Speed

 

 

"Relaxation is the key that unlocks speed and power." 

-Bob Orlando

 

"Natural movement is the shortest way to an effective result. Like the way the water runs, it always finds the right way." 

-Vladimir Vasiliev

I'm a little hesitant to write on this subject specifically; after all it is one of the trade secrets of my martial arts. We all have them, but a lot of the time practitioners can be hesitant to give them away. I am happy to however. That's the point of this blog after all.

Here is an example of my speed:

It is also a somewhat complicated subject.

How does one become faster? There are methods, and I will duly list them below, but it goes beyond any sort of physicality.

At my height I could do about eight punches in a second. Each to be defined as a 'real' punch had to be able to break at least one one-inch thick cinderblock. Nowadays I can only do about six on average, with a max of about seven. I expect in the next few months to go back up to eight. That's where I cap myself, because at least for me the muscles in my arm begin to tear, giving a red inflamed look to them. All this says is that if you stop practicing it vigilantly you will begin to slow down. That is the nature of atrophy with our abilities.

This is a drill I developed, quite by accident, but I have seen it work very well. Point in fact, it has never let me down.

You see speed is something of the mind. The faster you can think, the faster your body can respond and act on those thoughts. Every thought causes a physiological change to the brain's neural configuration. The faster you begin to think concretely, the faster you will find the mind can develop to keep doing so, and then more and more so.

What the above drill does is two primary things; it forces you to practice doing a full punch- from the body to full extension and then back to the body.

It also teaches your mind how to collapse thinking. Instead of thinking 1-2-3-4 as you do each punch in the chain, you instead collapse 1-2 and 3-4 to 1 and 2. Doing this will help you punch faster. If you have to think about each punch as you do it this slows you down, so instead you reassociate your mind's thought process to align two punches with a count of one. Eventually you are not thinking of doing two strikes, instead you are doing one iteration which is composed of two strikes. The two come naturally at that pace. I do this even when I practice six punches or eight strikes. It goes to 1-2-3, and 1-2-3-4, until I can think 1 and it means four punches will happen. 2 four more will.

I compress the time it takes to count, linking each strike with the thought of counting. So the thought of 1 may on its own take as long as a second to fully form, but when I do the strike at a speed of eight punches per second, it takes 1/8th of a second to fully form.

When you do such a fast sequence of strikes it is called a flurry.

This is a video where I go deeper into detail concerning how to flurry. For the demonstration in the video skip to 1:42.

Here is an example of someone who has realized the potential speed has in the martial arts.

And another.

 

But keep this in mind; the key to developing speed to be 'faster' than others actually has nothing to do with them. It has everything to do with you developing how to be faster than you were. Only then after that is done can one factor others into the equation. Because the ultimate goal is how to apply that speed in our techniques, and concerning self-defense to be faster than the other.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The picture honestly has nothing to do with developing speed save this; it took one second to take this photo. In that time Blanco was humorously picturesquely hit 8 times. Now imagine there was only person doing all those different attacks. That is completely possible.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"What it does determines what it is."  

Bob Orlando

 

"When you are content to be simply yourself and don't compare or compete,

everybody will respect you."

-Lao-Tzu