Reaction time, in kung fu, karate, Kenpo, or any martial art, is a tricky, little animal. I say animal because it is one of the most important things you have...that you want to get rid of. It is one thing that can get you killed faster than a bullet to the brainpan.
Reaction time is reaction, which means that it is something occurring after something else has happened. Do you understand what this means? If you possess reaction time, you are moving second and behind whoever is launching a punch at your face.
Now you are forced to move, and this because of the attacker's move, rather than in keeping with what you want to do. That means you are the target, and you must get out of the way, build a good block, or whatever. It means you are not doing what you want to do.
The best way to understand this thing is if there is attacker A on the A position. And a defender B on the B position. And a third position, maybe off to the right, which we will refer to as spot C.
The amount of time it takes A to go to B, B can move to C. But B HAS TO move at the exact same moment. If B moves after A, then he is going to get his block knocked off.
And, if B moves because of something he learned, or because of his training, or because of something else, then he is moving yesterday. B must observe A 'in the now,' and he must move in accordance and not because. This is the only way for B to survive.
There is, interestingly enough, the point of view of A, and of actually being able to hit somebody. If you have seen how many misses there are in the MMA, then you will understand this. Simply, A is moving to where B is, but B is no longer there.
In other words, for A to actually strike his opponent, he must strike not to where B is, because B is going to move, and spot B is where he used to be. And he must not attempt to change mid strike, for that will destroy his base and take power out of the strike. The trick is merely to understand and analyze the one sentence: in the time A attempts to move to B, B can move to C.
To finish, let me say that many martial arts instructors talk about timing and slipping punches and that sort of thing, but they usually don't understand the equation I have presented you here. To understand this equation-in the time A goes to B, B goes to C-you should write it out, on a piece of paper, with every scenario of a combat situation you can think of. No matter what martial art you study, Kenpo, Kung Fu, Aikido, or whatever, this piece of information will enable you to lessen and even rid yourself of reaction time, and raise your martial art to a much higher level.
If you want more hard core information about the martial arts and how to fight, click to Monster Martial Arts . I recommend The Punch as a great method for making a hard punch.