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I saw a wing chun video clip that got me thinking- basically, the guy was in a clinch with a kickboxer and is underhooked. The WC guy starts to throw a bunch of fast 45 degree downward elbows (#1, bau jang?) onto the guy’s neck/trapezius. They are just casually sparring, so he pulls them. Anyway, this made me think about fighting from the clinch- when we do sparring drills, we usually go for the underhook so that you can stifle their punches and use the leverage for throws (and you can neutralize some pushing if your arms are below theirs). But keeping your arms over the opponents (like in muay thai) allows for elbows and knees. What’s your perspective on where to position your arms in a clinch? I’d say in a no rules setting, each one still has distinct advantages- double underhook for keeping your opponent in position for straight knees to the groin, or over the top for grabbing the hair, ears etc for knees, attacking the eyes, neck cranks.
Its cool having a forum where hype is at a minimum and there’s people with different backgrounds (BJJ, krav, muay thai, kempo, wing chun (wing tsun? ving tsun?)). Also, the krav people generally accept that mixed martial arts are not entirely realistic fights, but still have a lot of validity in their own context.My opinion would be that you would want your hands underneath to retain the maximum amount of control and minimize your chances of being thrown. I would think that in a real fight, your opponent would most likely be looking to try to throw you to the ground so you wouldn’t really have much time to think strategy and soften him up. You would be to focused on not being thrown down.
My $.02
One hand over, one hand under would of course be the most neutral position. If you get to choose between both hands over or both hands under, I think double underhooks would be preferable. If someone knows what he is doing he could probably drop you pretty quickly using double underhooks, before you would have a chance to use those elbows and knees on him. Of course, if he doesn’t know what he is doing (doesn’t know takedowns), hands free might be better, because, while he is holding you, you get to do all of your counter attacks. That’s kind of what we do in Krav Maga, bearhug defense, just keep hitting him, also either push his head back by gouging the eyes, or twist his head sideways, peeling the attacker off you.
I think it all kind of depends on your own as well as your attacker’s abilities. If you feel confident that you will be able to take him down, maybe smash him onto the hard floor (or even pavement, then punch him a few more times when he is down), going for double underhooks is probably a good idea. If you’re not good at taking someone down and you don’t know the opponents abilities, you might want to stay in a more neutral position and try to strike from there, or disengage if you can. I’m not sure I would ever let an opponent deliberatly get underhooks on me, if he turns out to be a decent grappler, I might end up being at his mercy and he’ll be able to slam me down hard. On the other hand, if I’m really ready for it, as soon as he gets both arms under, I could gouge the eyes (street fight) or try to twist his neck sideways. But it might need to be something quick (or even savage), a single punch or elbow might not do it and he’ll still be able to take me down.
Also, I think if he underhooks you and isn’t able to get in close enough for the takedown, and you start punching and kneeing, he’d probably let go pretty quickly and you’d be back to the neutral position again. You really would have no real control over it, whereas, if you get good double underhooks and are skilled enough to use them, you would be in control.
I agree with giantkiller’s comment about preference depending on ability.
Good grapplers looking for a takedown will like underhooks. In KM for self defense reasons against takedowns, we also like having our arms underneath because we can use them to keep the bad guy’s hips away (making takedowns more difficult).
However, in a street fight, if you don’t know good takedown/clinch position, underhooks do expose your face.
BTW, this doesn’t help all of you out, but any KM instructors reading the forum, please check the Instructor Area. We just put up six new sections with text and video clips, ALL of them relating to clinch positions and defenses.
Six new sections with text and video clips relating to clinch positions? Sounds quite intriguing. Is there any way we could set up sections like that on the regular website for all of us to enjoy?
Can I? 😉 …….
You can also neck crank. Even with a thick neck if they pull off a take down the impact of landing should be pretty hard on them if you are controlling their head and pushing the chin over one shoulder.
What vid clip where you watching?
the clip was at
http://www.wingtzun-eschwege.de/kkb-sparringtreff-200308/sparringtreff20030802%20048.avi
Its a pretty big file, and its some wing chun guy sparring with a kickboxer. He’s not a very good kickboxer- he enters with bad high spinning kicks and such (doesn’t he know what wing chun is?) and runs straight back from the counterpunches (a good defense against wing chun, but not against other southern kung fu).
Anyway, at the end there is a clinch, and watching it again, the WC guy sort of has one hand over and one hand underneath. The WC guy dominates, but I’ll bet any decent martial artist could have taken on the kickboxer- he attacks and defends like a faceless bad guy in an American Ninja movie.-about neck cranks- I have a friend who was a CIF champion wrestler and like 20 pounds of muscle on me, and whenever he comes home from college, I challenge him to a grappling match. My grapplng experience is pretty limited. Anyway, he usually wins, but just by using neck cranks, I can get out of a lot of positions by simply cranking his neck straight back or to the side. The neck, unlike the limbs, is more easilly manipulated.
I know that vid. It looks like a real sparring challange (friendly 😀 ) to me. The Kickboxer seems to be discovering that he can not get into range to do his kicks and stuff. The WT has really good footwork on it too, which people always say sucks in Wing Chun et al. Once the kicker is beat (i.e knock down), the WT returns to ready, but if for real he would chase the guy down with more attacks and finish it, double knee drops to side mount etc….(or just run away 😉 )
So to me in the ending clinch, the WT has stopped a Kick with a kick to the standing leg, but kind slipps it, so he has to control the kick with arms. The kicker falls back so he then strikes and chases. The Kickboxer trys to hang on to not fall (or does clinch) but the WT goes immidiatly to right elbow to temple, ear, and neck. His left arm is just there holding the guy from hitting the wall or from getting that arm inside. In WT we would say the WT has both arms inside, not over/under, but I see what you mean.
The left could come up to neck pulling hand against the right elbows for more power if it wasn’t friendly. At the very end, after the last elbow strike, the WT is ready to catch up the guys chin and turn 180 to face right and be on left leg and do some left elbows to other side. This would also throw the guy down to floor under a double knee pin.
If you pause it at 1:00, the WT looks like that position on the KM advertisement, holding attackers right arm against chest while doing pointy elbow to temple. Hard to see from the angle though. 😀
Is that guy bleeding at the ear in the end? I love how the WT keeps his ready attitude as the video finishes and they walk back.
and the web address is Wing Tzun, which is my people, so I will try to find out who this is and more about it….. 8)
First about the clip – there should NOT be that much space so that the WT guy can hit like that, for gawdssakes! Then again, he did not even try to unbalance the opponent that is the first thing to do so that he cannot hit so that it hurts. The KB sucks in that clinch, that’s all there is to say to that.
Not that he has a clue otherwise. Boxing w/some 14? oz gloves against a WT guy. That doesn’t work at all. If kicks have to be used at all against a WT guy, they should be low! How many did he do ? Zero.
If I really had to fight a WT guy, I’d just throw a couple of non-straight punches so that my head would be in constant movement – not in center-line, while advancing. Then if I failed to KO the opponent w/the hooks/over-hands I’d try to clinch and control or take him to the ground, depending on the particulars of the situation.
With WT guys you just gotta throw caution to the wind, and also not fight in their range.
There is another thing that I have found to work against some that I learned way back in karate… bait him. You need to have good movement in/out to work this, but the idea is to get close enough w/a faint that he tries to blast, then immediately, take a step back, out of range, then sweep w/the front hand from up to down, and nail that back-hand to his face. I’ve tried that, it can fek up their game plan.
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Generally – upright, I prefer, if I can get it, is the collar tie or the MT head clinch – take control of the head, so you can unbalance your opponent, making his strikes mostly useless, while you can knee the heck out of him.
So… moral of the story:
#1 When you clinch – clinch! None of that pseudo-clinching, glue yourself to that body that there is no space to hurt you !
#2 take the opponent off-balance as soon as you can – a person being unbalanced is going to try to get that balance back – or go down. That means that he cannot do any real damage.
#3 if you feel you have the clinch all in your control, use it – off-balance and knee is a good solid basic solution. You don’t need to knee the head, either. Knees take the wind out of you just from the body. Thighs and groin also are great.
#4 If it looks like things are going bad, glue yourself to that opponent and take him down. If you’re losing upright, it’s better to risk taking it down, at least you get another chance, maybe he’s not that good there, and maybe this buys you a bit of tyme to get some of the cobweb out of your head.Not to make this a WT vs KM topic but
\”There is another thing that I have found to work against some that I learned way back in karate… bait him. You need to have good movement in/out to work this, but the idea is to get close enough w/a faint that he tries to blast, then immediately, take a step back, out of range, then sweep w/the front hand from up to down, and nail that back-hand to his face. I’ve tried that, it can fek up their game plan. \”
That is exactly why the WT in the video stops and returns to stance at ready all the time. You should never chase someone into a trap they set.
I forget who said it, but \”if you’re thinking of what your opponent can do to you, you’re not thinking of what you can do to your opponent\”. Or similarly, like Sussanah said, \”With WT guys you just gotta throw caution to the wind.\” Key things while fighting any scary style.
This clip was a good example of something Cali said in an earlier post- the front kick to the groin can stop any kick (well, ones above the legs). If you can beat them to the target, it will stop a front or round kick by hitting the groin and pushing them off balance. Against a spin kick, it will hit them in the butt and push them off balance. Against a high side kick or crescent kick, it can hit the thigh and push back,or can scoop up and hit the groin.
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