Board Breaking!

[Wolfman08]

OK, in all seriousness, I think of it as serving a couple of purposes. First, is that it helps to improve technique and accuracy, as you have to make sure you're at the proper distance and using correct technique to most easily succeed. Secondly, I think for many, its provides the psychological boost of additional confidence that what they're learning can actually do damage. In all reality, a board's not terribly difficult to break, but doing it successfully can overcome mental hurdles for many.

That's just my 2 cents, I'm sure other's have their own reasons for why they think board breaking is important though.

Quoted for win. The only thing I can think to add is that speed breaks really do test your speed, and water breaks are just plain evil.

What's the big deal, it's just a little board. As long as you're not sleep walking, it should be a piece of cake.

Alot of it has to do the physics of the break. Doing one board (for the average person) isn't a problem. Push on it and the thing will break. Two boards with spacers is basically the same thing. Two boards without spacers becomes a different animal all together. At the second board without spacers you're basically testing how precise you are, because if you don't hit in the exact right spot, you're not going to break the board. The third board is testing your timing. If you're not extended at the right time, you're not going through even if you're hitting the right spot. At four boards you're basically testing everything you have. Are you hitting where you're aiming? Is your timing right? Are you moving fast enough? Is your attack moving in perpendicular to the target? Is your technique correct? After the fourth board you aren't generally going to be demonstrating anything new, except for how dumb you are (it starts to get fairly risky in the long term after four). People break glass, ice, roofing tiles, cement blocks, coconuts, baseball bats, and numerous other things, but all basically test the same thing as a regular break, or are just the person doing them trying to show off (like the guy breaking glass Ps1 mentioned).

Can you test the same thing on a heavy bag? No, not really. Bag work develops the needed skills for breaking boards, sure, but it does not test them. With a bag you can lie to yourself and say you hit more accurately then you really did. You can hit and push instead of actually hitting. And you generally can only measure your progress on a heavy bag by how long you can go on it before your knuckles start to hurt. Which might be the same amount of time as when you started if you continuously hit harder.

[MasterPain]

Poor trees....

[Wolfman08]

Unless you recycle them. One of the guys in my school does alot of wood carvings when we practice board breaking. Another student has a bonfire fairly regularly, and she spends alot of time breaking boards to supply her oven.

[MasterPain]

Unless you recycle them. One of the guys in my school does alot of wood carvings when we practice board breaking. Another student has a bonfire fairly regularly, and she spends alot of time breaking boards to supply her oven.

Good ideas.

[DWx]

Poor trees....

Use re-breakable boards. Think they're harder anyway because they won't break unless you hit the line. Can also get data from them on exactly how much force is needed to break them. I think its pretty awesome to know that I can get 200lbs of force or whatever out of a technique (I might be a bit weird though )

[Wolfman08]

Don't they get easier after a certain number of breaks?

[DWx]

Don't they get easier after a certain number of breaks?

true, but you have to really break them a lot of times first. If you're using the same board over and over again in one session they do warm up too and get a little easier to break... still its not that much easier, you still have to have power to do it.

[sensei8]

Personally, I don't like re-breakable boards because I don't believe in them. I believe in boards however. Yes, re-breakable boards do save one a lot of money over one's martial arts life, but I'd rather not save on what a real board(s) will provide for me, and that is my satisfaction.

Do re-breakable boards have the same resisting effect as a real board(s)? No, I don't buy that for one second because boards, one from another, don't act the same because they are products of mother-nature.

[DWx]

Do re-breakable boards have the same resisting effect as a real board(s)? No, I don't buy that for one second because boards, one from another, don't act the same because they are products of mother-nature.

They don't have the same resisting effect but they are still a very good way of testing the amount of force and allow you to be a lot more quantitative about it. I break a lot using both wood and boards and re-breakable boards are equally as hard if not much harder. You have no leeway with the accuracy. You have to hit the centre because they will not break at all if you don't. With a wooden board you've got maybe the centre 1/3 of the board to strike and it will break. Wood is also so inconsistent. Yes re-breakable boards degrade over time but with wood a lot will depend on the tree growth (how close the grain is together), how much sap, how much moisture, what part of the tree it came from (curved grain or straight grain), type of wood etc. With re-breakable boards you can work you're way up the different grades too so you start with an easy one and then end up with multiples of the hardest ones.

[sensei8]

There are two camps...One camp is for the re-breakables and the other camp is for wood, I'm of the camp that favors wood. I've not meet a re-breakable that can challenge me as wood can. The inconsistency in wood, as DWx has mentioned, is what attracts me to wood over re-breakables. Both teach accuracy, to hit only in the center, but in wood, it'll break wherever it breaks and not like the re-breakables, and that also attracts me.

Breaking wood excites me! There's nothing like the sound of a wooden bat coming in contact with a baseball...give me wood in both venues.