Power

[RA Miller]

Had an insight a while ago which may explain why power generation seems complex. Here's the current draft of my thinking. Pick it apart. What have I missed?

Power generation is more mechanical than timing and it can seem like there is more to it. There isn’t, there are just more words. Power generation is the ability to generate and transmit force through a technique to have an effect on the threat. There are three aspects to it: Power Conservation; Power Generation; and Power Stealing.

Power Conservation is structure- aligning the bones in the body so that any power generated or stolen is transmitted into the threat with minimum loss of energy. For our purposes, the body is composed of bones and muscle, articulated via joints. Rigid things, like bones, transmit power more effectively than soft things, like muscle. If I push on you with a bone, it hurts. If I push on you with a steak, it hurts less than if I pushed with my knuckles alone.
The first piece of power conservation is to get, as much as possible, a rigid structure between where the force is coming from and where the force is going to. In most cases, generated power is coming from leg strength against the ground. From Newton’s Xth law (equal and opposite reaction) we know that you cannot put more force into the threat than you can push into the ground. Fortunately, since you can jump, that’s quite a bit of force. The reason that a 200 pound person who can jump two feet in the air can not strike hard enough to lift a 200 pound person two feet in the air is because of all the energy lost through poor structure.
Each joint in the power chain of bone between the earth and the force applied to the threat is a source of power lost. Every bent joint at the instant of impact acts as a shock absorber, bleeding off small amounts of energy into their flex and away from the intended target. This power is lost in the bend of the joints and rotationally through the spine.
Conserving energy is as simple as trying to remove ‘slop’ from the technique. Excellent skill at power conservation can allow very minor stolen or generated power to have tremendous effects, as seen in the “short power” of Chinese internal systems.

Power Generation is simply using muscle to create movement. Lift, push, pull. As a coach you need to watch for and teach when students who are using an inefficient muscle group to generate power. Punching using only arm strength is very weak as opposed to using leg strength to put the whole body into the punch or the hip twist to both use core strength and improve structure on impact.
These three muscle groups stack and an officer can use arm, leg and hip power in the same action. Instructor tip: Sometimes having the student concentrate on snapping the opposite hip back is more effective than pushing the same side hip forward.

Power Stealing is using a source outside of yourself to add power to your technique. Two obvious sources are the threat himself and gravity.
If you strike into the threat’s movement you will add the force of his momentum to the power you have put into the system. One of the reasons the Dracula’s Cape IR is so damaging is because it is combining the officers drop-step energy with the threat’s aggressive attack energy through great structure.
Use of gravity is one of the big equalizers. Gravity supplies both free power and speed if it is properly harnessed. Falling is simply faster than stepping.
The drop-step combines these two aspects: the lead foot is lifted suddenly off the ground and the officer’s technique, whether an IR, a strike or dropping into a lock position has a large percentage of his body weight as and un-telegraphed speed.
The specific techniques that the coaches must be able to teach are the drop-step; rising and falling wave action; and dropping into a low position.


Rory

[Bill Glasheen]

From Newton’s Xth law (equal and opposite reaction)

Newton's 3rd law - For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Still working on it...

- Bill

[Bill Glasheen]

This is mostly right, Rory. But there is one element that kind of gets glossed over. The following is ONE way of generating a tremendous amount of power. It isn't the only way, as you have already touched a lot of bases.

The best way I can easily illustrate this is by explaining how the atlatl works. For the uninformed, this weapon was used by homo sapiens for hunting and self-defense much longer than any weapon in human history. In recorded history it was viewed by the Spanish Conquistadors when they approached the Aztecs.

If Montezuma had not mistaken Cortez for the Feathered Serpent God Quantzaquatle, history may have been very different, with the 200 or so Spanish conquistadors being only a footnote in the history of that Nation, foolish invaders who were overwhelmed by superior firepower.

The genius of this weapon was almost completely lost to modern man. Copies of it were designed with a rigid "dart" (the spear that comes off the throwing device), and these weapons appeared as next-to-useless. It's no wonder that modern man dropped it in favor of the bow and arrow, right?

Then a mechanical engineer did the right anthropology homework, and ended up solving the genius of this old weapon.

The mechanical foundation of Atlatl technology is the flexible Dart. Under acceleration by the Atlatl, the Dart flexes and compresses like a spring, storing energy to be used to push itself away from the Atlatl and launching at velocities that easily exceed 100 mph. The first of many improvements to this mechanical system was the implementation of multiple length Atlatls to fine tune the device - longer atlatls tend to increase the system's range. Interestingly, the number pi is found for optimum performance in the Relationship between Atlatl length and dart length.

The great innovation of Atlatl weights in the evolution of this technology bears the mark of true genius. By building flexibility into the Atlatl's shaft and applying a mass to influence the amount of flex during the swing, the energy stored in the spring of the Atlatl can be exactly matched to that of the Dart. This allows for a more efficient use of available energies by forcing the atlatl to push away at the same time the dart is pushing away from the Atlatl, much like a diver pushing away from a springboard platform.

What we are talking about here is some of the details of a concept called sequential summation of movement. With the atlatl and dart, it's about one degree of freedom. With the human body, it's many. The trained athlete (a power hitter like David Ortiz or thrower like Nolan Ryan) learns to take each of these degrees of freedom and use them to create an energy wave that starts at the large muscle groups of the core, and finishes at the periphery.

The final piece to add to this puzzle lies in the dynamic stretch reflex at every joint. An ability to generate a spinal level muscular contraction exists in all of us. The strength of the contraction is proportional to the speed of lengthening of the muscle. Thus you will note that when an athlete jumps to dunk a basketball, the first thing he does is a quick squatting motion. That lengthens the powerful core muscles, and triggers this reflex. The more plyometric training done, the higher the vertical leap.

This spring or whipping power is its own thing. Some techniques tap into it; some do not.

Modern athletes do medicine ball work, classic Olympic lifts, and other open-chain exercises to enhance their ability to generate this neuromuscular power.

It's all related though. The energy wave cannot happen without Power Conservation through the body. But instead of it being transferred through a rigid structure, sometimes the human body transfers and enhances it through a series of neuromuscular (electromechanical) springs. One can also use this whipping power in the Power Stealing concept you referred to. As I learned aikido's shomen ate, it's about receiving that energy in a plyometric fashion and then delivering it back with a little neuromuscular energy added. The faster you lengthen my muscles, the greater the neuromuscular response to your energy.

This gets very complex in action, but it still is simple at its core. I try to explain to people when they generate power that they need to view the yin yang symbol.



As you articulated, rigid structures are needed to tranfer energy. But relaxation is needed as well. Otherwise there's energy loss where one is inappropriately stiff. What should be rigid and what should be relaxed changes by the millisecond.

Thus we have the yin yang symbol where relaxed is one color and rigid is the next. Black swirls into white. But there is no gray.

Hope that makes sense.

Bill

References: www.atlatl.com

[Rick Wilson]

You are so right Rory that power generation can generate a lot of words.

The mechanics of power generation can seem complex until the light bulb goes off and then you cannot see doing things any other way. So what begins as seemingly complex becomes simple.

Here are more than a few words I put together on power generation:

http://www.wilsonkarate.com/power_generation.html

[Sochin]

Hi Rory,

Each joint in the power chain of bone between the earth and the force applied to the threat is a source of power lost. Every bent joint at the instant of impact acts as a shock absorber, bleeding off small amounts of energy into their flex and away from the intended target. This power is lost in the bend of the joints and rotationally through the spine.

I'm posting this up on Chen Zhonghua's forum. I'm sure he says that the space inside the joint is a great source of the power of Chen taiji, as well as the turning of th spine. I often don't understand what he says in hi answers but I'll try and post it back here.

[Bill Glasheen]

Hi, Ted!

Hi Rory,

Each joint in the power chain of bone between the earth and the force applied to the threat is a source of power lost. Every bent joint at the instant of impact acts as a shock absorber, bleeding off small amounts of energy into their flex and away from the intended target. This power is lost in the bend of the joints and rotationally through the spine.

I'm posting this up on Chen Zhonghua's forum. I'm sure he says that the space inside the joint is a great source of the power of Chen taiji, as well as the turning of th spine. I often don't understand what he says in hi answers but I'll try and post it back here.

I don't know about taiji and the Eastern way of viewing this. But Rory gets my engineering mind going when he speaks like this. My brain is modeling with electrical and/or mechanical devices.

That being said, I'm up for seeing how you can take a Westerner's descriptive language, interpret it with an Easterner's point of view, and see if you can make sense of it back in our cultural paradigm. It's sort of like taking a paragraph to Babelfish, translate it to a foreign language, and translate it back again. The exercise is interesting, and occasionally informative. And sometimes it's just plain entertaining.

Looking forward to it!

- Bill

[2Green]

I'm curious if Mr. Miller could could comment on whether a person can strike with more than they weigh: to explain:

If I weigh 150 lb, and I punch with a 2" x 2" surface ( 36 lb/ sq inch let's say), I'm potentially, theoretically delivering about 150 lb into my strike.

Can I even make up the losses to deliver this, or can I even exceed it?

If so, how?

~N~

[Bill Glasheen]

Ted

Just passing a message along from one of our Canadian friends.

- Bill

“he says that the space inside the joint is a great source of the power of Chen taiji, as well as the turning of the spine.”

Some of your friends might refer to opening the qua. (using joint space to maximize extension)

Some of your friends might refer to closing the qua on impact (using joint space to maximize compression)

Some might advocate rotation around the spine, rotation off the front foot, rotation off the rear foot or shifting to a new axis before rotating.(forward momentum on rotational delivery)

Some might talk about spinal whip, some might talk about dragon flow, some might talk about the sequential summation of joints, but at then end of the day those who know how to hit are all saying the same thing with different words. JMO I might be wrong.

Great thread Bill! I enjoy threads on body movement in the martial arts especially when they are delivered with no political or social baggage.

Hey can you ask Ted if he can post a link to the Chen Zhonghua's forums I’m a bit of a fan . Student # 7 trained with him and he hits like a friggin machine!

[Dana Sheets]

People do hit with more force than they weigh all the time.

I think it has to do with how we connect to the ground (or not). My teacher was endlessly telling me that the power in my techniques would come from the ground. He would say "bring your weight into your hands, keep the shoulders relaxed, back, and down and use the legs to drive the power up from the ground"

I think this is the reason why martial artists hit hard in the lab with hundreds upon hundreds of psi in their strikes in somewhat controlled situations like breaking or bags or whatnot, but when a little adrenaline and a few emotions are added into the mix -- they mess with timing and footwork and body coordination - plus add in hitting a moving/non-compliant target - all that power starts to "leak" away.

Rather than looking at pitchers I think it is better to look at quarterbacks that are about to get sacked. How often does "pressure" mess up what could have been a perfect pass? And to turn it into a fight - just have the quarterback "throw" into the attacking linebacker instead of a far-away receiver.

So perfect body mechanics in a fight do require a mind that is unperturbed by the fact that a fight is happening. This is how mushin increases power. If your mind becomes unsettled then the pretty body mechanics fly out the window.

A gun doesn't have to think to fire - it is purely mechanical.

So either we train to become machines (see military and Bill's thread on PTSD) or we develop a mind that can control both the body and the emotions in perfect harmony in the eye of the storm of a fight.

[TSDguy]

According to those power-measuring pads, people can kick with ~ 2000 lbs of pressure and punch with a little less. That's more than you weigh. I can't pretend to understand all the physics, but you can do this because you aren't simply sitting on your target, you're using you're own muscles as well as gravity. If you sprint into someone, you hit them with a whole lot of momentum. As we all know, running into someone still triggers that third law, and you might very well hurt yourself.

Which leads me to, it might be a good thing to add something about hurting yourself in this section? In the first paragraph it very mildly implies punching with a fist to the skull is a good idea. Or maybe you just follow up this section with a section on "safely using power."

[Bill Glasheen]

I wanted others to answer Neil before I did.

Here's a simple answer to your question, Neil. Can you jump? If you can, then you can kick with more force than the force that gravity pulls your weight down to earth.

If you know how to use your body correctly (as loosely outlined by Rory above), then it's possible to transfer that same core muscle energy through your spine and shoulders out to your arms and hands. The action is out your arms to the target, and the reaction is against the earth via Newton's 3rd law (as loosely described by Dana above). You can also build energy up (with momentum) by charging forward before hitting. That allows the accumulation (conservation) of the energy of several leg strokes before you might "joust" someone with your elbow or palm-heel.

Here's an extreme example of putting it all together. Do you think this person has generated forces stronger than that of gravity pulling down on his body?



Now a question for you. Was this a leading question? Rory brought up a very interesting and clever way to put force into technique - by letting gravity work for you. I was wondering if this got you thinking at all.

- Bill

[RA Miller]

Thanks Bill. I've amended the passage to include your insights. It's a better piece.

Neil- I was going to use the jump analogy, but Bill beat me to it. the only thing I would add is that weight by itself is meaningless. No matter how many people tell you that twelve pounds of pressure will break the knee, if you lay a twelve pound barbell on it, nothing will happen. An ounce at a thousand feet a second, however, might take the leg clean off.

Rory

[Sochin]

Hey can you ask Ted if he can post a link to the Chen Zhonghua's forums I’m a bit of a fan . Student # 7 trained with him and he hits like a friggin machine!

OK,

Chen Zhonghua's new forum is a public forum (the interface ***** tho).

http://chenzhonghua.org/index.php?optio ... Itemid=146

No answer yet on my joints / power question.

Who the helium is Student #7?

[2Green]

Thanks both Bill and RA: I'm low on time right now but very interested in this subject.

I will post on my POV/experiences/questions ASAP.


~N~