Introducing Heavier Contact

[stoneheart]

Do any of you have a formal system for introducing and increasing the level of physical contact in your classes? If so I'd love to hear from you about it. What's the maximum level of force you apply or allow others to apply and at what belt does it happen? How do you account for the differences between gender and age?

 

[Miles]

I would not call it "formal", but we do hogu drills in which beginners receive less contact than more advanced students. As the student advances, she receives increasingly higher levels of contact-both in the hogu drills and in sparring.

By doing these drills with all ages/sizes/genders, the students learn several things, not the least of which is how it feels to DELIVER a full-power shot. Obviously, the receiver is learning something else...

One can also learn to take a shot by holding a shield, but I prefer the hogu for a more realistic target.

We also do a lot of bag work, but the heavy bag is not as mobile as someone wearing a hogu and you can't be as creative or realistic with counter-kicking the bag.

Miles

 

[stoneheart]

Thank you, Miles. Many hard styles also practice a type of leg and arm conditioning when you and a partner bang body parts together to build toughness on your limbs. I sometimes wonder if it's feasible to exchange light roundhouse kicks across the abdomen and sides, too, instead of only doing the legs and arms.

 

[tkd_Jaz]

We also do hogu drills just like Miles said. One thing we like to include is that your partner positions their hogu and you have to do a step and back kick and try to move them back. Or for example when we sparr if it's a advanced student vs. a beginner the beginner gets to hit the advanced student as hard as they can and the advanced has to have controlled kicks.

 

[Kacey]

We start out 1/2 speed and minimal contact, and increase the speed and power as the student improves in technique and confidence. We also do focus drills where students use other students as targets, to get them used to aiming a people instead of pads. As tkd_Jaz said, we start with senior students facing beginners, which also changes as they improve.

 

[deadhand31]

For the kids classes, we will sometimes devote an entire class session in teaching them to give and receive hard hits. We have them partnered, and one will stay in a defensive stance while the other kicks. We usually encourage those who hit weakly to increase their power. For head shots, we have the partner put their glove (which is heavily padded) against their helmet. Their partner then kicks them in the head. We've found that this has helped alot of the kids overcome their hard-contact fears.

For the adults, well, that is rarely ever an issue. When a student reaches a level high enough to spar, they also engage in street-fighting. In these cases, the level of contact is up the partnership. If someone gets punched in the head, and they think they can take a harder hit, they tell the partner to hit harder. If it's too hard, we ask them to lighten up on their contact (though that rarely ever happens.)