Knockout of the century! (Nocaute do seculo!)
Awesome! Though brutal, this is a beautifully executed spinning wheel kick. Watch this again, because it is the Platonic ideal of fighting beautifully in a unrehearsed, unchoreographed fighting competition.
High spinning kicks to the head, common to capoeira, tae kwon do, hapkido and certain northern kung fu systems require great skill.
Evolving Martial Artists appreciate this supreme expression of kicking, yet regard it as a stupid self-defense technique. Why? It is too dangerous for a violent encounter when a mistake can have serious consequences.
In TanDao we learn to distinguish between a high probability and high destruction technique when determining which of the multitude of punches, kicks, throws and fighting movements from different styles are truly practical and efficient for real fighting.
This kick is a high destruction technique as evident from this dramatic knockout. Yet fans of MMA, tae kwon do or kickboxing know how rarely this kick connects in fighting tournaments. A right hook or roundhouse kick to the head is statistically far more common. As such, this type of high kick is regarded as a low probability technique. It should be avoided in any serious violent encounter, no matter how skilled you are. By all means, use them for wowing audiences at demos and for movie fights scenes, but for self defense, a wise martial artist will employ high probability techniques all the time.
Keep it simple.
Our theme at TanDao for Evolving Martial Artists is to bridge the gap between modern martial science and traditional martial arts.
This Year of the Dragon, we will introduce fighting techniques that are both high probability and high destruction that are taken from our TanDao Dragon Form.
Keep exploring and practicing,
Lawrence Tan
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Tags: capoeira, kung fu, lawrence tan, self defense, tae kwon do, tandao
Scanning my memory banks (gingko helps)I remember being an excellent kicker during my kyuokushin and tae kwon do days–beginning my training with “no-contact” sparring in which high kicks to the head, “pulled,” scored points. But I soon found that they were dangerous and ineffective in street fights–once I was jumped by three guys during high school who for some reason didn’t like me (hard to believe how anyone couldn’t); they stupidly attacked me in cautious, staggered succession instead of rushing me all at once and knocking me down.
The first guy I nailed with a high, front-leg roundhouse a la Bruce Lee to the head–I expected it to knock him out but it only knocked him back a few steps–then the light bulb went on. From that instant I kicked no higher than solar-plexus level, using front and side kicks to inflict damage, working in close enough on two of them to finish the job with palm thrusts to the head area. The third guy ran off. Suddenly I felt like Mas Oyama.
As I’ve commented before, the best street defense training I got was participating in Kyuokushin full-contact, gloveless sparring–no contact to head or throat/neck but full power to the body; grabs, traps, sweeps, etc. As a kicker it taught me to lower my kicks, employing them to “cross the bridge,” inflict damage and get in close for reverse punches, hammer fists and elbow strikes.
High kicks in general, but especially spinning kicks, make no sense in a self-defense situation: one is not wearing a loose-fitting gi, may have boots on, may be on uneven pavement, or icy conditions with bad footing, at night with bad lighting–and a decent opponent will be moving and may catch a high kick, spilling you to the ground–a disaster.
But in a dojo or kwoon setting, they sure do impress the chicks!