Conditioning the fists

Hi!

Thanks to the good response last week's post had I am happy to give you the follow-up on that.

Since I got a suggestion to start with hands I decided to break that up into three parts, being one for knuckles, one for the other parts of the hand that we use to strike and then lastly, developing the type of grip that is an attack in itself.

Those of you who do boxing most likely know that the reason boxers wear gloves have nothing to do with hurting the other guy less. I mean come on! Get serious! Why would a sport where you can win by knocking the other guy out care at all about making punches less painful...? :D

The reason why boxers wear gloves is that a person's skull is actually very hard and can actually break the bones of the hand when you hit it with your fist.





Besides that, fighters in the China and Okinawa of old knew very well what the value was of having one's bones harder than those of your adversary. Sure- a punch in the chest can wind a guy, but what if it can separate the sternum from the ribs and disable him right away... That would be like being... I don't know... a living weapon, right?




On the more compassionate side of things, a warrior monk would use the ability to disable an adversary with one punch to end the fight before it escalates to the point where someone might or have to get killed. I mean- you can get the picture...

Guy attacks monk, monk punches the guy once to make him fall down on his back- probably too winded to get up right away. Monk says "Buddha bless you" and walks away...

Guy still lives and has gained the knowledge that it is a bad idea to mess with monks.


Whatever your reason for wanting an Iron Fist- you have to understand that it does not come overnight. To be frank- I can dent oil drums and break ceramic tiles now, but still can't break bricks- and I have been at this for 16 years now...

I have taken a look at the methods used by Karate and Kung Fu and have come up with these guidelines that can be applied to more than one style, type of equipment and environment.

1. Toughening the skin and the bones:

Weird as this may sound, Kung Fu seems to be more concerned with hardening the bones than the skin on the knuckles while Karate is famous for its knuckle callouses.

Which of the two you are training for really depends on how you apply contact to the knuckles.

Guitar players do not normally have deadly spear hand fingers, but we know that the findertips on their non-dominant hands have really thick layers of hard skin. These fingertips are the ones pushing the guitar's strings tightly against the fret board for long periods of time on end.

Similarly, push ups on the knuckles do not produce any impact or shock for the bones to absorb, but they do tell the skin on the knuckles that it is going to need to get thicker to keep protecting the bone underneath.

Any kind of impact should start out with padding. In Karate we have the makiwara. I have found that a normal punching bag actually works really well. I am especially fond of a heavy bag.


2. Gradual progression:

Shaolin's Iron fist has these steps:

1. Knuckle push-ups

2. The telephone book/ several layers of cloth/ paper against a wall (yes- the telephone book is quite a modern addition to an age old training method.)

3. Sand bag.

4. Bag filled with iron ball bearings (about the size of buck shot pellets. Come on!- Otherwise you might as well go punch a kettle bell!)

5. Trees, wooden posts and whatever else you feel you can take.

Now- different people have different rates of healing, so an exact time period for each step can't really be set for everybody. To be safe, however, I'd say that a year of continuous training at each step ought to do before progressing to the next.


3. Don't start with putting your body behind the punch.

This is a huge mistake when it comes to conditioning. Sure- it is good technique for kata and fighting to put the hip into it and to drive the fist right through the target. I can guarantee you, however, that if it comes down between you and that tree trunk about which one is going to break it will not be the tree trunk.

Still- introducing a fair amount of impact to the fist over time will build up to the point where a couple of hard objects can be hit at full power without injury. One needs to have patience, though.


4. Take time for the bone to heal.

I give my hands a space of 6 days in between to heal. The process of hardening bone acutally involves making small cracks in the bones (yes- that is what happens when you punch stuff!) and then letting those cracks seal up again with stronger bone tissue. Chinese ointments or medicinal wine that get applied through the skin after submerging the hands in warm water serve to help the body's natural healing process. If you do not have these things submerging the hands in warm water still help a lot and open hand qigong movements help prevent arthritis from setting in at a later stage.

Believe me- that shaking in your fingers after a session on the makiwara or wooden dummy is a sign of nerve damage.

Relax, though- keeping the hands and fingers loose and flexible with massage, stretching and whatever other means will ensure that your hands remain good for more things than just hitting.


I know we don't all have wooden dummies or punching bags, but these guidelines can be applied to whatever you may have on hand where you are.


Now that today's post is done with I also would like to thank Martial Arts Forums for having been the primary forum on which my blog posts got shared. I don't really know when this shutdown is coming, but when it does I will still be going strong under my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Something tells me the Wenhsiuquan Facebook page is long overdue anyway...

Dan Djurdevic, Jackie Bradbury, Randy Brown, Silatku Keluarga Hasdi, Colman Fink and Sensei Ando- I know where to find you out here on the internet. :) I really hope to hear more from all of you.

Until next week- Keep on training!