Garland

I've seen some of these things around that are supposed to count how many kicks you do, break it down into how many per interval of time (1 minute, 30 seconds, 3 minutes, etc) and somehow gauge the power (in psi I think) of your kicks.

How accurate are these things, and would they stand up to heavy thai kicks all day long? I want to try and get one, maybe custom, that would count how many kicks, but only if they reach a certain amount of force. (i.e. gauge heavy kicks only) so that I can make sure I'm not slacking on my kicks when I get fatigued...

I think that this might be a good way to assess how you'd do on a thai test (100 hard kicks in a 3 minute interval, 3 rounds....might mean you'd do okay on a thai test (depending on your trainers...the better trainers will punish you, almost like jumping you into a gang)... having to do 50 kicks and knees with people beating on you).
And, because the test is so grueling...be a good way to condition for fights...to maintain a similar level of kicking endurance and power.

Doing the thai test routine at least once a week would be my goal for going back into fighting, and to see how much I improve over the course of a week, using the "kick and knee" TBA type test as a way to track my progress...(not actually taking the test, but more of like a personal self evaluation to see where I'm at.) But I wouldn't want to worry about being hurt during that type of training.

What do you think?

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homo homini lupus

WildWest.

Perhaps it's just me and I've missed something, but I can't see the point in knowing how many kicks you are doing in a minute/hour/day/year etc. Does it really have anything valid to aid you in your training??
However, I like the idea of knowing how hard you kick and how hard you kick when you are fatigued. I see a lot of benefit in that for sure. It would also encourage you to kick harder as well which can only be good for you. The trouble is it wouldn't take into account your technique as a lot of guys can kick hard but only after they've wound up their leg for half a minute first.

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"Too much weights, not enough speed work"

Garland

Well...continuous hard kicking for three three minute rounds, upping the frequency of kicks would show improvement...and certainly would improve the speed of your kicks. That's why you kick the heavy bag x amount of times...to strengthen your kick, polish technique, and increase speed and endurance. Checking how many kicks you can do (hard kicks essentially mean good kicks with good technique...so long as you don't drop your hands) over a three minute interval is a decent assessment of your endurance and speed.

Wind up their legs? How so? That would certainly slow down the kick enough to suck alot of power out of it...especially a thai kick, which you throw using all of your momentum...at that point, it would be more or a push than a kick.

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homo homini lupus

WildWest.

I was thinking about this when I was doing the dishes and was going to post it but you've beaten me to it. So fair enough re knowing how many kicks you land per min etc.

There are some people who just aren't as athletic as others, yet kick hard albeit slower than us slimmer models. I exaggerated just to make a point but probably didn't explain it well enough. I meant those that telegraph their techniques so much that you can see it coming i.e. they wind up first. Sparring them is easy as you simply step out of the way, or stop them before they can throw their technique. They may be powerful, they've adapted the technique to suit their body type, but they are still slow. To be honest I don't really know where I'm going now, but I agree with your last post

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"Too much weights, not enough speed work"