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Wastelander
Wastelander's picture
Making the "Scorpion Kick" Practical

Hello, everyone,

The scorpion kick is a generally flashy kick, only usable by the most flexible and athletic martial artists, but it can be employed in a more practical manner. As with other kicks in the old-style Okinawan karate arsenal, if you want to kick someone in the head, you should put their head in a place that's easier to kick ;)

Les Bubka
Les Bubka's picture

Hi Wastelander

Hope you dont mind I post the same comment here, but I think this kick is underused in Karate, I'm glad that you use it :) 

Guys from Shintaiikudo work a lot with this, I could only find this one clip. I have set of their dvd and it is more on the subject :)

Kind regards

Les

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Thanks for the interesting videos gents! Personally, this is not a kick I would use. However, I did once see a gent secure a headlock and then “scorpion kick” the person he was holding in the groin before spinning him to the floor as he crumpled. Not something I would do, but there’s no denying it worked.

On the general point of dropping the head, one of my sensei used to remark (in a lightheaded way), “People will tell you that kicking to the head has no place in the street … I’m telling you if does … just make sure they are lying down first.” He did not actually recommend kicking someone in the head when they were down, but the joke brought home the fact that we can move the target :-)

Thanks once again for sharing!

All the best,

Iain

Cataphract
Cataphract's picture

I would call the demonstrated back kicks at waist level butterfly kicks rather than a scorpion kick.

I believe the original use of the scorpion kick is a throw like o soto guruma. Some Shuai Jiao fighters train that by kicking a post with a Matrix2 style scorpion kick.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GRjOTd5z8E at 3:30

Wastelander
Wastelander's picture

Iain Abernethy wrote:
On the general point of dropping the head, one of my sensei used to remark (in a lightheaded way), “People will tell you that kicking to the head has no place in the street … I’m telling you if does … just make sure they are lying down first.” He did not actually recommend kicking someone in the head when they were down, but the joke brought home the fact that we can move the target :-)

While we do include high kicks for fun, and those interested in sport kumite, we are huge proponents of the "bring the head down to where you can kick it" approach to head kicks :P

Cataphract wrote:

I would call the demonstrated back kicks at waist level butterfly kicks rather than a scorpion kick.

I believe the original use of the scorpion kick is a throw like o soto guruma. Some Shuai Jiao fighters train that by kicking a post with a Matrix2 style scorpion kick.

Names are pretty fluid things when looking at techniques like this, so I don't get too caught up on it. As for the larger, higher scorpion kick, I would agree that it is much more effective as a throw than as a strike. We do not actually have this technique in our Shorin-Ryu, though, so we looked at the version shown in our video instead.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Wastelander wrote:
While we do include high kicks for fun, and those interested in sport kumite, we are huge proponents of the "bring the head down to where you can kick it" approach to head kicks :P

Wastelander wrote:
While we do include high kicks for fun, and those interested in sport kumite, we are huge proponents of the "bring the head down to where you can kick it" approach to head kicks :P

We practice high kicks too. As you say, they are fun, good for fighting, and they are great for attribute development too. All of the people I know who have bone breaking leg kicks also have the strength, flexibility and technique for graceful high kicks too. The physical attributes are common.

Everyone can kick low and it is better to keep the kicks low for self-protection; if we kick at all. However, if we want the best possible kicks, then we need to work on our flexibility, strength and technique. High kicking then often gets included by default.

One mistake I made in my own training was to abandon high kicking because it was not practical. For a couple of years I never kicked above the waist … and my kicking got worse. The flexibility I’d spent years developing diminished, and my cherished low kicks got weaker as a result. So back to stretching every day and including high kicking in my training. I keep that firmly in the “fighting box”, but there is no denying the attributes developed help with the low self-protection kicking too.

All the best,

Iain

An example of a fighting pad drill that does in include high kicks:

Wastelander
Wastelander's picture

It's a very valid point that high kicking develops strength, control, and flexibility that benefit low kicks. There are some kicks which I simply do not do, at least not with any speed or power--my bad knee just can't handle any crescent or axe kicks, and isn't too thrilled with spinning kicks--but I still go through the motions to keep my leg strength, control, and flexibility going. 

Ian H
Ian H's picture

For those wondering, this is what the scorpion kick looks like in the sport kumite version ... at about 7 seconds in ...