Validity and reliability of impact forces from a commercially instrumented water-filled punching bag

Measuring striking forces is important to provide actionable insight for training and performance enhancement for combat sport athletes. Recent technology may provide a low-cost solution to an otherwise complicated kinetic assessment. The aim was to assess the reliability and validity of a water-filled training bag and integrated sensor for measuring peak impact force. A pendulum design was used to swing a range of known mass loads (kettlebells) from various heights to impact a stationary 21″ Aqua Training Bag ® . For each condition, the momentum of the mass at impact was calculated and compared with the measured impact force from a pressure sensor affixed to the side of the water-filled bag. Peak impact force was strongly associated with calculated momentum ( r (18) = 0.96 [0.91, 0.99], p