The Power of a Proper Fist👊

The fist is the favoured tool of many martial artists.

Thor’s father Odin said it best:

“It’s power has no equal! as a weapon to destroy, or as a tool to build.”

The fist can either protect you as part of a block or take down; or cause massive damage as a strike.

However, before we get there let’s look at how to make the fist!

Step 1: Curl the fingers as much as possible

Step 2: Continue to curl the fingers against the palm; making a ‘thumbs up!’👍

Step 3: Tuck the thumb against the fingers (the thumb should sit roughly on top of the index and middle finger.👊

Voila! The perfect fist, right?

Almost… let’s make sure of a few things to make it the ‘perfect’ fist..

First, make sure the front of the fist (Jung Kwon)(정권) is flat; none of the fingers are sticking out more than the others.

Second, we want to always have our wrist (Son Mok)(손목) straight at all times; whether blocking or striking.

Now let’s start with proper fist positioning during blocking. As we know Taekwondo (태권도) is strictly a self-defence martial art. Look no further than any of our Poomsae! Each Poomsae begins with a block; you would be hard-pressed to find a poomsae that starts with an attack!

While blocking, we are flexing our arms which will cause tension in our wrists.. the problems that may arise including tilting our wrists up or down. This weakens the structural integrity of the block, so make an effort to have a continuously straight line from the elbow to the front of the fist.

Now onto punching!👊

When we punch we want to make contact with our two foremost knuckles. These two are the largest and strongest of the knuckles.

These two large knuckles also line up with the arm bones when it is fully extended, able to deliver and also take the force of a punch.

“For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” – Newton’s third law of Motion.🤓

We all know that when we hit something, we exert a force… and that same force will be exerted on us.

So we don’t want a glass cannon! However-If all we are doing is punching the air, it doesn’t matter too much…

Most of us want to make our martial arts training practical, so we need to be able to defend ourselves, and our loved ones without the risk of injuring ourselves in the process.

Lastly, a few questions to answer:

“My fist shape is not straight, how can I fix this?”

I had this issue when I first started training Taekwondo.. My master had a great approach to fixing and strengthening the fist:

1. Hit something hard hundreds of times (like a block of wood with your belt wrapped around it) to strengthen the outside of the fist.
2. Hit something soft hundreds of times (like a punching bag or pad) to strengthen the inside of the fist.

“My wrists hurt whenever I punch something!”

Try a wrap while practicing punching your bags, blocks of wood or other things. Sometimes we just need to strengthen our wrist and wrapping it with sports tape or wrist wraps can help at the beginning.

You can also look up ‘Wrist Exercises’ and practice what you find!

Fist and foremost, let’s all train hard!

See you on the mats.👊