I nearly punched my friend in the head!

[Blade96]

Ok we were sparring last night and i was attacking and he was supposed to block with age uke but he didnt and i nearly hit him a new one, he had to duck to get out of the way. Now since my blocks and punches are rather sharp and abrupt, I often smack people on the arm or the hand or knuckle. and it hurts. Once I kicked my brown belt friend while we were practicing yoko geri keage. I talk to my parents sometimes (parents wanna know, right?) about my MA but not much. and they said that cause I am strong, that I dont know my own strength, that I should be careful cause i could hurt someone. I was wondering, Is it, my fault cause my punch was strong? Or his fault he nearly got punched in the noggin because he didnt block and had to duck instead? Should people be placing the blame on me cause my blocks and punches are strong and I sometimes hurt them?

Just wondering for opinions cause people (*cough* my parents *cough*) said I should be more careful.

 

[wushuguy]

both, i think. your friend shouldn't mind getting hit once in a while because it's a martial art after all. if you're both going hard, then hitting hard is ok. but if it's not supposed to be hard contact, then you need to learn to use hard and strength, but at the same time "land softly" this is a bit different than pulling a punch, because you're actually going to try to hit them hard, but have a bit of control at the connecting end if your buddy doesn't block it. While even going "soft" like this though, I suggest still to do hard strikes to the limbs, to help each other toughen them up. Also, if you are often having accidents like that with a willing uke and not with a sparring partner, then I think you really should work on your control.

I'm not sure about you, but I've seen too often people have pride when showing of "how powerful" they are by executing a painful technique then saying "sorry I didn't know my own strength". No excuse for that.

 

[just2kicku]

I gotta agree with wushuguy on this one. In our dojo there's something called "payback". I believe you said you just started, so I would say work on control. That might mean doing the tech slow and building up to full speed after say 5 reps. I do believe also that if he didn't block and gets smacked in the head, well, he should've blocked. Going hard is good, but its something that you have to build up to. If you were both purple belts or orange, then like I tell our students, too bad, you should've blocked.

Just remember, whatever you do to them, they get to do back to you

 

[ATC]

Control. control, control. Jr's. or beginners don't have it. But as you progress you need to develop control. Control is the ability to perform any technique at full speed and snap but have the ability to touch or destroy when needed, or in other words control the power. At this point you lack control. It will come with time and training. I see it all the time. Even some Sr's. lack control at times. Just work on it.

 

[72ronin]

Im sure your friend will pay more attention next time.
No use training with punches landing 30cm short of target. lol.

Just be aware that some people take more time than others to learn the actions of block mechanics etc.
Adjust your strikes to their skill levels etc.

As for the kick to the Brown belt, well its open season on brown belts (kidding)

Train hard but train safe.
Oss.

 

[jks9199]

Ok we were sparring last night and i was attacking and he was supposed to block with age uke but he didnt and i nearly hit him a new one, he had to duck to get out of the way. Now since my blocks and punches are rather sharp and abrupt, I often smack people on the arm or the hand or knuckle. and it hurts. Once I kicked my brown belt friend while we were practicing yoko geri keage. I talk to my parents sometimes (parents wanna know, right?) about my MA but not much. and they said that cause I am strong, that I dont know my own strength, that I should be careful cause i could hurt someone. I was wondering, Is it, my fault cause my punch was strong? Or his fault he nearly got punched in the noggin because he didnt block and had to duck instead? Should people be placing the blame on me cause my blocks and punches are strong and I sometimes hurt them?

Just wondering for opinions cause people (*cough* my parents *cough*) said I should be more careful.

From the sound of things, you were training well.

It's easy to "train" if partners never really put focus and strength into strikes that never really get in range to hurt you. Lots of techniques look great done like that; after all, that's what movie & stage fight choreography is all about -- making it look dangerous without putting the actors in serious danger.

But good training introduces the risk of injury if you make a mistake. It won't look as pretty. It won't go as smooth. You will collect bruises... and maybe worse. But you'll gain real skills.

I'm not suggesting that you have blanket permission to beat the crap out of your training partners, either! You have to adjust to the goal of a particular exercise, and you can't rely on the fact that you know what's coming to shape your actions unrealistically.

 

[blindsage]

If you don't learn control for speed and power that is appropriate to the specific training exercise you are doing, you won't have many training partners to practice with for long.

"It's not my fault people get hurt because I'm strong," is often followed by comments out of your earshot of "Wow, what a d***."

 

[Gordon Nore]

Agreed all around with everyone here. Blade, your strength doesn't cause you to hit people. It's hitting them that causes them to get hit. Raw physical strength is not necessarily an asset for hitting, kicking and striking -- I'm a big bruiser of a guy, but a twelve year old kyu and can break my nose.

My teachers used to say, "TSP - First, technique; then speed; then power."
Get the technique down first; the rest will come in time. If you were my student, I would carefully select partners for you and have you work on controlled striking -- hitting and getting hit -- hard enough to know you've been hit without having to call in a medic.

My instructors also used to say, during sparring, "If you hit it, you gotta kiss it." Makes folks careful. Have fun and take your time learning.

 

[Nolerama]

I think a lot of "strength" in new students is mismanaged enthusiasm for their respective MA, and a willingness to impress other students and their instructor.

Earlier this week, I got my lip bloodied, trying to instruct a new student on an scissor sweep. He kept going so fast! Even when I urged him to slow down... Took a knee to the mouth w/o a mouthpiece.

Eh... Always happens with new guys. They end up learning pretty fast. The Payback system is pretty effective. You spar/roll with a new guy a few times and end the spar quickly with a fast sub, and tell him that you had to rep and fine-tune your tech, he'll do the same.

 

[ChingChuan]

Ok we were sparring last night and i was attacking and he was supposed to block with age uke but he didnt and i nearly hit him a new one, he had to duck to get out of the way.

My instructor keeps telling us each and every lesson: make sure your goal is to hit someone. You don't help your trainingpartner by holding back and being careful - he'll only learn how to block properly when he gets a proper attack. Of course, this is different from 'being agressive and trying to hurt someone', but I suppose that that wasn't the case. So, are you at fault? Well, no, because now he knows he really has to block.

Now since my blocks and punches are rather sharp and abrupt, I often smack people on the arm or the hand or knuckle. and it hurts.

That problem - that your blocks hurt - can only be solved by training, training and more training... At least, I suppose that it's supposed to be felt but not really 'hurt', like the blocks in my art.
When my boyfriend started training, I got quite some bruises etc. because of his blocks. He wasn't doing it intentionally, he just 'used too much strength'. As he is a quite strong person, it took some time to teach him to rely on the technique instead of his strength - and that takes a while. It's part of the training process.
Also, it teaches you, the partner, how those blocks actually feel, what you're doing to someone. That doesn't free you of the responsibility to train those blocks until they don't hurt anyone - but I don't think it's your 'fault'.

Should people be placing the blame on me cause my blocks and punches are strong and I sometimes hurt them?

Well, no. Mistakes happen from time to time, even to the most advanced people. However, do try to continue working on it. I could imagine that people would start to blame you if the problem doesn't diminish after a while...

You could also try confiding in your teacher. In the case of my boyfriend, my teacher took some time to explain everything etc and my instructor made sure that he felt what he was doing to me (or another trainingspartner). That knowledge also helps with getting a good motivation for improving those blocks .

 

[Blade96]

I'm not sure about you, but I've seen too often people have pride when showing of "how powerful" they are by executing a painful technique then saying "sorry I didn't know my own strength". No excuse for that.

I despise people like that too. They disgust me cause they are just being evil. I just dont do that stuff.

Just remember, whatever you do to them, they get to do back to you

LOL true when that white belt took a kind of a hard punch from me in the solar plexus last night i joked with him and said it was karma for him doing the same to me last year =] Just a joke though. and we both laughed. for the record i never did it on purpose. Thats just evil.

Im sure your friend will pay more attention next time.
No use training with punches landing 30cm short of target. lol.

Just be aware that some people take more time than others to learn the actions of block mechanics etc.
Adjust your strikes to their skill levels etc.

thats true. Thanks guys. I guess last night I also forgot I was sparring with a white belt, as when I sparr with black belts I can punch harder because they block better and faster (obviously!) I'm just used to doing this with black belts cause thats who I mostly get paired with. Yes, I gotta learn control in case i do get paired with another white belt. but with BB's, I dont have to. BB's want me to punch harder and faster. so I think I forgot. Those BB's help me a lot though. My punching and blocking is better than my fellow white belt counterparts. Not being cocky, just honest. I didnt get hit by the white belt btw last night.
Thanks anyway!

As for the kick to the Brown belt, well its open season on brown belts (kidding)

Train hard but train safe.
Oss.

Hehe. brown belts look out. =]

Kidding! lol.

Thank you everyone for your thoughts!

*bows* Oss.

 

[sgtmac_46]

Ok we were sparring last night and i was attacking and he was supposed to block with age uke but he didnt and i nearly hit him a new one, he had to duck to get out of the way. Now since my blocks and punches are rather sharp and abrupt, I often smack people on the arm or the hand or knuckle. and it hurts. Once I kicked my brown belt friend while we were practicing yoko geri keage. I talk to my parents sometimes (parents wanna know, right?) about my MA but not much. and they said that cause I am strong, that I dont know my own strength, that I should be careful cause i could hurt someone. I was wondering, Is it, my fault cause my punch was strong? Or his fault he nearly got punched in the noggin because he didnt block and had to duck instead? Should people be placing the blame on me cause my blocks and punches are strong and I sometimes hurt them?

Just wondering for opinions cause people (*cough* my parents *cough*) said I should be more careful.

I punch my friends in the head all the time. It's called sparring.

You just need to find tougher sparring partners.