Kick with toes

Theres one thing i would really like to do still in my martial arts career, and this would be kicking with the tip of my toes. This might sound kind of stupid, but if you think about it, there is more impact force on a smaller area (ie toes) than a larger area ([censored]/foot) with the same amount of force given, because of the smaller surface area.

In plain english, with the same amount of force, a kick with the tip of your toes, will hurt a lot more that a kick with the entire foot. Which is true, Ive witnessed it first hand. My sensei can do this, he has no feeling in his toes whatsoever due to the fact that he has broken in how many times in his career already.
I asked him how he learned to do it, and he said that when he was training in japan, they had to kick a car tyre only with the toes for 3 hours every day for a few months.

This is where teh problem comes in, one, I dont have 3 hours a day to kick a tyre, and two, my medical insurance doesnt cover any "toe injury due to tyre kicking" accidents.
The alternative, which was also recommended to us which seems a lot more realistic, is to slowly get use to putting weight on your toes. Ie walking on the tip of your toes.

Now i want to know, which of the people on here can actually either kick with their toes like that, or has done the toe walking thing before? And if you have walked like this, how does one start, any tips would be appreciated.

Thanks

Really?! This is a goal, to kick with the toes? Put on a pair of steel toe boots and be done with it!

VDJ

We do some kicking with the toes, usually because we're aiming at a vital point. Ever been big toed in the 'taint? You can't imagine the pain. I believe they do it in Savate, but I think they have nice pointy shoes to do it with. But I've seen a lot of liver shots in Savate matches. Maybe Cord can confirm or debunk that theory.

Anyway, it's a tool that can be used for sure. It's just a question of whether or not you think it's worth the time and pain to create this one very specialized tool. Sorry, no shortcuts...start breaking them toes.

What you are saying is the old Okinawan form of a front kick. It's powerful yet one only uses a little power but kick a nerve center/pressure point usually using the big toe. This form is rarely taught these days and for it to work the toes need a lot of conditioning. Old Okinawan masters were known to walk on the tip of their toes like ballerinas do.

@Mark, thats exactly that, small but extremely powerfull kicks, that is the aim, my aim for martial arts is defense, not so much sports, I was thinking about it again last night, and if it requires me to walk on my toes, then so be it. Ill check on youtube, there might be tutorials on how to do it.

@VDJ Yes, i already got a nice pair of safety boots just for that purpose

You do land kicks with the toes or rather the tip of the shoe in savate, yeah.

But savate kicking techniques are all based around wearing shoes. One advantage of delivering kicks with the tip of shoe is you can deliver the kicks with more extension than if you are kicking with the ball of the foot, and a good solid kick to a soft target, hitting with the hard tip of the shoe does definitely hurt.

My question would be this, though:

If your interest is self-defense just how often are you going to i) need/want to deliver a toe kick, and ii) be in bare feet at the time? And given that those sorts of circumstances are going to be vanishingly rare, is it worth conditioning your feet, versus just learning to kick wearing footwear?

Cheers,

Matt