Five Steps to Make a Hard Punch

The Five Essential Parts of a Hard Punch!

What is the difference between your punch, and the hard punch of a master like Mas Oyama, who could kill a bull? If you dissected his body you wouldn’t find any special about his fists. So what did he know that you don’t?

hard punch

The knowledge he had, aside from a humungous helping of belief in himself, was the correct data on how to make a punch. That he had this information is obvious, for he couldn’t kill a bull without it. Here is what he knew.

First, one must connect the body directly to the ground. This means standing and pushing energy go down the legs and into the earth. This is done by doing kata while relaxing and breathing to the tan tien and ‘willing’ the energy into into the ground.

Second, you must use the legs when executing a punch. This puts the entire body weight behind your strike. Would you rather have an arm punch, maybe twenty pounds times velocity, or a full body weight punch…your body weight times the velocity created by your leg push.
Third, one must align the hips properly in all karate moves and techniques. Many people actually twist and turn their hips the wrong way, and break the line of energy from the fist to the ground. To test this, simply have somebody push on your extended fist and turn your hips back and forth until they can resist the push without effort.

Fourth, One must keep the shoulders from rising when punching. If you raise the shoulders the energy tends to leak upwards and out of the shoulder, and not down through the body and into the ground. Again, have somebody push on your punch and raise and lower the shoulder until you can channel the flow of energy easily and without effort through the shoulder, through the body, and into the ground.

Fifth, you must snap the fist on impact, and ground and push with the legs, and turn the hips, and keep the shoulder low, in complete synchronization. This is what it means to use the body as one unit, or, as I call it CBM–Coordinated Body Motion.

Okay, that’s everything. You’re ready to jump over that fence and wave your red hankie at that 500 pound soon to be hamburger named Otis. Don’t worry, I’ll film the whole thing from this comfie branch.

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