Flying, Spinning And Jumping Kicks: Are They Practical?

Martial art styles like tae kwon do, tang soo do, wushu and some forms of karate instruct their students on how to perform flying, spinning, and jumping kicks. A martial arts movie without a good number of these kicks is boring. Flying, spinning, and jumping kicks are what make martial arts movies fun and demonstrations exciting. Tournament competitors pepper their forms with a series of these kicks along with breath taking acrobatics. While these kicks are very flashy, the reality is that they have very little practical application.

When martial artists are young, they all want to learn flying, spinning, and jumping kicks. It's a great way to impress those around you as you "wow" them by breaking boards with a flying side kick. A martial artist first learns his or her basic kicks in a standing position. Eventually, as the basic kicks become natural and can be executed with ease, the instructor will incorporate more dramatic kicks into the class.

Jumping kicks require the student to execute one of the basic kicks while jumping up from a stationary stance. Flying kicks involve getting a running start and execute the kick in mid-air. Spinning kicks are executed while pivoting on one foot and whipping the entire body into the direction of the target. All of the basic kicks can be executed in with either a flying, spinning or jumping variation.

For self-defense purposes however, these kicks are very impractical. Remember that a street altercation is very stressful and chaotic. What works best on the street is something simple and direct. If you want to learn how to defend yourself on the street, spend less time training flying, spinning, and jumping and more time with some good hand techniques and low kicks. As far as your upper body is concerned, simple elbow strikes, eye gouges, palm heel strikes and a little boxing is what I recommend. When it comes to your lower body, knee strikes and low kicks to the knee, instep, groin, and stomach are much more effective than a jumping spinning anything.

Fancy kicks are full of problems. First of all, they lack power. Secondly, flying, spinning, and jumping kicks require more physical preparation, so they are easier to telegraph and allow the opponent time to react. Kicks thrown in the air lack the stability of a lower kick and the kicker is much more vulnerable to falling to the ground. As far as older students are concerned, training in this manner can lead to a lot of injuries and a short lived martial arts career.

If you're looking for practical street survival techniques, then stick to the basics. Save the acrobatics for the tournaments!