Sticks

I agree with JKogas, anything that will strengthen your wrists, forearms or even upper arms as long as it doesn’t start taking away from your speed.

For my wrists I use an “old school method.” A stick with a rope tied to it that has a weight at the other end of the rope. Hold your arms in a relaxed position out in font of you and twist the stick in your hands until the weight reaches the top. Then twist the other way until the weight is back on the floor. Repeat until forearms are burning.

I also have a 26” piece of black pipe that I swing around. Not sure on the exact weight. All I know is that after a few minutes swinging that around my rattan sticks feel like toothpicks.

That is pretty much why we train with our power sticks you can swing them as hard as you want. We have a 28 step mirror pattern the when I swing my partner will swing and block it out. We started slow and soft now we can swing for the fences. Our power sticks are almost imposable to break with stick on stick contact.

Hi,

I'm currently training in the Philippines and I'm selling sticks to help pay my way.

I get my sticks made here. I get my Kamagong sticks made by a carpenter from the wood carving region of Paete. Needless to say the sticks are of excellent quality and real "Ironwood" weighing around 500g each. I actually have some that are 550g!

I also have Bahi and I'm taking delivery of Molave, Yakal and Philippine Mahogony next week.


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Regarding the power striking topic what people do here and elsewhere is to hit tyres. I'm sure you've probably seen the donut configuration with say 5 tyres stacked hortizontally and one stacked vertically.

I was asking my instructor about this as I saw the wood that holds the tyres in place for $200 on the internet and wondered what the Filipino take would be on such lavish expense. He showed me his training aid. It's a truck tyre sat in an iron cuboid of sorts. I think the rough dimensions were 24" by 18" by 36".

He's going to show me some applications in my next lesson so I'll report back.

In my previous style of Escrima (Latosa Escrima - I'm now studying Bahad Zubu Kali) we used to have drills against staffs for power. 30 hits on the forehand, 30 hits on the backhand, ducking under the stick as you go. It was a real workout.

It's worth remembering that "Power" comes from correct body mechanics. When I just started Escrima my instructor saw I was using my wrist too much so he actually taped my elbow to my body and got me to do the same strikes! The gym also had a collection of swords so I was told to go and get the braveheart replica and practice the same strikes with that to also help improve my striking.

Best of luck with your training. I'll go and have a look round the rest of your forum now!

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