Hip Strength and Sidekick

The execution of a good side kick is more difficult than is at first imagined. Stretching alone will allow the foot to be placed in the correct position. However, without adequate hip strength then this placement cannot be maintained. The inversion of the foot to produce balkal requires that the invertor muscles (on the outside of the lower leg) are stretched and that the anterior tibialis muscle (shin muscle) is strong. The abductor muscles (gluteus minimus/medius) must also be strong to facilitate the elevation of the leg to the correct position. If the hip is not placed correctly then the load is commonly moved onto the hip flexor muscles. This is an incorrect position. It is almost certainly a strength problem that ensures an incorrectly executed kick.

Normal growth development strengthens the front of hip by everyday activities - walking up stairs, running or even just walking. The outside abductor muscles require specific training to increase their strength. If this is not done then even if stretching is carried out the kick will still be done wrongly because of hip weakness. To complicate matters, the centre of gravity must not be allowed to move too far back from area above the hip of the standing leg.

Stretching and strength both assist in keeping the upper body nearly upright to move the centre of gravity forward. Leaning backwards to increase kicking leg height destabilises the entire body with the result that power is greatly reduced and aimed along the wrong vector to approach the target. Strength and flexibility are both critical for this kick to be powerful. The rotation of the standing foot to point the toes away from the target not only ensures that the hip is put in the correct line (shoulder/hip/leg must all be in a straight line to the target) but also pushes the entire body forwards by almost one foot length at the moment of foot/target contact. Sparring side kicks may make contact to score points with but the real test is aiming at a small target accurately with the correct part of use. It really shows up the difference between a student with flexibility and strength and one who has neither. The kick in this latter case is generally very poor.

All skeletal muscle at all times is under some tension - tonus. What we know as tension is generally consciously applied. This is deliberate muscular contraction to cause movement of a limb to achieve some end result. At the other extent of range of motion the muscle can lengthen to its limit then the sensation of tightness and the accompanying pain is felt. What is happening is the brain is issuing nervous impulses to cause a contraction because the muscle is reaching its length limit. This is the length that the brain remembers as allowable. Stretching is simply a matter of resetting this remembered length to a longer muscle. Muscle without the brain intervening would be completely free moving with no tension. Obviously a muscle could not function without tension as no contraction would be possible.

Imagine a Velcro arrangement. The little hooks of one piece attach to the surface of the other and "stick" together. Muscle does something similar but it is initiated by the brain. The two contractile proteins attach and lock onto one another. Then by a series of detachments and attachments but further along the muscle, like the hand over hand pulling in on a rope, the muscle will shorten. In the opposite direction and still using the analogy of the rope, by playing out the rope, the muscle is lengthened.

What is important to understand is that it is the length that the brain remembers as full length determines how long the muscle can be before it begins to contract and so not lengthen anymore. Stretching is retraining the brain to recognise a longer muscle. This is mostly under unconscious and involuntary control unless you are very well trained in recognising and feeling your muscles - kinesthesia. In other words you can only learn to relax so much. Once you realise that stretching involves not the muscle but the brain then the whole picture changes. All stretching exercises are geared to retraining the brain to remember new information. Information that has not altered from normal growth and development. This also explains why once a stretched state has been achieved almost no loss occurs if stretching is stopped for months or years. You will not have to start again. The new information regarding muscle length is stored in the brain forever unless it is changed. Some loss will result as a muscle not used at its new length for sometime will naturally shorten to maintain the expected tension - also new information. It is very complicated in detail but quite simple in the overall picture.