Performing the Side Kick in Kempo Karate

Video Transcript

"Now when you get advanced, it all happens in one fluid motion. You'll notice my foot as I am kicking, it turns. That allows me to get the proper snap. If you don't turn the heel, what's going to happen is, you're going to hurt your hip. At low levels, it's not going to hurt. But if you try kicking at head level, you're going to be, it's like pulling a wishbone apart. It's not, it's very painful. So if you practice proper body alignment now, usually holding on to a wall is good. You can in fact, even turn out your foot before you kick. Kick low, get that movement down. Train your body to just think of these movements naturally without thinking, and then it'll come. Repetition is how you build power and technique. Now I'll do it with my right sides so you can from the other. From the back it's the same movement; up, out, back and down. You notice too, that I'm kicking to the middle; it's the most effective target zone. Well, actually the most effective target zone would be taking somebody's knee out. You kick straight down to the knee, you break the knee, they can't chase you because they can't run. But in a sparing situation or tournament situation, where you have a target zone, you hit them in the middle. It's like breaking a board. Right? You hit right in the middle, you'll fold them over. Bam! It's harder to get that much power with the head level kick because you have to really reach for it. You have to really, really reach up and even then you have to be super flexible to get it up that high. That takes a lot of years of practice. So the next kick that we're going to teach is the back kick, what to do if somebody's behind you."