How to KO & Break Legs with Leg Kicks

WHY LEG KICKS ARE THE MOST UNDERRATED MUAY THAI STRIKE

By Evan Lee

The leg kick, at first glance, does not appear to be a particularly devastating strike.

After all, what damage could the largest and most powerful limbs in the human body possibly do? Turns out... it's a lot.

Our legs are strong because they are the tools on which we rely to keep our body up. However, someone else can use their legs to hurt our legs, which disrupts our rhythm and ability to fight.

Today, we will be talking all about the leg kick, and by the end of this, you should have quite a few tips that will allow you to slice 'n dice your opponent’s legs.

First, we must understand how to throw the low kick. Before we get into that, understand this: as Sean shows in this video, there are many different types of low kicks. Understand that there are many ways to throw all kinds of techniques, be they kicks, punches, knees, or elbows.

The type of technique you throw will depend on the given circumstances.

With that in mind, let’s get to the video.

KILL THE LEG: How To Throw A KO Leg Kick (Muay Thai Style)

MORE WAYS TO MAXIMIZE LEG KICK EFFECTIVENESS

One of the most important tips you can take away from this video is how to set up your low kicks.

To land your low kick successfully, you want to make sure that your opponent is unable to lift their leg to check or unable to check with any kind of weight behind it. Because if they can, you’re going to get hurt.

This means your time to low kick is any time weight is being shifted heavily onto one leg.

You can force this shift with strikes like Ernesto Hoost did with hooks, or you can time it as they take any step. Given that walking is shifting weight from one leg to the other, whenever your opponent is moving their feet is a perfect time to land a low kick.

Timing your kick also greatly increases the amount of damage that your opponent takes, and there are even more ways to increase power. The principle for generating power is that you must move as much of your bodyweight as possible in the direction you are striking.

The clearest example of this is Conor McGregor. Conor is known for his deadly left hand, famously dubbed "the touch of death” by legendary MMA coach Firas Zahabi. Conor is able to generate such power because of how effectively he is able to throw his bodyweight into his strikes. The principle is the exact same in low kicks, as Sean demonstrated above with the power low kick. If you want maximum power, make sure every detail of that technique is perfect.

 KO Low Kick Tricks & Patterns | Low Kick Clinic

Duke Roufus Breakdown: The Low-Kick Finale

He displaces his opponent's weight through pushes and punches, creating perfect opportunities to land low kicks. When his opponent is already hurting and worried about the leg kick, he switches his techniques up to make them fear other strikes. All of this led up to a beautiful low kick finish -- something Duke Roufus of the past never would have never imagined himself doing.

Roufus’ first encounter with leg kicks came when he saw his brother Rick Roufus get decimated with them. At the time, he believed low kicks to require no talent at all and were unworthy of being in the ring. Yet twenty years later, Duke would end his kickboxing career having won many fights by breaking his opponents' legs with kicks.

That is the power of the leg kick. Hopefully with these tips and tales, you can destroy some legs of your own.

Good luck and break a leg. Or several...