World Of Swords

Kicks are one of the best and most powerful weapons you can develop. Not only are kicks cardio intensive, giving an instant sweat during a work out, but they are one of the most powerful weapons you can have in a fight. After all, most people don't know how to use their legs, and if you do, instant advantage.

Of course, kicks take a little extra hard work if they are going to be great. But if you take your time and do learn the types of kicks in a certain pattern...you can have power busting kicks of the first magnitude. That said, let's go over the proper order of kicks.

The first kick is merely standing and doing the kick. You don't have to have a stance, you can even put your hand on the wall, and do them at a moderate and easy on the body speed. The idea here is to look at your body examine how it has to move to generate efficient and effective kicks.

The second kick is going to be done from stationary stances. Take a kick like a simple front snap kick, low level to begin, higher as you get better, and learn how to apply it from the rear leg while standing in a front stance. Go through all the stances you know, one by one, kicking with the foot you are not standing on.

The third kick is to use your weight leg for the kicking. This means you kick with the leg you are standing on. Again, go through your stances, but this time figure out how to hop so that the leg you do not have weight on replaces the leg you are standing on, and the leg you are standing on does the kick.

The fourth kick is to explore the direction you are kicking in. This is going to require some quick contortions of the body. Simply do the third kick, described in the last paragraph, but this time kick first north, then set up and do the kick to the west, then the east, then the south.

Now, there are a few things you should remember as you go through these four stages. Don't be one of these people who do ten kicks per kick and then quit. Do a hundred kicks, three hundred, even five hundred kicks per kick.

The idea is to develop your legs so that they are as light and easy to use as your hands. So concentrate on learning how to relax while you do your kicks. Soon your kicks will be second nature, light and easy, marvelous little things of quick flick, and yet able to instantly end any fight.

Gina Carano put womens MMA on the map, but Cris Cyborg Santos may have become the sports first dominant female champion by virtue of her overwhelming TKO victory in the main event of Saturdays STRIKEFORCE event. Cyborg simply was too physically strong and her punches too powerful for Carano, who fought valiantly before succumbing to a barrage of ground and pound punches at the end of the first round.

Before a near capacity crowd at San Joses HP Pavilion, Carano and Cyborg made history as the first women to headline a major US mixed martial arts event. Cyborg entered the cage first to a mostly negative reaction, stopping along the way to shadow box and throw kicks on the entrance ramp. The crowd went nuts for Carano, who was accompanied into the arena by Randy Couture who trained her for the matchup.

Despite the fight being scheduled for five rounds of five minutes each, the women set a frantic pace from the opening horn. Cyborgs size and strength advantage was apparent from the outset, as she landed an immediate flurry of punches before taking Carano to the canvas. Carano landed in top position, but quickly found herself in trouble as Cyborg worked for a kneebar and then a heel hook. Carano was able to extricate herself, and get to her feet but Cyborg took her back and immediately took her down again. Carano landed in top mount, however, and was able to score with some big punches from the top. Inexplicably, she backed off and let Cyborg get to her feet instead of pressing what may have been her best opportunity to win the fight.

Carano was able to land a couple of effective jabs on the ensuing standup exchange, but Cyborg caught a body kick attempt and quickly closed the distance again. Cyborg once again took her opponent to the mat and after an unsuccessful armbar attempt mounted Carano and began a brutal punching assault that eventually forced the stoppage.

Despite Cyborgs triumph the most dominating performance of the evening belonged to former DREAM middleweight champion Gegard Mousasi. In his first fight at 205, Mousasi destroyed STRIKEFORCE light heavyweight champion Renato Babalu Sobral via TKO at the 1:00 mark of the first round. Mousasis victory wasnt a shocking outcome, but the utter ease with which he handled a tough, experienced and well rounded opponent in Sobral was stunning and evoked comparisons to recently signed heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko.

Earlier in a card full of decisive finishes, Gilbert Melendez became STRIKEFORCE interim lightweight champion with a third round TKO victory over the double tough Mitsuhiro Ishida. Melendez will now face Josh Thompson to unify the belts once Thompson is medically cleared to resume fighting.

First, you can't simply know about the True Martial Art, you have to experience them to really know them. To know about is like wondering and fantasizing, to know is to actually do. It is the difference between talking about the word 'wet' and actually jumping in the ocean.

Thus, if you read books about the martial arts, if you watch movies about the martial arts, if you talk to people about the martial arts, it doesn't work. The only thing that works is to actually go to a school, a dojo, and experience them. To put on a karate gi or kung fu uniform and step onto the mat and find out how they really work.

Interestingly, they don't work the way they work in the movies. Bruce Lee makes it look so cool, but he had two arts, one was a movie art for the camera and creating the WOW in the audience, and the other was designed for combat. These two arts don't even resemble each other, they are greatly different.

When you step onto the mat for the first time you will find you are entering a wonderful new world. You will have butterflys in the stomach, you will actually be a in a state of awe, and you won't know what to do. You will learn how to put on the uniform, bow, and how to conduct yourself in this strange, new world.

The fun starts when you learn your first moves. Everything you do is going to seem so totally odd, but it is really just unfamiliar. You'll do everything wrong, make all sorts of mistakes, and totally misunderstand such simple concepts as right and left.

Eventually, you'll be able to do those techniques, and you'll face off against a real opponent. Oh, Lord, you have to actually block and hit somebody, and throw them to the ground! How in heaven's name are you going to do this without looking like an idiot?

Time moves along. You practice, and persist, and things start to make sense. The techniques and forms become understandable, approach second nature, and are even able to be applied in the great chaos of freestyle.

Of course, the most important lesson has already been learned...you won't learn anything if you don't step forward. What's that old fable...a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. And the step you took, into the school and onto the mat, will end up being the most significant and important step you will ever take in your life, for this is the step that brought you discipline, good health, confidence, and the ability to take on and defeat any problem in life.