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We were working on blocking a front kick in class on Monday, and yesterday I woke up with my shins bruised to hell.
Now, I have *always* bruised easily, so this isn’t really the fault of the exercise, just the fact that my shin was impacting the leg of another person with some force. And, it’s sore, and painful to touch, but it’s not enough to keep me out of class tonight or anything.
What I’m wondering is… does the tissue \”toughen up\” after doing this a while, or will I always bruise like this when I spar? Is there anything to *do* for this other than pad up?
If I can \”toughen up\” the tissue so that it doesn’t bruise as easily, I don’t want to keep that from happening by padding up and being a wimp. However, if I’m going to bruise up like this every time regardless, and the only thing to be gained is pain tolerance, I think I’ll invest in some shin pads. I’ll have PLENTY of other opportunities to learn pain tolerance. 😆
Also, does anyone know of anything that encourages bruises to heal faster? All I can think of is gentle massage to stimulate circulation. Cold helps with the pain, but I don’t think it helps with healing. I’ve tried some of the bruise fade ointment in the past, and it was a waste of time and money.
When you block the kick move into it. This will soften the impact. Also your shins will toughen up.
Lotar
bruising tendencies can only be reduced so far.
You can’t condition the walls of your blood vessels.If you’re like me and have more fragile veins,they’re going to break and bleed when an impact against them occurs.I did stop taking my daily low-dose aspirin pill (for people over 50) due to lthe level of bruising.I still bruise if I’m whacked a good one.
I have trained a lot of Muay Thai and my shins have taken some beating in the past.
My shins have grown a certain amount of tolerance.
Boxing linament is a god send at helping with bruising, rub on the effeted area before and after training.
Re:
quote \”scrapper\:I have trained a lot of Muay Thai and my shins have taken some beating in the past.My shins have grown a certain amount of tolerance.
Boxing linament is a god send at helping with bruising, rub on the effeted area before and after training.
Dare I ask what \”boxing linament\” is? I’m having visions of the nasty stuff my parents used to rub on my chest from Watkins when I had colds as a child. 😆
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quote \”jjbklb\:bruising tendencies can only be reduced so far.
You can’t condition the walls of your blood vessels.If you’re like me and have more fragile veins,they’re going to break and bleed when an impact against them occurs.I did stop taking my daily low-dose aspirin pill (for people over 50) due to lthe level of bruising.I still bruise if I’m whacked a good one.
You know, I completely forgot that I’m taking a dose of aspirin every day now to combat the effects of the Niacin therapy I’m taking. I bet that is contributing as well. I’ll try stopping it and see how that works.
My family has \”fragile capillaries\”, so my mom & my sis also bruise like the dickens. At least I don’t have a clotting factor problem like my sis… that would be a *real* problem! 😆
I didn’t think there’d really be anything to condition for that, but thought I’d see what experience other people had with the bruising.
\”When you block the kick move into it. This will soften the impact. Also your shins will toughen up.\”
Also, be sure to point your toes \”up\” as much as possible. This flexes the muscle around the tibia (shinbone) and while it may not help tremendously with bruising, it does take some of the impact away from the bone itself, resulting in less pain.
My sisters and I bruise easily too. I also have a tendency to be slightly anemic, and I do find that taking extra B12 and iron supplements helps slightly.
I’m not wearing a skirt or shorts for awhile…. we had Knee Fest in class the other night!
\”Also, be sure to point your toes \”up\” as much as possible.\”
I was always taught to point your toes down when blocking a kick? Have I been taught wrong?I always block with my toes down. Toes could get broke if they are up .
I suppose people block different depends how you are taught. Just had a thought though!!! Blocking a front kick with your shin! Thats a new one to me.Lotar
conditioning
you can condition your shins by kicking thai pads if you have someone to hold for you, or by kicking the bottom of the thai heavy bag, (the long heavy bag that almost touches the floor) Usually the filling has settled into the bottom and it gets pretty solid. Do hard round kicks to the bottom area and in a couple of weeks your shins will start to get solid. If you wanna be hardcore about it, you can go kick banana trees, or the legs of tables and chairs around your house, but i wouldn’t recommend it.
CORRECTION :
Apoligies – Somehow I completely missed that we were discussing front kicks specifically – When I suggested toes up, I was thinking of blocking \”roundhouse\” kicks, esp. to the legs — I have never been taught to block a front kick in that way. That being said, I haven’t been taught to block front kicks with the shin either — Maybe just not advanced enough ?.?.? Either way, as I said in the earlier post, if you point the toes up, the muscle \”gathers\” around the bone, somewhat negating the bone on bone pain that can occur.
Anyway, sorry for the confusion.
😳
As far as the technique, I’m probably not describing it correctly. The attacker is delivering a front kick to the groin, and the defender is doing a sweeping type maneuver to deflect the kick. So it’s not a ‘squared off’ block. But it does mean my shin is meeting his shin with some force, and I look like someone beat me with a stick. 😀
Its good to acquire the skill of picking off round kicks with the point of your knee as opposed to taking it on the shin.
I’ve not tried \”boxing liniment\”, but such products have a long history in both eastern and western combatives. I started doing a lot of research on this when I was looking into the Western science behind dit da jow, the kind of liniment used in Chinese martial arts, often in conjunction with the conditioning of the striking surfaces of the body. Different ingredients do different things, but properties include increasing circulation and releasing stagnant blood, cleaning the area to prevent infunction (largely a function of the alcohol, I’d imagine), and dulling or masking the pain through agents like peppermint oil (old timey boxer remedy, I’ve read). Some have properties to callous the skin and such, but I don’t know if these work, nor do I particularly find that useful. The rubbing itself does a lot of the effects, I’ve found, as it sort of massages out the bump and distributes the fluid. The liniment makes massaging a bruise more palatable, in addition to other properties it may have. Dit da jow can sometimes be found in Chinese herb stores, sometimes called antiseptic for western labeling purposes. There’s a thai liniment I’ve heard is popular- I would assume its probably some good stuff because they wouldn’t mess around with it if it wasn’t.
The Thai liniment is also called boxing liniment. I first heard about it when training in Thailand. If you type ‘boxing liniment’ into Ebay you will find plenty of Thai suppliers selling it and the pictures will give you a better idea of what to look for in your own stores.
My Thai instructors gave pretty much the same explanations as above, regarding its healing qualities and I know that after training 6 hours a day for the last 2 months my shins certainly benefitted from having it.
I paid $1.50 for a small bottle in Thailand but everything is a lot cheaper there. Hope this helps.
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