Week 10

3 drill: Investigated body shots from the backfist attack.
• Hit through to the abdomen, piston back inside to face followed by lap and hit to chin.
• As above initially but instead of piston, crappy chop to the outside gate and hit to chin.
• Backfist, step to the side, turn and hit to floating ribs.
• As above but fake the body shot and slide across his centre to other side and hit to body. The beauty of this technique is that the fake sets up the opponent to compact on one side on prep for the hit, as they load you pass to the other side and attack the open soft part of his body, complete with hit to the chin.

Martin touched on the limitations and positives of the 3 drill. In a previous post I touched on my ideas about the limitations of the drill. For Martin the key one he talked about was how it developed a certain muscle memory in terms of the expectations of movements due to happen in a given order. Your defence at times can be happening before the attack instead to being alive to it.

Pre emption pad training.
In the pre fight posture, ready to go, palms open and pointing at the target, elbows in, looking and talking to the chin, compact body, core activated, weight just off heels on balls and ready to drive forward.
• Partner flashes the pad, we had to close the distance and hot once with the right hand. Maintaining relaxation, giving nothing away (telegraphing), making sure the hand moves first and forward. Extend the elbow through the punch.
• As above but this time the partner steps forward with the pad and we had to meet and engage with the punch. Then moved into hitting with 3 punches.
Sparring ideas: Looked at use of mun sau (inquisitive hand) coming through to subtly trap the rear hand and hit to chin. Enter with punches to gain contact, trap and hit to chin.

Sparring: One side attack whilst the other defends. Stayed quite compact and relaxed, Martin said my stance was to shallow, I kept standing parallel at time, need to keep depth (just as in the 3 drill). Have to stay ground as I was coming high on my hits at times. Despite initial reservations, I really enjoyed the session. Took the hits and stayed calm, look forward to the rest of my martial life...