Wen Hsiu Quan

Hi, everyone Recently I have made the fat gathering around my waist my enemy and have kicked my training into high gear to burn as much of it as possible. That is one of the things for which a style with punches and kicks is good for. Personal trainers tell us that to burn fat we have to use as many muscles as we can and focus on large muscles rather than just the limbs. Well- those high kicks don't just come from the legs... In fact- even a simple punch involves the use of other muscles than those of the arm. It was in this heightened enthusiasm that I have decided to shift my focus away from things like turning my leg so that my roundhouse kick hits with the flat part of my instep rather than the edge of the foot on the big toe's side and move it towards hitting and kicking hard and on time. Well- one of the main effects of doing that is that you get faster and strike harder, but the other is that one's technique just does not look as beautiful. This seems ...

Hi! I am glad to say that I have successfully developed the ability to kick my own head height with roundhouse and reverse roundhouse kicks at any time of day without warming up. It took a whole lot of training to get there, though. For years I have been unable to kick high without warming up first. Well... when I was 17 I had no trouble doing it, but then I had to grow older. Still- I have decided that as long as I am training- I can keep pushing until I get it back and I am happy to say that it is back and better than ever, because now I can also HOLD the kick at head height. That is the thing with anyone still actively practicing martial arts- we just have so many more tools available to help us in fights than a person who has just attended a self defense class or two. During my early karate years I have been warned by my Sensei that high kicks are really not suitable for self defence and that we should rather stick to low kicks whenever we have to fight for real...