter in reality.
The last element in the subject of attacks is the ‘tactics’. But more on that in one of my next articles.
All rights reserved to Eyal Yanilov ©
Activities in September
The Fighter’s Workshop, conducted by Eyal and Pavel Tsatsoulin (founder of RKC) took place in Long Beach, California. It is going down in history as a unique meeting between two masters of their fields, who combined their skill and knowledge for a single awesome event! Out of the grinder, 32 new fighters are born.
Teaching in a new KMG country: For the first time this year, Eyal brought the teachings of Imi and the way of KMG to Brazil where he conducted a seminar in Curitiba and a seminar in Porto Alegre. KMG welcomes Brazil into the family and hopes to see more events there in the next few months!
Eyal continued on to Mexico and then to Trinidad & Tobago where he conducted two series of seminars. One with the assistance of our local director Major Sarwan Boodram followed by an additional one with local instructor Ian Levia.
Four new GIC launched this month:
The first course took place in Finland, followed by a large seminar, both led by Eyal.
The second course was in Mexico, led by Eyal and Nick Maison in which participants began their metamorphosis from students to instructors.
Eyal also conducted a large open seminar in Monterrey with nearly 100 participants.
The third course took place in Germany under the tutelage of Global Team Member Ilya Dunsky.
The fourth course is KMG’s very first General Instructors Course in Rome, Italy – conducted by Eyal and Tal Kvores. Eviva l’Italia!
Director Peter Lakatos (Hungary) is planning a grand finale for September by inviting Eyal to conduct a series of open seminars in Gyor, Budapest and Nyiregyhazaon the 30th of September. They’re supposed to be awesome events, so don’t miss them!
What Does KMG Have Planned for October and November?
KMG’s annual Combat and Fighting Instructors Course is starting in Belgium. We expect a high turnout and invite you all to join our CFIC Facebook page.
Two new Kids Instructors’ Courses will be taking place – The first in Den Hague, Holland and the next in Newcastle, Australia. Both courses will be conducted by International Team member Nadav Shoshan (Expert 2).
New General Instructor Courses will take place in the USA, Argentina and Ecuador. KMG will also be conducting part 2 and 3 of various GICs which have already begun in Ireland, Mexico, Germany, USA, Argentina and Norway. Good luck to everyone!
Instructors seminars and open seminars will be taking place in Spain (Sevilla and Madrid), England, Germany, Holland and Argentina.
Remember, at any given time KMG is planning an event near you. Click here to review our upcoming events!
Special Offer: 100 EUR Off on the “Touring and Training” Winter 2012 Event!
This month KMG is offering you an amazing discount! Sign up now and we’ll knock off 100 EUR from the price. Just like that!
You get to join one of the most attractive events of the year and save 100 EUR while you’re at it!
Sign up now! This offer is good up to the 10th of October at which point we sober up…
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As always thank you for reading! Feel free to contact us at any time at info@krav-maga.com. Also, you are always welcome at our Official Facebook group.
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May October be as fun and fruitful as September was.
Eyal
and the KMG HQ staff
