On Bended Knee

Today in class we looked at some different ways of kicking at the knee. For the most part, if you want to damage the knee joint, it is best to strike it from the side. This means if you’re frontal to your partner, you’ll want to throw mostly roundhouse kicks to get the job done – although you can also throw curl kicks (and maybe a heel kick or two). If you get to your partner’s side, you have a few more options – knees, stomping through, side kicks and front kicks.

If someone is silly (or unfortunate) enough to straighten out their leg for you, it is possible to damage the knee by kicking at the front of the joint – causing it to hyperextended. If the knee is bent, though, the joint can take a substantial amount of pressure (it is really hard to damage) from the front.

Why would you kick someone in the knee? Well, hopefully you have a pretty important reason for not wanting them to be unable to run/walk very well. Perhaps they have nefarious intent, are faster than you and you want to get away from the situation. If you were to run without hitting them first, they would simply follow you. If you were to first deliver a solid kick to the knee, this MIGHT slow them down enough to give you time to exit.

We also looked as some fun takedowns involving the knee, as you can see on the above video. If you like that takedown, you should check out Stephen Kesting’s longer instructional on it as well as some talk about why it is illegal in sport Judo. Watch it here.