Kicking Speed

[Brokenmace]

Does anyone have any training drills to increase kicking speed? I already do frog hops, but that just increase the contraction rate of my quads. I need to increase the speed at which I lift my knees. Any suggestions would be very appreciated!

[SlashBurn]

Hope this helps

I use a length of elastic (its the medical kind) wrapped around my foot and tied off on something immovable. Then I go at it working sets of my kicks. This really seems to help me especally by adding restance to the recovery which seldom gets worked in bag work. Also you might what to look into some more plyometrics. They are a great way to increase your explosive movement which will directly boost your speed. You say you do frog hops but have you ever tired box jumps? You need two strong boxes that are of a good height (say anywhere from 12 inchs up depending on your skill level) you set them up stand on one and then jump off. As soon as you hit the ground you absorb the fall and spring back up landing on the other box. By the way never do this on a hard surface because it really is bad for your joints if you do. Hope that helped!

[shredder]

Lifting your knees is more of a hip flexor issue than a quad issue. One way to work these would be to try some hanging knee raises. Hold a weight between your feet or use ankle weights, and lift the knees high. The abs are involved isometrically.

Also try skipping rope while taking high, fast steps.

Plyometric drills and explosive lifting are usually good for speed.

Examples of the former are:
Vertical leaps, side jumps, sprints (40 m and 100 m) and fast twisting situps on an incline - http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/...tingSitUp.html

As for Slashe's suggestion, instead of boxes you can jump on stairs or bleachers as well. Or you can step up and down quickly instead of jumping. A way to add resistance other than an elastic band would be to work on movements in the water.

If you have a weight routine, do a couple of sets of squats, lunges, leg curls and calf raises. This will give your lower body a balanced attack. Abductor/adductor machines aren't a necessity, but it helps to be flexible in those areas.

Flexibility is always useful. Here's a great stretch: http://www.exrx.net/Stretches/HipFlexors/Lunge.html

[crazyjoe380]

your trainer can hold up the thai pads..

and work you out like a what!!

that works well..

[shredder]

So there's this Life Fitness Multi Hip machine that you can actually do single knee raises on, although the one I tried needed one more notch to adjust perfectly to my height.

Here's a picture:

[Builderofmuscle]

You should do circuit between leg exercises and kicks. For example:
Squats - 1 set of 10reps
Front kick - Continous for 30 seconds, as fast as possible with left leg
Leg Press - 1x10
Front kick - right leg 30 sec

That would be one circuit for fron kick. You can rest 1 minute after all four exercises. Than do another circuit for Side kick, and round kick, and whatever other kick you want to work on. You can subsitute the lunge for the legpress.

It's also important to work your lower abs. You can do ab work after the circuit training.

[Guest]

Kick low only. Never higher than groin height.

1. These are much quicker as they travel much less distance.
2. Your balance is hardly compromised.
3. Your leg is not available to be caught.
4. All the best targets to kick are low anyway.

The downside is that they are not really part of many sporting activites (being too dangerous) and do not look impressive, therefore not as good for the ego.

Mind you, I forgot that most people who say they want effective self defence really don't mean it. They want to look cool and win trophies..........

[terry]

I think it is useful to look at what other sports do for developing leg speed. For example:

Power lifting: speed squats, speed deadlifts (50% of maximum, 3 sets of 10 with each set of three timed and ideally under 2.5 seconds)

Track & field: High knee spints, band assisted sprints (behind car)

Bicycling: riding for long period in low gears with fixed gear bicycles, velodrome sprint training

Muay Thai: Thai pad combinations with 10 kick combinations (combination speed), aggressive pad holder counter kicking (recovery speed), sparring (initiation speed and elmination of telegraphing motions). And, of course, jump rope.

T

[Builderofmuscle]

Low kicking is good for self defense, and pracical for sparring. But in most tournaments they don't allow you to kick under the belt. But if you're training for the streets, you want to focus on the thighs and bottms of the knees.

[Mayur]

Hmm......I use a straight and simple method

Work on form first

Work on speed next

Work on power at last

Bring the three of them together and u got a good technique.

For speed -

Assume a fighting stance and kick with any leg to face height, when ur leg returns to the ground, keep ur weight on the back foot and land on the balls of ur feet and bounce it back up immedieately to shoot out another kick.

Keep doing this till ya are exhausted

Extra notes -

Kick at face height, if u practise speed at face height then ur low kicks will become naturally faster

Remember to bring ur leg back to the ground completely the purpose of this exercise is to improve the speed in which ur foot reaches it's target

Hope that helps,

Mayur B