(electronic music)
- Bruce Lee's JKD, Jeet Kune Do Economy of Motion.
I believe, one of the most important concepts
and principles in Jeet Kune Do.
Again, I have my shifu joining me today.
So shifu, talk to us a little bit
about what does that mean, economy of motion?
- Well, ordinary boxers, they start off
here with their hands, right, and they ask
you to punch from here to here
and bring it back to the face.
It would be considered economy of motion.
You don't want someone to throw a rear punch this way.
- It's like a windup.
- Right, yeah yeah. If they're doing this kind of thing
it's winding up, it's telegraphing, et cetera.
So we look at it from tools point of view.
So the tools are actually economical.
At the same time also in fighting
you have to be very economical.
An example here, if an assailant was right behind us
and he was about to approach and say hey buddy
and he's touching me here, I'm not gonna go wind up
and boom and hit him in the head.
It's a matter of you feel threatened,
depending on the environment and the context
of what's going on, as soon as I feel something
that's it, that's all I'm doing.
I'm just immediately hitting from point A to point B.
- Kinda the shortest distance?
- Correct. So if he was there, that's what I'm doing,
and I apply my entire body into it
because then I can just fire and continue firing.
Very, very effective but as soon as I feel something
I can hit low, I can hit to the groin
and come back to the head.
Just a matter of being very economical with your strikes.
From point A to point B, wherever that target is.
- What about in terms of defense?
If economy of motion, I mean we don't do a lot
of blocking and block two, three,
five other times before you hit it back.
- Right. If you happen to parry,
you're doing it intentionally because
as you're doing it on the second intention.
Let's say I wanted him to think I was parrying.
Then I baited him to that, so...
Jack, if you could get in frame.
And he threw a cross punch, the slip is happening
at the same time I'm hitting, right?
I'm not going slip, hit or catch, hit, right?
I'm just going, whack, in and that's
what's economical is that my attack is there.
Also too in reference to fighting, do I go back
to the context of a fighting sport?
If that's the case, we're gonna circle around each other.
Go that way.
We're trying to find and we're trying to hit each other.
That's not the economy of motion.
The economy of motion os going in.
A problem that you see, again if we're talking
about what Jeet Kune Do is or isn't,
is that if he's bouncing around.
You're moving over there and I'm moving here,
nothing is happening, all we're doing is saying
"Hey everybody, we're about to fight".
- Yeah
- The idea is once...
- And people start following you on cell phones.
- You got the cell phones coming out.
Everybody's recording you and everybody's
saying hey you two...
(laughter)
But again, if you're feeling threatened
in any way, shape or form the economy
of motion comes in a direct line.
If it's not there then it's switching to one or another.
But it's not going, let's put our hands up.
Okay? That's not it at all.
That's an entirely different thing.
Now you're defense mechanism is around your ego
not necessarily defending yourself.
Because if you had to bring your hands up,
I had to bring my hands up, who's the winner here? Nobody.
- And also I think when you're training you gotta
consider if it's a self-defense situation,
the more time you give this guy,
the more you put yourself in danger.
You don't know if he's got friends next to you,
you put your hand, some of his friends
may be behind you, you don't know,
you put up your hand, you dance around
he might pull out a weapon, you don't know either.
So you gotta be very, very careful.
So we're training in terms of to go in, right, shifu?
To move in.
- That's correct, that's correct.
- If we've sensed danger.
- Yes, that's correct. The whole idea, again
if you are gonna be economical with you're weapons
that they hit with power.
So again, one is hitting. Extreme hitting.
And you were just talking about multiple opponents.
If I were to strike immediately with this guy,
I have to come back to something else.
Right? So I'm just trying to be as economical
in my strikes as possible.
And we can go back to every single tool.
The tool is the jab. So if I teach the jab, that's here.
It's not here. And if we're pulling the arch principle
behind it and then it's not here.
It's very short. Very crisp, and it's like a whip.
- And what about, shifu, for other,
like kicking and stuff, how would that apply?
- So Jack, for camera purposes,
if you stand in a right lead.
So again, winding up from here to here
to get this leg to come over is probably too much time.
Whereas this, it just goes here. Okay?
The whip in itself is the arch, and that's
where you get that snap and crack.
So you're not getting a lot of power.
That's true, I'm sacrificing speed for power
but the speed is gonna develop the arch at the very end
which is the result, is the crack.
If I can stun the guy and if he hunches,
he's gonna come down, right?
So, if I hit the leg, come down, boom boom.
Right, I'm gonna follow up with another hit.
If anything, you can come in with a power hit.
Economy-wise, he's here, he steps in,
I hit the leg, he comes down, boom,
and this is gonna fire right through.
- So this is the power shot
- Yeah, that's it.
- And also, especially with aiming
we're trying aiming here but really it's the groin.
- Yes
- You don't need tremendous power to...
- Correct
- Take the guy down, that makes a lot of sense.
That's why, economy of motion,
when you're training keep that in mind.
That's why shifu always teach me,
it's not so much about the techniques
it's the principle when we're training.
Are we doing too many fancy moves?
It's actually very difficult to keep it simple.
'Cause it's so easy, oh we add more and add more
and play around with different thing.
- Right
- And then we need to simplify it back again, so
economy of motion, JKD, it's a principle,
it's not a technique.
One of the core principles in JKD.
Comment below. Maybe share with us.
What's your take and how maybe this
would me or has helped you in your training.
It doesn't matter what style you are, it's just a principle.
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