Punch Question

I try to make sure that just because I think something is bollocks, I make sure rather than just assuming, so....

Long, long time ago, I was a guest in a class and there was air-punching going on, so I was inclined to discount what was said. But I don't know everything so I'll ask, just in case....

I was informed that a strike would be (in some manner I cannot grasp) harder for being snapped back rather than pushed through, ie that air-punching/shadow boxing technique (presumably snapping back from a point a bit behind the target rather than on the surface) somehow can generate extra power.

I can't see how pulling a strike off the target can make it hit harder, but maybe I'm wrong. I'm not though, am I? This is bollocks aint it?

total bollox mate!

When shadow boxing (or punching the air) I really don't think its advisable to snap your punches out fully, injuries WILL occur

Yes, MJD. I was also led to believe the same!!

I was told Snappier punches = Harder punches, I don't know what the rationale behind this was.

Could be he was talking about the 'The Impulse-Momentum Change Theorem', of which an explanation can be found here, using boxing as an example.

http://www.physicsclassroom.com/Class/momentum/U4L1c.html

I wouldn't be fully extending my arm right enough into thin air, not very good
for the joints!!

MJD,

Just something to think about...

what about a whip - or, if they're illegal in the UK, how about the old wet towel flicked at someone in a dressing room? You think it would hurt more if you flailed with it i.e. "pushed it through" or if you snapped it back?

Stockwhips thrown out i.e. without snapping back on the handle wrap around someone. Real damage is done when you snap it back.

As for extending your arms...nope...never taught, especially when "air punching." You ALWAYS keep a slight bend in your elbow to avoid hyperextension aka "tennis elbow."

If you're not going to snap your arm back...what are you going to do with it? Leave it out there?

Re boxers (and I have boxed professionally)...IGNORE what they tell you about punching as bugger all of it applies to bareknuckle work. The padding in their eight to sixteen ounce gloves negates the effect of snap punches. With bare knuckles it is extremely effective.

Nick

PS: The "snap" punch still makes about 3 inches of contact/penetration before being "retracted"

PPS: There are two main types of impact in karate...snap and thrust. Snap is used on targets such as the groin and oft times the head. Thrust is necessary when you hit the body because the clothing - much like the padding in a boxing glove - will absorb the snap otherwise. Snapping tends to knock people out, thrusting tends to break things.

The specifc example, as I recall, was throwing a double palm heel strike to the collarbones. I wanted to drive through with bodyweight transfer before retracting, and was told that I'd get more 'power' by striking and snapping back to guard pretty much instantly I hit the target.

I'm still frnakly baffled how you can deliver more impact by pulling off the target rather than trying to ram your strike through it....?

Adding to this...and taken straight from the link provided by Monty (thanks Monty)

Thus, to minimize the effect of the force on an object involved in a collision, the time must be increased; and to maximize the effect of the force on an object involved in a collision, the time must be decreased.

snapping the punch back is therefore maximizing the effect of force on an object.

and with regards to padding in gloves....

Padded dashboards provide some give in such a collision and serve to extend the time duration of the impact, thus minimizing the effect of the force. This same principle of padding a potential impact area can be observed in gymnasiums (underneath the basketball hoops), in pole-vaulting pits, in baseball gloves and goalie mitts, on the fist of a boxer, inside the helmet of a football player, and on gymnastic mats. Now that's physics in action.

Also...consider this...

If you ram through the target will your target move backwards? (A lot of very ignorant people assume that if you hit someone, and he travels backwards it is evidence of a good punch/strike)

If he does...then a percentage of your force was used to move his mass and not cause damage. I'm not a scientist so excuse the layman's language but, if you had pushed your target, and not struck them they would travel backwards even further. In other words, the "pushier' your punch, the less "punchier" it is.

If on the other hand, you hit him and he stands there, all of the energy "dumped" into the target and none was used in moving him.

Again, apologies for the layman's terms

Nick

Shite...I just realized this was Dave's forum...sorry for chiming in mate.

Nick

Yeah, I get that - you're trying for what physicists call Impulse (force in zero time). What I don't get is the idea that by hitting just to the target and snapping back off it you can deliver more than by by bodyweight transfer into the target.

Effecitvely, I was wanting to smash my battering ram at high speed into the target and out the back, and I was being told that I could hit harder by delivering a sharp tap with it instead... essentially hitting at the same speed but whereas I wanted to allow the victim's body to brake my strike to a halt, the instructors wanted me to use my arm to stop its own forward motion.

Same strike up to the point of impact, but I just can't see how me pulling back once contact is made is going to make for a better strike than allowing all the force I've developed to go into the target.

As I see it, I generate the same energy both times and hit with the same kinetic energy (1/2 x mass x velocity squared) but in one case the victim gets all this energy. In the other case some of it is dissipated by me pulling back the strike.

Assuming I don't begin pulling back until I'm actually in contact, the initial strike arrives the same in both cases, but after that I'm actually removing some of the energy of the strike by pulling it back before it's stopped by the target's body...?

Obviously, the faster you deliver the energy, the more damage you do because a slower delivery allows nearby tissue to flex and soak up energy, and gradually the whole body to be pushed back. A faster strike delivers its energy before the target can begin to move away and therefore increases local tissue and bone trauma... I get that bit.

But.

Once that initial split-second of impact is over, if you're pulling back then that's all you get and whatever energy wasn't dumped into the target is now partially lost because you're applying a rearward force to the impacting object.

If it's allowed to go in, then the remaining energy is dumped into the target - less efficiently than at first impact, but it's there all the same.

My pleasure Nick.

It’s all about displacement, if 100% of the target absorbs 100% of my energy, we have a 1:1 ratio and this is a push, however if 5% of the target absorbs, say 50% of my energy, we have a 10:1 ratio and we have a strike. Due to the smaller area absorbing a greater amount of energy the strike is more powerful. Instead of being pushed back by the strike, the target deforms in a very specific area.

Monty.

I tend to use the target to provide the rebound, like bouncing a ball.. Granted there isn't as much rebound!!

The hard bit is judging when the strike becomes a push I find and you will lose some energy, but with the local displacement and the power ration I reckon it's worth the trade off...

MJD
Im with you on this one, it sounds like the punches you are describing are like the ones a kareteka would land in competition or those that sport martial artsits throw!
They might cause a bloody nose but unlikley a KO.

In boxing the punches are 'snapped' to ensure you return to your defensive position, and also the extra snap (and twist of the wrist) must be aimed beyond the target!

The punches you were shown i assume were 'pulled' once they reached the target?

I get that. My problem is this - the initial impact is the same in both cases, so the same damage is done.

But if you pull the strike off at first impact, that's all you get. If you let it go in and come to stop naturally, you get a bit more.

To put that another way: My fist is moving at the same speed and has the same velocity in both cases, so delivers the same amount of energy to the target in both cases (I'm discounting here the possibility that a 'deeper' strike might have more energy due to bodyweight transfer)... in one case I then apply a rearward force and pull the strike out, in the other I allow it to expend all its energy in the target and THEN retract it.

What I can't see is how I'm better off without that extra energy going into the target. Yes, it may push the target but only AFTER the same initial damage has been done...

Aha... Monty you're talking about what I wanted to do - let the opponent absorb the whole blow and rebound from him, rather than pull it out myself before it'd delivered all the energy I'd supplied.

Si5 - yeah, exactly. These guys wanted to start snapping back at the surface of the target rather than driving into it.

I'll let this explain as it says it better than I can!!

The Effect of Rebounding

Occasionally when objects collide, they bounce off each other (as opposed to sticking to each other and traveling with the same speed after the collision). Bouncing off each other is known as rebounding. Rebounding involves a change in direction of an object; the before- and after-collision direction is different. Rebounding was pictured and discussed earlier in Lesson 1. At that time, it was said that rebounding situations are characterized by a large velocity change and a large momentum change.
rebounding

From the impulse-momentum change theorem, we could deduce that a rebounding situation must also be accompanied by a large impulse. Since the impulse experienced by an object equals the momentum change of the object, a collision characterized by a large momentum change must also be characterized by a large impulse.

The importance of rebounding is critical to the outcome of automobile accidents. In an automobile accident, two cars can either collide and bounce off each other or collide and crumple together and travel together with the same speed after the collision. But which would be more damaging to the occupants of the automobiles - the rebounding of the cars or the crumpling up of the cars? Contrary to popular opinion, the crumpling up of cars is the safest type of automobile collision. As mentioned above, if cars rebound upon collision, the momentum change will be larger and so will the impulse. A greater impulse will typically be associated with a bigger crumple zonesforce. Occupants of automobiles would certainly prefer small forces upon their bodies during collisions. In fact, automobile designers and safety engineers have found ways to reduce the harm done to occupants of automobiles by designing cars which crumple upon impact. Automobiles are made with crumple zones. Crumple zones are sections in cars which are designed to crumple up when the car encounters a collision. Crumple zones minimize the effect of the force in an automobile collision in two ways. By crumpling, the car is less likely to rebound upon impact, thus minimizing the momentum change and the impulse. Finally, the crumpling of the car lengthens the time over which the car's momentum is changed; by increasing the time of the collision, the force of the collision is greatly reduced.

MJD

But my leaving it on target till it stops you've spent more time on target which equates to less force not more.

All I know is this...I've hit people with both and the snap punch does way more damage.

We had a huge fight one night at Monash Uni in Melbourne. We had gone to rescue one of ours who'd been ganged up on by some students. We got into a running battle with a horde of students and I was fighting beside the "rat pack" (all the full contact fighters). Whereas they were knocking people over I was knocking people out.

I also noticed years later on the door that the big guys hitting would cause bruising, broken noses and split lips etc...all very superficial. At about 1st dan level I'd gone beyond this and was breaking jaws and knocking people out. By third dan I was shattering jaw bones (multiple breaks with one punch) and my body shots were rupturing spleens and causing internal damage.

Noel Hattwell was about the "snappiest" fooker I ever knew (and he hated full contact stuff) and he used to knock out five people with five punches (you can read about him on my forum somewhere)

The snap is not done, nor is the retraction started, before you make contact. As I mentioned above, I still go two to three inches of penetration and then retract it. The mind game I play is I want to pull it back twice as fast as I threw it out.

Nick

Following that analogy, I come up with this:

One car is stationary. One crashes into it at a given speed.

Case 1: The rolling car is free.
Case 2: The rolling car is on the end of a Bungee Cord of Doom which is just long enough to start slowing the rolling car as soon as it hits the stationary one.
Case 3: Same as 2, but the cord is not replaced by a steel cable that will yank the moving car to a halt as soon as it touches the other.

Now in all three cases the initial impact is the same, resulting from the car's mass and velocity. If velolcity is low we'll get a 'pushy' impact, and if it's high the impact will be sharper. But it's the same in all three cases.

Now, my brain tells me that in all cases you'll get an initial very high impact damage, but:

Case 1: more damage as the car ploughs into the target, but falling off fast as the target is crumpled and pushed away.
Case 2: Falls off faster due to force pulling it away.
Case 3: Initial impact only.

I can't see how the taget could be more damaged in case 3 than in case 1, given that the initial imact is exactly the same in all cases.

try hitting a punchbag and snap your punch off it..what happens?
Not a lot
Now hit through the target..what happens
yep the bag moves

So whats better?
yep thats right through the target

I take your point Nick.... but I wonder, did your shots arrive at the same speed as those of the full-contact guys, or were yours going faster? Faster dump of energy = more efficient, I get that.

It's just that my physics degree can't accept the idea that you can deliver more energy with a strike to the surface then pulled off rather than a strike into the target... I will happily accept that you can deliver a better shot than someone else though - is it perhaps that your snappy strikes are moving faster, which is a whole different question and one that I understand completely.

I've watched lots of guys push a bag about and make it swing, and I know that's not nearly as good as making it quiver. Ie impact rather than push.

What I can't grasp is how, as Si5 says, a fast shot to the surface and pulled back achieves more than a fast shot deep into the target and THEN pulled out when it's spent.

Ok...

then you come over here for "wet towels at dawn"

You get to hit me with your towel with all the follow through you want.

I'll get to hit you by snapping mine back.

Yours will tickle me...I will take pieces of meat out of your body.

a towel is not an arm!
Arms are solid, muscled and controlled by the person doing the stike!
A towel is an inaminate object designed for one specific purpose, NOT for striking.

I bet you have to roll your towel up (twist it around) a bit before you flick it to make it heavier and more controlled?

Its not an analogy that ends itself to punching

Also an arm has the advantage of bodyweight behind it, a towel flicked does not!
If you threw a palm strike in the manner suggested, you would merely cause annoyance, yet if you drop step or at least throw it piston like a boxer this will have greater effect