Self-Defense and Safety Tips:
High Kicks - November 2003
Self-Defense Tips by Alain Burrese
High
Kicks
I written about high kicking before, but here are a couple
things to think about regarding the topic.
First, I know high kicks can work in a real fight, someone on
this list has posted that he has used them, and I have seen
them work first hand. However, I still teach and
recommend that you do not kick high in real fights for a
number of reasons, including:
1. As previously posted, clothing and being cold can
make it more difficult to kick high, thus making what is
easier for you to do in the training hall, more difficult on
the street, and therefore being a riskier technique.
2. The higher your foot is off the ground, the more
likely you can lose your balance and end up on the ground
yourself. This can happen a variety of ways, one of
which is having your leg grabbed. Higher it is, the
easier it is to block and or grab at times. Again,
nothing is certain, just going with the odds. With your
leg high off the ground, you also present different targets
for your opponent that are not there with your feet on the
ground.
3. High kicks take much more skill and training.
This is more of a reason I don’t teach them in
Streetfighting Essentials and Attack Back seminars and
products. You can learn low effective kicks much easier
than high kicks. Because low kicks are safer to execute
as in being less risky to you, easier to learn, and take less
time to become proficient in, as well as being easier to
execute under high stress, they are better to teach those not
learning a martial art, but learning street defense.
I am not against high kicks if you study an art that includes
them, and you spend the time needed to become proficient in
them to use in an actual encounter. They can be used.
However, you can learn low kicks and other street techniques
such as I teach in Streetfighting Essentials and Attack Back
more quickly and become proficient in their use more quickly
than you can the high kicks. That and the fact that some
people, due to certain physical limitations, will never be
able to achieve the effectiveness with their high kicks to
pull them off in a real fight, low kicks are what I recommend
for actual combat.
The most bang for your training buck when it comes to real
fights are the simple, effective basics. The more
complicated techniques are fun to learn, and will work once
you have spent the time to become proficient in their use.
(and that can take some time) And even then, the
experienced martial artist and fighter will often resort back
to those simple basics when a fight occurs.