Importance of Speed in Martial Arts

Series Summary

Speed kills! This has never been truer than in the martial arts. All the greats, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Bill...were known for their great speed. Now that you have perfected the front, crescent, and round house kicks and mastered the straight, reverse, and one-inch punches, learn how to deliver them so fast that your opponent will never know what hit him. In this free video series, expert Michael Lewis will guide you through a series of drills that you can leverage to improve the speed and accuracy of your martial arts skills. Michael's drills cover a variety of areas including seeing, hearing, and feeling as ways of detecting speed. Michael also illustrates how not to "telegraph" or reveal when you are going to throw your punches and kicks.

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Michael Lewis with Yeshua Ryu on behalf of Expert Village. Today, we are talking about speed drills. Speed is key when you are doing any type of martial arts activity. Whether it is sparring, in your katas or self-defense techniques, speed is very, very important. One of the most basic principals in martial arts is that you not only work on your power, but also on your speed. It does not really matter if you have a super powerful punch, if you are not quick enough to land it. So speed is key and one of the top priorities in martial arts. Now, when you are sparring and your opponent has his hands up you must pay attention. The first thing that your brain must process when training for speed, is that it must 'see' the technique that is coming at you. When your opponent throws a punch, you first have to see it coming. The next thing that your brain has to do is that it has to recognize what that strike is. It must realize the fact that it is a threat and that you have to block it. Then you have to react to it and your brain has to choose how to react. You have to make a bunch of decisions in just a few split seconds. When he throws that punch, I am automatically going to block this way, up towards my head where the punch is thrown. I will do that because this is how I have been trained to block that strike, over and over again, so it becomes a reflex. However, if he throws a straight punch towards my head, I will turn and block a different way. This is how speed can benefit your martial arts training."