S
Shinzu
Guest
how do you feel about breaking? at what level should a student begin to break and what should they break?
do you think it is a necessary for students?
do you think it is a necessary for students?
As a confidence builder its great for begnners.
I do not advocate breaking as a rule. Once in a while its fun to do but I've seen to many people break hands and arms when they missed or lost concentration (usualy higher ranking people Beginners are not so sure of themsleves and pay more attention)
I have know people who never did their first break till they had been studying for over 10 years. They were as nerveous(sp) as the white belts.
The look on the students face the first time they break is great.
Shadow
I do not advocate breaking as a rule. Once in a while its fun to do but I've seen to many people break hands and arms when they missed or lost concentration (usualy higher ranking people Beginners are not so sure of themsleves and pay more attention)
I have know people who never did their first break till they had been studying for over 10 years. They were as nerveous(sp) as the white belts.
The look on the students face the first time they break is great.
Shadow
OP
OP
Shinzu
Guest
i agree also that it is a great confidence builder and it lets students actually test their technique and prove to them that their hard work pays off.
i also believe that it can be very dangerous. i have seen many people try and break to much and actually hurt themselves.
one of the most crazy breaks in my opinion is a head break. why would anyone want to break with the part of their body that keeps them alive?
for demonstrations it is very cool. but it has to be by someone who knows what they are doing.
i also believe that it can be very dangerous. i have seen many people try and break to much and actually hurt themselves.
one of the most crazy breaks in my opinion is a head break. why would anyone want to break with the part of their body that keeps them alive?
for demonstrations it is very cool. but it has to be by someone who knows what they are doing.
I think I'd just give the boards my wallet rather than fight them.
I've broken a few small boards. It does give some measure of conifidence, I suppose, but I frankly think it's an unfortunate aspect of karate--it encourages the thinking that in an actual fight you'll have steadied, stable, easy to strike targets, not someone who is bouncing all around and won't stand still and tries to move his body away when you try to hit it.
K
Kirk
Guest
We did breaking in TKD, but none in kenpo. Have any of
you used those rebreakable boards? How do they fair?
you used those rebreakable boards? How do they fair?
B
Battousai
Guest
Hey Shinzu,
I wrote up this stuff on the BudoSeek forum about board breaking. Its my general opinion on the topic. For everyone whos seen it on BudoSeek, just ignore this post, nothing new. First is the purpose of breaking, second is an analysis of breaking with spacers.
There is a fundamental question as to the point of Tamashi Wari (breaking training, (Japanese)). It can seem like breaking a board or any sort of material has little relevance to striking real live people. How applicable is such a methodology that approximates materials like wood and stone to human bodies?
I don't think the comparison of the human body to other materials ever was, or ever is, the essential value of Tamashi Wari. Definitely breaking materials is a very poor approximation to hitting a person. But I think that thoughts along this line are a fallacy and are not along the line of the true purpose and value of Tamashi Wari.
For me, and it took me awhile to see this, breaking things have very little to do with the actual breaking of them. Rather it has everything to do with the amount of force applied.
Tamashi Wari is not about training to be able to break large piles of hard substances. Its primarily about force output, and by force output I don't mean trying to maximize the force in a strike. Increasing the strength in striking is a fine thing, but Tamashi Wari training has nothing to do with that.
Breaking is about applying a specific amount of force to a substance to break it and hopefully nothing exceeding that amount. Its all about learning how to strike with varying force. Its main concern is the controling of the power of the strike. Such that the practitioner has total control over the amount of energy leaving the body.
Beyond this, there is a conditioning aspect to the striking surfaces. Jawbones and knees may be approximated much more accurately to hard materials then other areas like the diaphram.
Now it could be asked why would anyone want to hit someone with less then the maximum amount of force possible? The best answer is conservation of strength. These martial arts were designed in feudal nations, meaning that hand to hand (weapon to weapon) combat was the primary means of warfare. When you are in a battle against hundreds and thousands of people, that could last anywere from an hour to many hours, conservation of strength is what's going to keep you alive and able to kill.
A modern day illustration would be fighting a group of people. If you have to go through 10 to 20 guys, hitting each one with maximum force, how strong are your strikes going to be by the time you get to the last one?
Besides the fact that strikes done correctly and targeted correctly need no where near full power to incapacitate most foes, strikes done at full power are very lethel and while this was not as great a concern in feudal times, its a very real concern today.
I think that the most skillful way to break something is with the least possible amount of energy. For example a hanging board, breaking it so that the broken piece of the board falls straight down would be the most skillful strike. Breaking it so that the piece flys through the air in a downward arch is the easiest way.
I believe that training to break the greatest amount of material misses out on the whole point of breaking in the first place. It is much more beneficial for students to break just 1 board over and over again, learning how much force is needed, then it is to just sit a stack in front of them and constantly drive them to break larger and larger piles. Breaking a constant amount of material, over and over again until you know exactly how much force should be applied to break it, that is the greatest training in my opinion.
Breaking has gotten labeled as a means of gauging strength and martial skill, but it should never be used as such in a training environment. The one who can break the most is not necessarily the greatest.
I would think the purpose of breaking things in public consists of wowing a crowd and gathering attention. Which isn't a bad thing (as long as spacer's are not used, LOL).
All this being said, there is a very real danger involved in Tamashi Wari. If the strikes are not done correctly bones can be broken.
As stated in the other post about breaking, tremendous confidence can be gained when kids get to break things. And when supervised, the risk of injury is drastically reduced. Statistacally I would bet that most injuries in breaking are due to oversized ego's breaking by themselves on their own and then for of public glorification.
Breaking with Spacers:
Board breaking with spacers defeats the purpose of breaking.
Spacers - even the width of a toothpick - drastically reduce the force required to break the boards (or blocks/bricks).
It appears to the audience as if the breaker has broken much more material then they actually have.
The physics of this was documented in the 1970's by physicists studing the martial arts. How it works is that when boards or whatever are separted by a spacer, the first board breaks, then the pieces of the broken board are propeled in a downward velocity. These 2 pieces of the board hit the board below it at nearly the same time the hand (or whatever striking surface) hits the second board, so that the force of the downward projected pieces add to the force of the strike.
So that the total force exerted on the second board =
Force of strike after breaking first board + Force of broken pieces of the first board.
This effect, of the board above striking the board below, continues like a domino effect throughout the entire stack of boards.
By the end of the break as much as approximately 40% (I'm not exactly sure on the percentage, it was from the article I read, that was about 3 years ago) of the force required to break the boards comes from the force of the board above striking the board below, thus the actual amount of force needed from the strike itself is only around 60% of what it should be to break the boards.
Really, breaking with spacers is like breaking 1 board, then a second board, then a third, etc.. Rather breaking without spacers is really breaking 4 boards (for example). If someone broke 9 boards with spacers, they did not really break 9 boards, they broke a single board 9 times in one strike, which requires much much less force then breaking 9 boards that are all flush side by side.
This makes the strike look much more powerful then it actually is to audiences, in truth deceiving the audience about the power of the strike and the relative effectiveness of the art in question.
Spacers should never be used by any school, they do nothing but puff up the school and have no value in training. They waste wood and other materials. They are in effect a method of faking a powerful strike used by schools of little martial value.
Instead of breaking 5 boards with spacers, just break 2 or 3 without.
I wrote up this stuff on the BudoSeek forum about board breaking. Its my general opinion on the topic. For everyone whos seen it on BudoSeek, just ignore this post, nothing new. First is the purpose of breaking, second is an analysis of breaking with spacers.
There is a fundamental question as to the point of Tamashi Wari (breaking training, (Japanese)). It can seem like breaking a board or any sort of material has little relevance to striking real live people. How applicable is such a methodology that approximates materials like wood and stone to human bodies?
I don't think the comparison of the human body to other materials ever was, or ever is, the essential value of Tamashi Wari. Definitely breaking materials is a very poor approximation to hitting a person. But I think that thoughts along this line are a fallacy and are not along the line of the true purpose and value of Tamashi Wari.
For me, and it took me awhile to see this, breaking things have very little to do with the actual breaking of them. Rather it has everything to do with the amount of force applied.
Tamashi Wari is not about training to be able to break large piles of hard substances. Its primarily about force output, and by force output I don't mean trying to maximize the force in a strike. Increasing the strength in striking is a fine thing, but Tamashi Wari training has nothing to do with that.
Breaking is about applying a specific amount of force to a substance to break it and hopefully nothing exceeding that amount. Its all about learning how to strike with varying force. Its main concern is the controling of the power of the strike. Such that the practitioner has total control over the amount of energy leaving the body.
Beyond this, there is a conditioning aspect to the striking surfaces. Jawbones and knees may be approximated much more accurately to hard materials then other areas like the diaphram.
Now it could be asked why would anyone want to hit someone with less then the maximum amount of force possible? The best answer is conservation of strength. These martial arts were designed in feudal nations, meaning that hand to hand (weapon to weapon) combat was the primary means of warfare. When you are in a battle against hundreds and thousands of people, that could last anywere from an hour to many hours, conservation of strength is what's going to keep you alive and able to kill.
A modern day illustration would be fighting a group of people. If you have to go through 10 to 20 guys, hitting each one with maximum force, how strong are your strikes going to be by the time you get to the last one?
Besides the fact that strikes done correctly and targeted correctly need no where near full power to incapacitate most foes, strikes done at full power are very lethel and while this was not as great a concern in feudal times, its a very real concern today.
I think that the most skillful way to break something is with the least possible amount of energy. For example a hanging board, breaking it so that the broken piece of the board falls straight down would be the most skillful strike. Breaking it so that the piece flys through the air in a downward arch is the easiest way.
I believe that training to break the greatest amount of material misses out on the whole point of breaking in the first place. It is much more beneficial for students to break just 1 board over and over again, learning how much force is needed, then it is to just sit a stack in front of them and constantly drive them to break larger and larger piles. Breaking a constant amount of material, over and over again until you know exactly how much force should be applied to break it, that is the greatest training in my opinion.
Breaking has gotten labeled as a means of gauging strength and martial skill, but it should never be used as such in a training environment. The one who can break the most is not necessarily the greatest.
I would think the purpose of breaking things in public consists of wowing a crowd and gathering attention. Which isn't a bad thing (as long as spacer's are not used, LOL).
All this being said, there is a very real danger involved in Tamashi Wari. If the strikes are not done correctly bones can be broken.
As stated in the other post about breaking, tremendous confidence can be gained when kids get to break things. And when supervised, the risk of injury is drastically reduced. Statistacally I would bet that most injuries in breaking are due to oversized ego's breaking by themselves on their own and then for of public glorification.
Breaking with Spacers:
Board breaking with spacers defeats the purpose of breaking.
Spacers - even the width of a toothpick - drastically reduce the force required to break the boards (or blocks/bricks).
It appears to the audience as if the breaker has broken much more material then they actually have.
The physics of this was documented in the 1970's by physicists studing the martial arts. How it works is that when boards or whatever are separted by a spacer, the first board breaks, then the pieces of the broken board are propeled in a downward velocity. These 2 pieces of the board hit the board below it at nearly the same time the hand (or whatever striking surface) hits the second board, so that the force of the downward projected pieces add to the force of the strike.
So that the total force exerted on the second board =
Force of strike after breaking first board + Force of broken pieces of the first board.
This effect, of the board above striking the board below, continues like a domino effect throughout the entire stack of boards.
By the end of the break as much as approximately 40% (I'm not exactly sure on the percentage, it was from the article I read, that was about 3 years ago) of the force required to break the boards comes from the force of the board above striking the board below, thus the actual amount of force needed from the strike itself is only around 60% of what it should be to break the boards.
Really, breaking with spacers is like breaking 1 board, then a second board, then a third, etc.. Rather breaking without spacers is really breaking 4 boards (for example). If someone broke 9 boards with spacers, they did not really break 9 boards, they broke a single board 9 times in one strike, which requires much much less force then breaking 9 boards that are all flush side by side.
This makes the strike look much more powerful then it actually is to audiences, in truth deceiving the audience about the power of the strike and the relative effectiveness of the art in question.
Spacers should never be used by any school, they do nothing but puff up the school and have no value in training. They waste wood and other materials. They are in effect a method of faking a powerful strike used by schools of little martial value.
Instead of breaking 5 boards with spacers, just break 2 or 3 without.
OP
OP
Shinzu
Guest
hey Battousai.
thanx for the great info. your knowledge is most appreciated. i was always told that a one inch board can be compared to breaking a rib, and as you progress in the number of boards you could compare them to breaking larger body bones.
i think focus and mindset play a big part in breaking. if the wrong attitude is taken the breaker has already failed.
i don't feel it is a major part in the martial arts. it is sort of an "extra" event that has gained much attention.
i do like to break within my reason but i dont feel it is necessary for training.
thanx for the great info. your knowledge is most appreciated. i was always told that a one inch board can be compared to breaking a rib, and as you progress in the number of boards you could compare them to breaking larger body bones.
i think focus and mindset play a big part in breaking. if the wrong attitude is taken the breaker has already failed.
i don't feel it is a major part in the martial arts. it is sort of an "extra" event that has gained much attention.
i do like to break within my reason but i dont feel it is necessary for training.
C
Chiduce
Guest
I think breaking is an integral part of martial arts training. I also feel that the certified instructor whom is at least a shodan should be able to give basic instruction in the art of breaking. Makiwara training teaches impact properties, discipline, humility, honor , respect, and integrity within the individual. It acts as a guide of purpose for the practitioner to excel in all areas of their respective martial skills. This not only includes punching, throwing, kicking, and striking; but meditation, prayer, and chi circulation & cultivation through proper breathing methods for their particular styles. Finally makiwara training helps the practitioner develop stamina in withstanding the rigors of martial stretching, wich is an art within the martial arts of system. Basic breaking naturally comes from this training. As the makiwara training becomes easier; the improvements within the other areas of the practioner's style become evident. Without this vital tool within the martial arsenal of any stylist, there exists a void of truth within the practitioner of missing out on the wisdom which their art gives as the gift of true virtue! Sincerely, In Humility; Chiduce!
D
Drunken Master
Guest
After passing my 7th Kup ITF Taekwon-Do Grading on Saturday (18th March) I now am learning to break for the next grading.
We use re-breakable boards for this.
Firstly, I know boards don't fight back. Having said that, boards are quite good at blocks.
My opinion on the subject is that board breaking teaches you precision and control and helps to toughen and condition your attacking tool for any attack you may have to make.
Plus, it makes you feel damn good when you break it. kind of therapeutic.
We use re-breakable boards for this.
Firstly, I know boards don't fight back. Having said that, boards are quite good at blocks.
My opinion on the subject is that board breaking teaches you precision and control and helps to toughen and condition your attacking tool for any attack you may have to make.
Plus, it makes you feel damn good when you break it. kind of therapeutic.
K
Kirk
Guest
It may or may not be beneficial, that I don't know. I haven't
trained long enough to be able to look back and think, "Boy, I'm
sure glad I learned to break". But I do know that a lot of m.a.ists
that have been training for a couple decades now complain about
arthritis as a result of it. It may have it's place, but definitely not
the end all be all.
trained long enough to be able to look back and think, "Boy, I'm
sure glad I learned to break". But I do know that a lot of m.a.ists
that have been training for a couple decades now complain about
arthritis as a result of it. It may have it's place, but definitely not
the end all be all.
I've always found the explanation that a 1" board was equivalent to a rib to be laughable. A rib is not a dry, flat, inflexible plane of brittle material. A rib (in a living body) is flexible, with very small surface area, and arched, making it stronger than a flat surface. It takes a lot more to break a rib than a 1" board...especially if that rib is in a target trying to hit you back!
Another claim I've heard is that the board represents samurai armor. Again, dead, flat piece of wood versus a contoured and lacquered piece of amror on a moving target...with sword!
Here's the main reason why I don't see any value in board breaking for martial artists: you don't have to be a martial artist to learn how to break a board. Anyone with an ounce of skill can teach a non-martial artist to break a board in less than a day.
Cthulhu
Another claim I've heard is that the board represents samurai armor. Again, dead, flat piece of wood versus a contoured and lacquered piece of amror on a moving target...with sword!
Here's the main reason why I don't see any value in board breaking for martial artists: you don't have to be a martial artist to learn how to break a board. Anyone with an ounce of skill can teach a non-martial artist to break a board in less than a day.
Cthulhu
D
Drunken Master
Guest
You must be one hell of a teacher. I have been watching people learning to break boards for years now. The many students I have watched have taken many classes to buildup to breaking a think/harder board.
In ITF Taekwon-Do it is a requirement that you break a brick to pass your black belt exam. In much the same way that it takes time to condition your body to break a board, it takes years to condition your body to be able to break a brick.
My school has board breaks required for every testing. (Yes, this means white belts have to break too). For our tests and practice purposes, we use rebreakables. These aren't too far removed from the necessary force to break real boards, but they are slightly harder. For a real board, you can hit in the general vincinity of the boards center, and still break it. For the rebreakables, you need to hit the seam dead-on, or it will completely lock up.
Every year, our school has a tournament within our chain. At this tournament, breaking is one of our events. We have to use real boards, typically pine. Our scores are ranked on difficulty, technique, number of tries for the breaks, and confidence. Our setup is this; below black belts get 4 boards. We are allowed up to 2 breaks, using any number of boards we want in each break, which means we can use 3 then 1, 2 and 2, etc. We can use any technique with the exception of a punch. (too many lower belts hurt their hands in the past, we substitute with palm strikes, instead.) Black belts get 6 boards, and they get to do 3 breaks. The black belts are allowed to do punches.
Every year, our school has a tournament within our chain. At this tournament, breaking is one of our events. We have to use real boards, typically pine. Our scores are ranked on difficulty, technique, number of tries for the breaks, and confidence. Our setup is this; below black belts get 4 boards. We are allowed up to 2 breaks, using any number of boards we want in each break, which means we can use 3 then 1, 2 and 2, etc. We can use any technique with the exception of a punch. (too many lower belts hurt their hands in the past, we substitute with palm strikes, instead.) Black belts get 6 boards, and they get to do 3 breaks. The black belts are allowed to do punches.
Sure, a non-martial artist breaking a board may bruise or skin a knuckle, but they can still do it. The biggest hurdle to overcome is mental...you need to teach the person to strike through, and not at, the board. This is the hardest part. If you can train a person to do that, then it is relatively easy to train a non-martial artist to break a single 1" board. Then again, I would train them to do it with a hammerfist, since teaching someone how to punch correctly can take a lifetime 
Cthulhu
Cthulhu
OP
OP
Shinzu
Guest
breaking does teach concentration an focus. if you are not totally committed to breaking an object you are less likely to break it.
for our black belt test you must break a cinderblock.
it also teaches you hand/foot and eye coordination.
for our black belt test you must break a cinderblock.
it also teaches you hand/foot and eye coordination.
I think our teacher basically said the same thing, arnisador. Breaking boards or whatever looks impressive, but isn't terribly difficult to learn. I'm sure it does require some training, physical and mental, but it sounds like something anyone could do if they really wanted to; that it's not a really special skill. I guess in one sense, there's no need to learn it because it's supposed to be relatively easy to do (I don't know first hand), but OTOH the training required to do it may be beneficial, especially for the mental aspects. Physical training is fairly obvious, mental training less so, so if you have something that helps the mental training it could be beneficial. I don't know, maybe I'm just rambling.
T
TLH3rdDan
Guest
personally i agree that board breaking serves no real purpose other than a confidence builder and a flashy show for demonstrations... as far as comparing boards to bones it cant be done even in comparing two different people you can have different bone densities so you can say that 1 1" board = 1 rib or what ever bone you want to say... not to mention the fact that was pointed out earlier that bones are not dry and brittle... as far as rebreakable boards go ive seen more people injure theirselves on those things than on bricks... plus after time the rebreakable boards eventually begin to get easier to break... as far as teaching someone to break a board ive taken non martial artists and taught them how to break boards in less than 30 minutes so no it does not take years of training to accomplish breaking...
Klondike93
Master Black Belt
Iv'e used the rebreakable ones and they're ok, for a while. In TKD we would break boards for every test, and when you got to black you had to break two roofing tiles (that was fun) and four boards.
The tiles with a hand technique and borads with a kick.
The school I teach at now, we feel it's more important to have endurance so we do rounds, sparring and on the bag.
:asian:
