Just as we enter the season that most makes you want to punch strangers (seriously, have you seen how crowded the stores are?) I'm proud to bring you a study that tells you just how to make your punching the best that it can be.

Now, I sift through a lot of research to bring you the best studies I can, but this one was something special. Its abstract seems to have been guest-written by Bruce Banner, midway through his transition to the Hulk. That's the only way I can explain sentences like "PUNCHING IS A KEY COMPONENT OF STRIKING-BASED COMBAT SPORTS" (yes, written in all caps) and "IT HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED IN BOXING THAT THE ABILITY TO APPLY FORCE VIA PUNCHING TO AN OPPONENT IS PARAMOUNT TO VICTORY."

That might seem like the most obvious statement of the Year, but take another look. Sure, punching applies force to your opponent, but is force, in the sense of physics, the most important factor in winning a fight? What about the speed of a punch, or its accuracy, or the number of punches you can deliver?

It's a good question because if you have a factor you can measure, like force per punch, then you have a benchmark to rank fighters' ability before they even step into the ring. That could help in matching competitors with one another, and it lets trainers build a scientific approach to training, so they know if their athletes are making the most of their time in the gym. Do they develop more forceful punches?

Over the years, scientists have tried many ways of measuring the force of a punch. There are dynamometers (spring based force meters) built into punching bags; load cells built into the neck of a dummy that you punch in the head; and piezoelectric sensors, which can be made small enough to fit into a boxing glove.

Which is exactly what a company in Philadelphia, PA (SensorPad Systems, now defunct) did. They made the special gloves, and then teamed up with researchers at Philadelphia University to observe forces in six real fights. Surprisingly, real-life punches weren't as hard as the punches that had been measured in the lab: 3,554 Newtons in real life versus the 4,800 they expected. But more importantly, the results led to Hulk's observation: the winner was not the one who landed the hardest punch or the greatest number of punches, but the greatest total punching force over time.

To put that in perspective, imagine a fighter that throws two really hard punches, versus one that gets in ten medium-strength punches. The second one has applied more force, in total. And according to these researchers, that's the one who will win every time.

Hulk and his friends – actually a team of sport scientists at AUT University in New Zealand – combed scientific studies to find the best measures of punching force, and more importantly, where it comes from. They settled on Ground Force Reaction as the key. In this type of study, the subject stands on a board that is rigged up to sensors. If he moves, the floor "feels" it. Through these studies, the New Zealand team learned that force from the ground is directly related to the force from a punch. The energy that drives your hand needs to come from your feet.

So what's the bottom line? To develop a stronger punch, you need to focus on your legs. The New Zealanders give a detailed breakdown of training principles for each area of the body, to provide maximum force for punching. Their recommendations, in order of importance, are:

Legs: focus on strength and power. Build a strength base with axial (up-and-down) motions like squats, deadlifts, and lunges; and with longitudinal (forward-and-back) movements like hip thrusts and bridges, heavy sled pulls, and pull-throughs. Then, do a period focusing on power versions of these movements: push presses, vertical jumps and long jumps, and medicine ball throws.

Sound like fun? Here's the hard part: to make this work, you have to rest. A lot. The authors stress that you aren't really developing strength and power unless you do these exercises with 2-5 minutes in between. That's what lets you practice a truly maximal effort, training your neuromuscular system and not just your metabolism.

In the third phase of training, you can continue developing strength and power through actual punches, but again – and I know it's hard to rein yourself in – focus on single punches or combinations, with rest periods in between. Faster work on the pad or bag is fine for conditioning, but it doesn't develop strength and power.

Core: focus on stability. This mainly means endurance for your lower back. You want your core to be strong and somewhat stiff, to be able to transfer power from the ground through your body to your fists. And you want to be able to do that for an entire bout, right? The authors suggest a progression that increases the difficulty of keeping your body stable: prone quadruped, kneeling split-stance cable row, Pallof Presses.

Upper body: focus on velocity. Go ahead, tell your friends that that upper-body training is the least important when it comes to punching. They may laugh, but who cares? You'd beat them in a fight any day.

Start with a strength phase including bench presses, overhead chins, and bent-over rows. Progress to a power phase that includes bench press throws, and then advance to medicine ball throws and clapping push-ups. The name of the game is fast and ballistic.

Scientists still have a lot to learn about how punching works, but the importance of the legs to generate power, and the lower back to transmit that power to fast hands, are already pretty clear. Focus on your lower body in the gym, and you'll be winning fistfights in that crowded shopping mall before you know it. HULK APPROVE THIS MESSAGE.