karate strikes: more similar to systema or boxing?

[guird]

I've been walking around with a question that I can't quite answer for myself.

I know of three ways of generating power in a punch, the wing chun way, the boxing way (where the angular momentum of the torso is behind the punch on impact), and the systema way, throwing the arm itself at the target. The last one isn't arm punching, you do use your entire body to throw the arm.

I saw a number of comments in reply to an explanation on systema punching saying 'just like karate!'. Until then I thought the punches generated power the same way as boxing/kickboxing punches, but looking at the movements - especially the horizontal hammerfist strikes- in the katas I see much more in common with systema. For example, when (in shotokan) we perform a hammerfist strike, we rotate our body so that the arm whips into the strike, as opposed to rotating it in the direction of the strike. hip movement for choko tsuki also tends to be much less than for any boxing straight punches I've seen, and the movement feels much more like throwing your fist than driving it.

that said, these punches are somewhat different from the punches we use on pads and to spar (especially sparring punches have a lot of rotation).

It would also explain why we hardly rotate our bodies into hook punches such as in empi.

This difference doesn't seem to be brought up or discussed unless systema is the topic though, so am I perhaps mistaken? is it just some styles of karate?

[Zaine]

I cannot count the numbers of way a punch can be thrown. The short answer to all of your questions I think is "yes."

Vague, I know but it hits it. Punches generate power in a widely varying amount of ways. Some are similar to systema, some to boxing and some to things that are wildly different from those two concepts. Even within one system, as you touched upon, there can be many different ways to the same punch.

So again, the answer to your question is "yes."

[Harkon72]

My answer is that you use your whole body, each element has it's contribution to make, from the ground up, externally and internally.

[guird]

Very interesting take on the question. It makes a lot of sense for multiple ways of generating power to be employed to different degrees in different punches. just like the snap of the wrist adds power, so can throwing the arm.