I learned this type of kick some forty years ago in Kwon Bup Korean Martial Arts. This was the forerunner of modern day Tae KwonDo, and the unfortunate truth is that these kicks aren’t practiced anymore. Why, I don’t know, because this type of kick is the hardest kick, the fastest kick you will ever see.

I call this move, no matter what type of martial art you do it with, the pop kick. Whether you do a wheel, a side, or a snap, the basic principle doesn’t change. You replace the left foot with the right foot, and place the right foot on the target…this all has to happen simultaneously.

By same time I mean that the right foot and the left foot begin motion at the same time, and the left foot hits the ground at the same time the right foot hits the target. By doing it in this fashion the whole body compacts at the same time, then the whole body expands at the same time. This causes a very pure explosion in the tan tien, which is a point a couple of inches below the navel, which is the energy generator for the body.

In addition to the purity of explosion you will feel in the energy center, which will tend to concentrate energy in the kick, you will experience a sudden weight on your standing leg at the same moment you experience weight in the leg you are kicking with. This sudden weight tends to make the explosion of energy very precise, even as it increases the violence. This will really increase the energy of your technique.

If you are doing this technique with a snap kick, make sure you get the knee high enough so that the foot comes in straight, and doesn’t slide up the front of the target. If you are doing a side kick, make sure you turn the hips so that the weight of them really slams into the target. If you are doing a wheel kick, make sure you get the hips up high enough so that the kick can fly in truly horizontal.

The fourth technique would be a spin pop to the rear, and uses the side kick. You would practice all four kicks against a wall, learning how to lift legs simultaneously, and place the feet on the wall and the ground at the same time. You don’t have to hit the wall with power, save that for a bag, control will actually give you more power in the end.

We used to have all kinds of entry moves to make these kicks work. We would angle our stance as we slapped the attacker’s hands, and the we would do it subtle, and then be in the kick before the target knew what we were doing. As we invested time and sweat the explosion would get more pure and more full of energy.

Make sure you use it in a variety of stances, and you will have a truly expanded arsenal of martial arts weapons. This is a great kick to practice, and it is born of the successful union of karate power and TKD kicks. Japanese martial arts or Korean martial arts, this is the fastest kick, and the hardest kick, and perhaps the most effective kick I know.

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Tags: Self Defence