Are boxing, MMA and kickboxing unique in terms of the way each style deploys hand strikes?
Yes.
Ben Edwards and the Subtle Art of Striking, Part One
Ben Edwards is, without a shadow of a doubt, one of Australia’s most exciting – and experienced – combat athletes. Few fighters are qualified to comment on MMA, boxing and Kickboxing: Ben has excelled at all three.
T.T: How did you come to striking? Was it through a traditional martial art? How were you initially taught? Did those elements of style change once you started kickboxing?
B.E: I used to punch the shit out of my punching bag when I was a teenager.
The Ups and Downs: ‘Bangin’ Ben Edwards and the Vicissitudes of Fate
This article, originally printed in International Kickboxer Magazine, is republished here as an introduction to ‘Bangin’ Ben. He was recently interviewed for this blog on the subject of striking and the way it differs for MMA, boxing and kickboxing. Ben is a unique authority, having fought at an international level as both a boxer and a kickboxer. He also stands poised in the brink of international competition as an MMA fighter.
The Ritual of Exercise
“Discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.”
Susan David,
During her TED talk entitled, ‘The Gift and Power of Emotional Courage.’
There’s a problem with ‘modern’ gym training: you’re expected to leave your brain at the door. In reality, whether this is a good or bad thing is irrelevant; it’s not actually possible. Your mind has a habit of following you everywhere and demands to be involved in everything.
Box Office Appeal: Mayweather Versus McGregor
Published in ‘Mayweather VS. McGregor: Money Fight’.
“The public has been hoodwinked. It’s the biggest farce in boxing history,” says Peter Graham, former world champion heavyweight boxer, kickboxer and mixed martial artist.
ABC FM: Do Combat Sports Encourage Violence or Teach Respect?
The Principles of Striking 4: Knees and Elbows Draw the Arc of Your Strikes
What’s the essential difference between a jab, a hook and an uppercut? It’s the same difference between a push kick and a round kick, believe it or not.
The Principles of Striking 3: Your Hands Travel To and From Your Face
There are a few reasons for this.
- Your hands are part of your guard. If your hands aren’t in contact with your opponent’s body, causing pain or manipulating their guard and expectations, they should be on your face. You can’t get hit if your gloves are in the way. Simple.
- You’re far more accurate if your punches issue from your chin. Some people prefer to guard higher, keeping the hands near the top of the head for better coverage and effective use of the forearms for blocking. When you punch, however, lower the hands to your chin. Wild punches coming from your chest are going to be all over the show, as futile as trying to hit a pigeon with a roman candle.
- Lastly, yet of equal importance to the first two points is that if your hands do nothing other than travel to the target and then back to guard, there is little for your opponent to see and little indication that it’s coming.
The Principles of Striking 2: Rotation
Question: Why are fighting sports split into weight classes?
Answer: Because your weight is the engine of your power.
To put it simply, a one hundred kilogram person hits you with one hundred kilos, provided that it’s properly recruited.
The Principles of Striking 1: Breathing
Striking is the art of generating as much power as is humanly possible to incapacitate an opponent. This is defined by the equation, ‘mass times speed over distance’.
Simply put, the variables involved are related as follows: how much the weapon weighs, how fast it travels and finally, how far it travels.
The greatest fighters are masters of this equation and are constantly mitigating and modifying it to get the knockout. After all, there’s no room for discussion when your opponent is laid out on his back.