Paddle Drills

[Superfoot]

Would anyone like to share some interesting drills they perform when utilising the TKD-style paddle targets? Here's some I have used:

1)Angular Push Kick-Spinning Hook Kick

Here, the person holds two paddles in their left and right hand. From a fighting stance, they approach with you with overlapping paddles covering the right side of their pelvis (whilst slowly performing a right round kick). You use your left leg to perform a Lead Push kick, with your foot at an angle of 10 degrees pointing outwards (or however far you wish) onto the overlapping paddles. Dont push too hard, or ask your partner how much force to use.In my opinion it should be moderate. A good angular push kick to the right side of the pelvis should cause your partner to turn their torso to the right and lean fwd slightly. . After the kicking the padded region of their pelvis, bring the lead leg down quickly and perform with your rear leg, a Spinning Hook Kick. As soon as you bring your lead leg back to the floor, your partner moves the overlapping paddles from their right parts of the pelvis to the height at which the spinning kick will be thrown. Discuss this also with your partner.

The purpose of this drill to help you counter a right kick with a spinning hook kick. In short:

i) Kick partners padded right pelvis. They should tilt to show that should they throw a right kick, they cannot throw their hip into it.

ii)Bring foot down, and perform spinning hook kick.

2)Lead Hook Kick, Lead Round Kick

The purpose of this drill is to enable you to utilise a hook kick to pull your opponents lead hand away from their face, and use the opening created to execute a round kick with the same leg to the face.

i) Get your partner to stand in their fighting stance, holding a paddle in each hand. Have them extend their arms so as to mimic the distance between hands in a fighting posture, but also protect them from being hit in the face. With your lead foot perform a hook kick on the paddle they hold in the lead hand.

ii)After contact, with knee still bent from the hook kick, throw a lead round kick onto the paddle which has been designated as the face region. Dont ask your partner to put this paddle over their face, just about 45 cms in front of them. This may very depending on their height.

3)Squatting Spinning Hook Kick- Squatting Round Kick

The purpose of this drill is to respond to an attack that swings with full force to your head region, and you wish you avoid it by attacking the legs.

If your are fighting from an Orthodox stance, this is best to use on a person fighting your in the Southpaw stance

i)From a standing fighting posture, squat and perform a spinning hook kick on two overlapping paddles held by your cross-legged seated partner, just like how Ryu does in Street Fighter, where you press Down and hold Kick. This is intended to strike and sweep the lead leg of the approaching opponent.

ii) After this, two things may happen in a real life situation: either the sweep takes your opponent of his feet and he falls on his shoulder, or his leg is just knocked off the floor, and remains standing.

iii)For the former, use the same leg to perform a round kick in a diagonal motion downwards onto tilted paddles which your partner creates.

iv)For the latter, utilise a Side Thrust kick into two overlapping paddles which are held by your partner to simulate your opponents inside rear knee.

In this series of movement, both your hands should be placed on the floor to help you aid the follow through, and help you stop when ready to perform the next maneuveur. When you chose to stop your spin, allow your kicking leg to keep moving, but only from the knee, so the heel of the kicking foot touches your buttock. Dont keep a straight leg, otherwise stopping to perform the next move will be difficult. From the heel in the buttock, or from an earlier position in the trajectory on your foot, can you then perform the follow up.

In martial arts, it can be argued that the techniques you learn are tools. how you use them is up to you. The purpose of each drill above is just how I visualise their usage. You may wish to use them differently, if at all. I hope I have explained myself well. Thank you for reading. Thanks for any responses.

[pegasi]

How abobut blocking drills? There's a sequence that they go through with the kids at my school, to teach them the basic blocks with both forearms- circle block, high block, inside block, low block, double block. These are run through in this sequence, right side then left side for each block.

The older kids are pretty quick at it, after they've been doing it a while.

I think its a great drill for the kids, to practice on how to keep from getting hit. They don't do it with adults at my school, but it certainly wouldn't be a bad thing if they did.

[yamesu]

Interesting drills.

Ill prob' try some variations of the above mentioned tomorrow.

Cheers.