Kung Fu Throwing Video Tutorial

Kung Fu Throwing is a system developed by Lou Burruss and Mike Caldwell in 2005. He wanted to come up with a structured throwing plan to help developing throwers. As the only two Seattle Sockeye players who lived on Capitol Hill at the time, Mike and Lou would meet often to throw. Lou solicited Mike to help him with this and to their surprise they found that it was an excellent system for established throwers. (They were in their 7th and 9th years on Sockeye.) They did KFT once a week the entire season and Lou’s throws were more consistently on than any other year.

The philosophy of the KFT seeks to improve a thrower in three ways. First and simplest, repetition. The entire program takes about an hour and features ~450 throws. Second, it seeks to challenge the limitations of a thrower by pushing them to throw beyond their comfort. Not so much in terms of distance, but in range of release. Lastly, the central portion of the program tries to articulate the different components of a throw. It separates the wrist from the arm from the shoulder from the hips from the feet. Young throwers are often limited to a single forehand where the handwristarmshouldertorsohipsfeet have to all be doing the same motion every time. What if a defender takes it away? What if you need to get around a marker? Really great throwers make adjustments large and small to their footwork and release points in order to beat defenders.

A warning about KFT: it is very physically rigorous. Mike and Lou felt taxed by it and they were in incredible shape and their bodies in ultimate frisbee conditioning for years. KFT should be treated like a workout and you should pay attention to your body. Pay attention to the upper hamstring on your step leg (not your pivot leg) because that is where most of the stress of this workout goes. Also consider a partial workout to begin. Cut the 25s down to 15s or even 10s to start.

You can download a printable PDF of the KFT routine here: .

Reddit user shhhhhgotosleep has also created an easy to reference PDF guide as well which is meant to bring with you out to the fields to keep track of your progress as you work through the steps: KungFuThrowing PDF walkthrough.