Class notes: standing neck crank plus give and take a shot

Firstly it was great to see more newer faces tonight and old ones. The class felt busier and had a real energetic buzz to it. I will also apologise to the newer members of the class for not blogging about what you guys did. Hopefully the stuff below will become relevant to you very soon and not seem that new as you have already ready about it...


The pummel: addition of detail from previous blog entries, when turning the shoulders for the underhook there is a slight pushing motion with the upper arm and shoulder. This subtle motion adds to moving the partner and affecting his balance. The rear arm is also activated so that the lat muscle is helping to secure his underhook and give it no space to move around.

Half Thai clinch: This was covered a few sessions ago but new details worth mentioning is that as he goes for his underhook you take the back of the head. You still have the underhook on the other side so clasping the shoulder and pivoting with help to to control him. I think we only looked at pivoting one way and that was towards half Thai clinch side.

Full Thai clinch: don't let go of the contact to get it. Steps of the ladder. Swim your underhook out to get full clinch.

Arm drag: Trace the arm back, punch the hips and no matter what his size grab around at the hip bone. Any further and he can look for the DWL.

DWL: Trace the arm back, rev the wrist and reach over his arm, maybe catching a naughty elbow on his nose on the way over...

This is what can happen to the elbow on the ground if you chose not to tap when in a deep DWL:





Standing neck crank and the magic bones. If he goes low with the Thai clinch or head control you can look for this which at first glance is a guillotine. In fact it is a bloody horrendous neck crank.
His head needs to be at your ribs just under the pec muscle and you want the hairline at the forehead to be on you. Slide your forearm along his jaw bone using the key bones of the arm, the 3-4 inches of ulnar and radius bone from the wrist crease, then go palm to palm. This driving of the forearm will cause the head to turn, as if he is looking across the front of your torso. As you push your hips forward pull the radius bone towards you causing both big pain in the jam but tremendous pressure on the neck.



This is a nice technique to use if you have gone for the choke and he has worked his head out. Even though we were not doing it hard, my neck is still not 'right' almost 3 hours later. If this was done in the heat of combat it really would mess up someone's neck for a long time.

3 Drill with a low and deep stance using any attacks that we remembered. I worked with Dave, Ayyaz and Trist. All felt very different in their feel and attacks. Ayyaz kept nailing me with the throat attack through the centre off the back fist. Trist kept getting deep chops in and Dave was most excellent at controlling my elbows. I found it hard to stay low and deep and my tendency was to raise up with the attacks which straightened the legs, plus it is more taxing on the legs to stay low.

Give and take a shot drill with 2 extra attacks and being balanced in all points of the punching phases.
As last week, left head hook, right head hook, left body shot, right body shot. Notes on these, specifically the body shots - keep the hands up when turning into them to prep the uppercut counter. Keep the hands up.
The extra 2 shots and counters were after the right body shot and he has countered with an uppercut, drop the right shoulder and attack with a left uppercut. He blocks (catching the ball left) and throws a right cross. You roll the shot and drop the left shoulder and attack with a right uppercut. He blocks with his right hand (catching) and attacks with a left hook to the head. You duck under and come up on the outside of his left arm.

Footwork - the 3 basic motions with punches and looking to get fluid and balanced in our motions. 1: Step out and pivot away. 2: step out turn the hips and move perpendicular, 3: retreating in a curve with feet that in my mind were making the noise da-da-da-da-da

Jab and counter jab drill. Range, range, range. Do not step into range and have a jab that lands with a bent arm and you in range for him to attack and not needing to step forward. Tonight the next phase of the jab was throwing with forward footwork but then getting back out of range when you bring the arm back to the protective shell. Don't stay there.

The catch them every time right hand. Jab, jab and regular right hand then every so often step out to the left and commit to what looks like a left hook. Circling under extend the right hand to land. Even though I knew what was coming, it vexed me every time. This was one of those one time only tricks so hopefully no one will read and remember this...

The slight edge and the percentage of messy and working. It is better to train well and with precision so that when we actually spar and fight it will be messy. However if we have trained the techniques well then when it gets messy we have a higher percentage of being successful than if we learn poorly. Poor learning will always equal poor execution.

Inside and outside gate pak sau against the jabs. An elusive boxing drill. I did not get a chance to do this other than in the air. The partner throw jabs and you stay alive with footwork. Martin analogised by saying his glove has dog shit on it and you do not want that glove to touch you. So using alive footwork and the inside and outside gate pak sau you can practise being out of the shitty glove range.