Mythbusters: Hatsukoi Limited Edition

Ask, and you shall receive.

Just wondering, is it even physically possible for a five-foot-ish girl to kick a six-six guy in the face without the girl jumping and with the guy standing straight?

It might sound unlikely, but let’s take a look at the numbers:

I knew geometry would come in handy one day

I knew geometry would come in handy one day

Well, TJ, there you have it. I took the ratio from this study, and got Misao’s height from Wikipedia. I am solving for x, where x is the length of Ayumi’s leg. If Ayumi is delivering a roundhouse kick with her instep, the length from her hip to her striking foot will be longer than the length from her opposite hip to her (planted) supporting foot. This also ignores the fact that Ayumi likely has a good bit of distance between her hips, which would increase her reach somewhat.

Ayumi is boss

Ayumi is boss

Even if the assumptions are not exact, I think the kick is completely within the realm of possibility, especially considering that Misao slouches a bit. Hopefully I didn’t embarrass myself by making an algebra mistake here…

About Kabitzin:
One of the founders of Sea Slugs, I handle most of the blog admin tasks while wearing my I AM BOSS shirt. I like my action series well-choreographed, and my romance series extra trashy. I also have a soft spot for puns.
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22 Comments

  1. (Power Level: 35)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 1:40 pm | Permalink

    I think I tried to do this math once, and I realized that I would have to presume a 30-60-90 and I stopped there, because I don’t want to recall trig. Also because standing on one leg is very different than doing a roundhouse.

    The trick is, to even do a good 90 degrees kick you have to tilt almost horizontally. If you try to do a 120 degrees kick, it’s going to flip you back pretty hard. Unless you’re buffed like Ryu or Ken it wouldn’t look like what Ayumi was standing when she kicked Misao.

    But I think your math is fine, and Ayumi can reach a 75″ person’s chin.

    • (Power Level: 3048)
      Posted April 24, 2009 at 1:46 pm | Permalink

      From TKD experience, you can get a 120° kick without leaning back too much, if you are willing to sacrifice a lot of power. Plus, let’s be honest. It was the power of the pantsu that really knocked Misao down, not the power of the kick.

      I noticed while grabbing the screen cap that Ayumi actually does not do a roundhouse kick, because the fanservice would not be as good. Instead, she does more of a crescent kick or a soccer kick. I think the kick is still plausible, even if a bit unlikely.

      • (Power Level: 35)
        Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:00 pm | Permalink

        More relevantly however, roundhouse kick shows off the panties a lot better than a crescent kick or a soccer kick, and if you really want to go into details… Ayumi used her right leg to kick Misao, which hits him on the left cheek/chin. His neck would be rotating to his right, or back. How does he see the pantsu???

        The screen cap you have there is a good example. There is no LOS from Misao’s face to the pantsu because her leg is in the way.

      • (Power Level: 3048)
        Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:13 pm | Permalink

        I think because it is an inside kick, he should be able to see the front-bottom patch of pantsu from the corner of his left eye because of how short the skirts are in Hatsukoi Limited. There would only be a peripheral glimpse at the moment of impact, but I think that would be enough to get the KO.

        A kick from inside to outside would definitely break LOS, but not so much for an outside to inside kick.

      • (Power Level: 35)
        Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:48 pm | Permalink

        I guess it depends on how much extension happens when Ayumi serves it.

        I think it would be a toss up either way.

    • (Power Level: 12)
      Posted April 27, 2009 at 2:20 pm | Permalink

      This conversation is hilarious and awesome. Delicious use of math, Kabitzin!

  2. (Power Level: 14)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:24 pm | Permalink

    I read somewhere that she’s 4’9, which makes her EVEN SHORTER THAN KONATA, and more like Yu-chan’s height (or, rather, lack thereof).

    • (Power Level: 35)
      Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:37 pm | Permalink

      Wiki says so. Well, she’s still in middle school, so…

      But that does foil the point of this mythbuster if we can believe the numbers.

      • (Power Level: 14)
        Posted April 24, 2009 at 3:53 pm | Permalink

        no, #’s are good….I believe in Otou-sanian axioms.

        What would be more interesting is, by calculating the height of Ayumi, can we come to a conclusion on her weight? Thus, can we determine the force of her kick? Thus, can we determine the pain Zaitsu felt?

    • (Power Level: 3048)
      Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:44 pm | Permalink

      Dang, really? She doesn’t look like she is much shorter than everyone else in the anime, which means that all her classmates are really really short :hmm: .

  3. (Power Level: 30)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:28 pm | Permalink

    LOL. Never knew Physics could come in to handy in this way.

  4. (Power Level: 19)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:40 pm | Permalink

    Consider a spherical cow…

  5. (Power Level: 154)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 2:52 pm | Permalink

    I think what’s important is that we have the numbers to back up the panchira.

  6. (Power Level: 14)
    Posted April 24, 2009 at 9:11 pm | Permalink

    Oh no… not maths in my anime.. good job here though. I do enough maths as it is for my course so I didn’t bother checking the maths here though…

  7. (Power Level: 216)
    Posted April 25, 2009 at 12:54 am | Permalink

    Thanks for taking the time the calculate this out. *Thumbs Up*

    However, the metric and imperial measurements listed in Wikipedia differs, since 6’3″ or 75 inches is only about 190cm, and if you take the metric measurement Misao is more like 76.5 inches tall assuming 1 inch = 2.54cm. Shouldn’t change the answer much though, so the conclusion remains plausible.

  8. (Power Level: 2)
    Posted April 25, 2009 at 1:15 pm | Permalink

    Can we call the rest of the mythbusters team to actually try this in real life? Or are we going for the molded dummy testing?

  9. Kou
    (Power Level: 1)
    Posted April 26, 2009 at 4:13 pm | Permalink

    lol i stumbled on this thinking it would be another boring opinion-based anime blogs. But that was great work lol.

    • (Power Level: 3048)
      Posted April 27, 2009 at 7:43 am | Permalink

      Thanks! After this comment, I checked my logs and I was amazed to see that I had over 5,100 extra visitors in one day alone that visited this article thanks to Stumbleupon!

      I suspect it was the Mythbusters tie-in, and after reading some guides I am not sure I could replicate this kind of success on a regular basis, but the increase in traffic was impressive (especially considering that I did not do any additional work).

      • (Power Level: 216)
        Posted April 28, 2009 at 11:29 am | Permalink

        Wow, 5100 in one day! that’s impressive.

        So uh where is my thank you card for inspiring you to write this article LOL? :grin:

      • Jesus159159159
        (Power Level: 918)
        Posted April 29, 2009 at 1:41 am | Permalink

        I had over 5,100 extra visitors in one day alone

        am I… not good enough for you anymore?!?!? :cry:

        So uh where is my thank you card for inspiring you to write this article

        THANK YOU CARD?!?!? Man, you’re lucky to even be in a post from KABITZIN!!! That only happened to me once, and it was because of how much I spammed! ;P

  10. STUMBLER
    (Power Level: 1)
    Posted April 30, 2009 at 10:18 am | Permalink

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    <( O__O <)(^__^) CONSENSUAL RAPE! :grin: :eek:

  11. Steve
    (Power Level: 1)
    Posted July 26, 2009 at 10:03 pm | Permalink

    to view my take in all this, visit this site.

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