Actually, your bones do harden from kicking with them. You body will start to thicken bones as its senses stress being placed on them.
For instance, gymnasts have some of the densest bone structures of any athlete. Even though they're tiny people usually, I understand that they are heavy for their size.
Check the Archives for the article "New Thougts on Shin Conditioning" for more details.
Khun Kao
The other factor you need to take into account, that apart from the forces of chaos making all the wrong things happen at the right time (and the very effective thrusting block) is that these guys are heavyweights. Now I know that bones tend to have strength related to mass, but the physics of what happened has a lot to do with it. The force and mass of the kicker I'd say has much to do with the break. But as everyone else has already mentioned it was a combination: Big guy kicking hard, perfectly executed block hitting a shin that really didn't have muscular support (I'm with you on that one Brooks) and the impact happening on the central fulcrum point of the bone (If the shin was a seesaw this would be the point of balance).
Pre existing injury, certainly could have been there is no way to discount it. But short of getting a physicians report, bonescans and lots of other things, it's pretty much conjecture. I've only ever heard of a few cases of shins getting broken. I've broken someones Fibula (the smaller bone beside the shin), and I managed to break someone ulnar (in the forearm), but these things happen in Muay Thai, it is a full contact sport afterall. How many Tae Kwon Do fighters have gotten broken feet? How many BJJ players have gotten wrenched shoulders, popped elbow and the like? The risks are always there.
The guy kicking is Richard Paans (something like that anyway,don't really remember) and is a decent MT fighter from Holland.It was a kickboxing match,not MMA
and Paans has fought MT plenty of times,so I think he's used to shin kicking.
IMO,it was just a freak accident caused by bad timing and maybe a pre-existing injury.
"
OK, I hope you see what I'm getting at. Bottom line, I feel, is that this fighter did not
have Shins of Stone like your typical 16y.o. Thai fighter."
Not to contradict you,Khun Khao,but I thought you couldn't really harden the shins (or any bone),but rather deaden the nerves on the shins so kicking doesn't hurt as much.Any opinions about this?
the one throwing the check or block is lloyd van dams.
don't know who the other cat is.
I dont think the guy kicking was trained as a Thai Fighter. Wasn't this a NHB fight? I think he had little experience blocking or being blocked with the shin and therefore was not conditioned properly.
You're correct, we've discussed this before. There are a couple of factors.
One thing to bear in mind is that this is a rare, freak accident. This kind of thing does not happen very often. I have heard of 4 instances of this occurring in the 10 years that I've studied Muay Thai.
My feeling is that for one, the kicker is not Thai. What I mean by that is he is obviously a Westerner. I don't know of any Westerners who train the way Thai's do. A young Thai kid first starts going to the boxing gym/camp when he's between the ages of 8 and 12. They start the kid off kicking the heavy bag all day long, every day, for YEARS ON END!!! This is how the shins get conditioned... period!
We Westerners don't have that kind of training program. We start off going twice a week for an hour or two. We may kick the heavy bag for a little while each week, but nothing like in comparison to the Thai's. In the Western world, Muay Thai is a hobby. In Thailand, its your life!
OK, I hope you see what I'm getting at. Bottom line, I feel, is that this fighter did not have Shins of Stone like your typical 16y.o. Thai fighter.
Next, if you watch the way the opponent blocks the kick, you'll notice that not only does he block with his knee (as he should), but he actually thrusts his hip forward a little bit into the kick. Watch it slow and you'll see what I'm talking about. He didn't *just* raise his leg.
The double impact mentioned above increases the force/stress placed on the shin exponentially! Now, the final thing is this.
When you throw a MT-style roundhouse kick, the leg is relaxed until just before it reaches the target. You have to stiffen your leg and foot to prevent injuring them. Because the knee block was thrust forward a little bit, it seems to have caught the kicker BEFORE he tightened up. That means that all the leg muscles were still relaxed and therefore NOT supporting the bone structure and NOT absorbing the impact.
Therefore, his leg broke.
*DISCLAIMER- All the above is just my opinion. Because I don't even know who those two fighters are, and I'm not a trained sports medicine practitioner, I can't give you any cold, hard facts to back up what I say.
Khun Kao
i don't think it's a thing that occurs alot, but it's happened more than once.
maybe the kicker had a preexisting fracture that he was unaware of.
Really its a case of a freak accident. He probably just caught the shin dead centre and that caused the snap. It didnt particularly look like a solid block. Just an average check.
Yours,
Beev
Ok, I'm sure you guys get this question EVERY week in the kickboxing Q&A, but I don't get a chance to get over here as much as I want.
I'm sure everyone knows the video where the guy breaks his shin on the other guys leg check.
Everytime this topic comes up in the UG someone asks why it happend, then 20 people say "got milk." I don't buy that.
There is so much stupidity on the UG (maybe in the world overall), but you guys seem really knowledgable here. I checked the archieves but still didn't find any info.
So, in your guys opinions, what caused the break? The best explanation I've heard is that the guy kicked more with the side part of his shin, however I don't believe this to be the case either.
So, what caused the break? Does this happen much in Muay Thai? Anyone know the names of the fighters or good websites mentioning what happend?
Oh, and one more thing. What's a cut-kick? Is that the samething as a leg check? Any good websites on leg checking?
Thanks for bearing with me and I'll try to make it over here more often.
That does make sense. If you want to break a stick, the middle is where to put the preasure.
So what part of the shin are you suppose to hit with? The part closest to the foot?
As for checking, I'm guess the part closest to the knee is what you ideally want them to hit, at least thats what works best for me.
"How many Tae Kwon Do fighters have gotten broken feet?"
Hehe, my left foot is a bit sore, but not broken. I don't know how I landed wrong, but when I threw a roundhouse during a drill on Saturday it just totally went nuts hurting, and then it went away that day and came back after I got home. Hopefully it'll be totally gone by next week when I head off to the US Open, cause I really think I'm in over my head there, even in perfect health.
But anyway, as to this whole thread, I think it's pretty simple: The center of the kicker's shin hit the blocker's knee. However hard you may think to make your shin, put it straight up against a knee like that and the knee will win every time. I don't think it's rocket science. It's like breaking a stick by hitting it over the edge of a table. I think it's a rarity because an impact between those two surfaces like that is a rarity. But if guys were kicking knees with their shins constantly, I think this would be more common. Big if though.
Thanks a million everyone.
"1. The knee should point towards the incoming strike, not towards your opponent."
This will help me more than you will ever know.
I agree, that last point is one of the most important lessons in using the leg shield/knee block. Your knee must be raised to meet the incoming strike (which will be a kick 90% of the time).
If you raise the knee so that it is pointing at your opponents body, then the kick can strike the outside of the leg on the muscles, which will hurt you, not him. AND, the force of the impact can cause you to turn sideways, opening up an angle for your opponent to exploit.
Good Luck!
Khun Kao
I've never been taught to step in on a leg check, but it sounds like a very good tactic. I'll have to experiment on it with my students when our classes start back up.Thai's do have leg jamming techniques. This involves timing a Teep (Push Kick) to either your opponents chest, hip, or thigh before the kick reaches the target. Not only do you jam the kick, but you can very easily knock your opponent on his ass! The raised leg block/leg check/knee shield (or whatever you want to call it) is extremely effective, and as you stated, can be used in a variety of fashions. You can even use it to block head kicks! A few points to remember about using the leg shield:1. The knee should point towards the incoming strike, not towards your opponent. 2. The foot of the check leg should not be tucked. It should be perpendicular to the floor from your knee.3. Ideally, you want to block with the knee, or the very uppermost portion of your shinbone, which is going to be denser than your opponents striking surface. There are exceptions to this rule, of course.Cut kicks (submarine kicks) and leg checks are two different animals. See below:
Here is a picture of a Leg Check (fighter in Blue) vs. a Cut or Submarine Kick (fighter in red). Guess which one won? LOL The Cut/Submarine Kick is a very lowline kick aimed below your opponents knees designed to take them off of their feet.Now, as far as "pebbles", I know a lot of people who have reported having that condition. I never have, though I've had my fair share of knots on the shin. I'll leave comments on that condition to someone who has experienced it.Khun Kao
Ive just watched the video again. I retract my last opinion, there was quite a heavy thrust into the block.
I have been taught before that a good way to nulify a low kicker's strategy is to work in hard, thrusting type shin blocks. Aiming the top of the shin (the area just below the knee) at the bottom/centre of your opponents shins.
I have used the strategy before now with mixed results because different people have different levels of shin conditioning.
Yours,
Beev
Thanks for the info guys.
Glad to hear that its not commonplace in thai boxing, however since many in MMA are training with limited amounts of actual thai boxing work (since they have to work on everything else as well) this may raise the possibility of seeing this? Hope not. I remember in Rizzo vs. Barnett they crashed their shins I believe from both throwing low kicks and it made one of the loudest popping sounds I heard in UFC. They seemed ok, but of course they are more kickboxers than most in MMA (especially Rizzo).
I've read the archive of the new shin conditioning ideas; very interesting.
Is kind of stepping into your check the proper way to do it? I did traditional point karate but we did leg kicks in it so after i saw the Van Damme movie kickboxer(yeah, i know) a few other students and me started leg checking. I even had our Shihan teach me some leg checks that remind me of like kung fu hand trapping, but with the legs. More like jamming their kick before they get their full momentum forward. Do they do this in muay thai as well?
Anyway when I learned to step into my checks (in a seminar) it was as life-changing as learning checks in the first place. I got my clinched and my feet sweet out from under me alot, and stepping into the checks helped alot to shot that.
Of course I LOVE leg checks, I tend to over use them. I would block stomach kicks with them (or try) or even sometimes punches after one guy punched my knee and their hand swelled up like grapefruit size. Also since few point karate guys had seen a leg check if confused them more than anything and gave me a second head-start on them while they pondered why I just banged my shin against theirs.
Are cut-kicks and leg checks the same? Any good websites on them?
Everyone else have little tiny pebble things floating in your shins? Is that bad? Or just the price and part of the process?
Thanks again guys.