Forward Stance and Back Stance in Karate

The Forward Stance and Back Stance are used to execute technique by moving the body forward or backwards. In Karate, we want to always achieve the highest possible speed and efficiency of movement. This blog gives some tips on how to execute your stances in the most efficient way.

Imagine your body like a "stack of dishes”. Moving around this stack of dishes as fast and efficient as possible would mean keeping your center axis perfectly vertical when moving. You wouldn't want to allow your stack of dishes to lean in any direction and have them crash to the floor! When executing forward or backward motions, your body should not move up or down, nor lean or shift. Shoulders and hips always remain parallel to one another and on a clear horizontal plane when advancing or retreating.

One way is to imagine that the ceiling is so low that it's touching your head whereby your torso must be kept vertical at all times. In order to alleviate the rising motion it is imperative to keep compression on your forward leg and the rear leg when reversing. The buttocks are always tucked under and the movement is initiated with the lower abdomen (hara). This way your legs do all the work and you’ll achieve much more efficient movement with the added benefit of strengthening the legs...and that's the point!

In front stance the ratio of weight distribution between the front leg and back leg is 60% and 40%. Back stance is 30% and 70% on the back leg. Back stance and forward stance are opposites to each other.

I liken forward stance to be like a brace against a wall, as if you are pushing to prevent the wall from falling in. Another way to look at it would be to prevent someone from pushing you over a cliff or if you were to climb down a steep hill you probably go backwards in forward stance.

Back stance however is the opposite. it prevents the opponent from pulling you in. Have someone grab your belt from the front while in back stance, have them lean back and gently try to pull you forward. In another way, you can look at it as if your front foot is used like a brake, to prevent you from being manipulated or pulled in when engaged with an opponent.

When done correctly back stance is about 2 shoulder widths in length. Both feet are at right angles to one another with the shoulders, hip, knees and ankles lining up in the straight vertical line on the back leg. Try this with a mirror to see what I mean.

One interesting theory is that back stance was created to prevent the judoka from setting up throws while practicing with karateka, when karate was first introduced to Japan.

For a good stance you need great flexibility in the ankles A saying I often heard in my younger years was "karate begins from the ankles up”, meaning you need good compression in your ankles as well as strength and flexibility.
Much practice is required to build this up, but your karate will really benefit from it.