RamboWanaBe

Hey Kingpin, I do your number 1 stretch, its very difficult to get the knees touching the floor, but that is a goal of mine.

I will try your other stretches soon.

Tekkerz

If you want to get some nice high kicks happening I would recommend a combination of static and dynamic stretching for the hamstrings, hip flexors/extensor and hip adductors/abductors.

The static stretches which have already been mentioned are good and I also recomend these:

Sit on the floor with you legs straight out in front of you with your feet about 30cm apart. If you have a carpet or floor surface with paralell lines its good but not a must.
first just reach out in front of you and touch your fingertips to a point or line which is comfortable for you and doesn't require any effort.
Next take a big breath into and try to fill expand your abdomen before your chest expands to full capacity, all the while drawing your hands back towards your body.
As you breath out again slowly push your hands forward until your breath is fully exhaled. You should find that your fingertips have reached a point or line on the floor which is further than the first time you did it.
Repeat this about ten times, each time you should stretch reach a little further than the last time, but of course you will ultimately come to a point where you cannot stretch any further.
do this every day, its easy to do when you are watching tv so no excuses.

A good dynamic stretch for the front kick is leg swings.
you need a space where you can take 4-6 long steps forward.
place your hands out in front of you with your palms down and arms straight and take a step forward with one foot, using the momentum of the step swing the back leg forward to touch your hands out in front of you, when you put that foot down in front of you repeat the action with your back foot, do this until you run out of space then turn around and move up to the other end of the space, repeat 4-5 times remembering that you are no trying to perfrom the kicking action but rather just swinging the foot forward and up as though it were a dead weight on the end of your leg.

This can be done with the inside and outside crescesnt kick movement (much like an axe-kick but apply the same idea of just swinging the foot through the range of movement) for the adductors/abductors.

If you have a handy chair or milk crate if your kicks arent too high yet, slowly perform the kicking movement and static hold your foot in that position for as long as you can, if there is a wall or surface next to the object you can lightly rest your foot against it but no more than 5 percent of possibly pressure should be applied, when your foot dips down and touches the object below it is time to finish. This can be done for both front kick and side kick on either leg.
I have held the front kick posistion for more then ten minutes one time, give it a try.

kingpin

Rambo, it takes a while to reach the floor, just dont force it mate. There was a really over anxious guy in my taekwondo class back in the day and the injuries he caused himself would have been laughable if they didnt end up with him being picked up in an ambulance on two seperate occasions.

RamboWanaBe

With the box splits (legs out to the side) is it considered incorrect to position your feet out?

If I keep my feet parallel, I feel too much stress on my knees, like the muscles are going to pop out the knee cap.

kindred

I have a stretching machine. If you wanna do it the easy way id suggest getting one of those. Get a cheap on thats what i did i think mine was $60 off eBay. They work but you have to use them every day for at least 20-30 minutes thats what i found anyway.

You could also try the stretches they teach you in class.

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Josh_GTiR

Rambo, I do that stretch with my toes out.

ChrisOX

Hey Josh how many stretches have i shown u!

Josh_GTiR

Yeah, too many! You always say I am doing it wrong as well.

ChrisOX

cos u dont do em right to get the proper stretch out of it!