When you mis-manage punching and it goes into grappling

Advice on what I should train and drill when if I mis-manage my punching and distance and I end up in with my attacker grabbing onto me and grappling.

Boxing into vertical grappling is an art in itself. Some good clinchwork from Muay Thai, some Judo and some Greco Roman.

If you want the best of all the above in a pressure tested system, I couldn't think of anything better than Erik Paulson's material - he is a master at this. He has whole sets of DVDs around this kind of training, if you get the chance to pick some up you won't be dissapointed with the sheer volume and value of the content.

www.erikpaulson.com

you should nearly always practise the transition from punching (or striking actually) to grappling as the most common used principle in our system is

SHUT DOWN THEN PUT DOWN

I agree with Michael.
Erik's material is excellent
He travels to the UK regularly and teaches seminars that are usually open to public - so we'll keep you posted on here when he's over next.
Al

geordiedave wrote:Advice on what I should train and drill when if I mis-manage my punching and distance and I end up in with my attacker grabbing onto me and grappling.

Get into some decent push hands grappling....

I always teach basic stand a clinch drills, release drills and ground escapes the most important thing is to stay off the ground.If you do go down get up fast!

This seems to be quite a complex area in my opinion as one thing leads onto another. You've got Bulling, Wrestling,Grappling, Clinching, then you've got take-downs,shooting, ground fighting, pins,... I've had a look on Youtube of some of Erik Paulson's stuff and there's loads, though in my own experience I would just like to master one or two techniques and for starters this has got to be from a standing position obviously. Looking at Dave Turton's reply SHUT DOWN THEN PUT DOWN is the key here that once you are in grappling position to put your attacker down on the ground as fast as possible ?

We all know that in the street technique mostly goes out the window the most important part of staying off the floor when grabbed/clinched is to be aggressive not just s bit aggressive but f***ing aggressive. Go through your attacker or get away.Just DO NOT COURT THE GROUND in the street!!!

Geordie

Just as an option - just because you'd closed down into clinch and vertical grappling range - there's alot of stuff you can still do really quickly that doesn't need you to throw the guy down on the ground to finish the fight.

But again - it depends on what you are looking to do - win the fight or survive the fight and escape.
The latter is the recommended option in self defence and would be best suited to getting the guy on the floor with you remaining standing - basic snatch, drag down type techniques are probably going to be more successful for the novice than technical Hip and Shoulder throws
If you want to finish the guy - an alternative (and I am only saying it's an alternative) is to consider continued striking from the clinch, lots of elbows and head butts to blitz the guy - or look at strangles either from the belly-to-side position or getting round the back to rear naked chokes, etc
From these positions you can then always snatch or drag the guy to the floor whilst applying the strangle.

Peter said it best though - the winner is usually the one with the most fire in his belly - so be ferocious, have a high work rate and massive intent to come out on top
Stay on your feet at all costs and get away as soon as you can

If your looking in terms of self defence/street fighting Id say the best bet would be to get various people and practise Sprawl and Brawl. Basically you got to get the other person to the floor and you can use punches to set it up. Youll end up in lots of positions that are uncomfortable and the more you practise the more comfortable youll get.
Alot of people always stress 'dont take it to the ground' but thats on assumption that you are better than the other guy and have a choice in where the fight ends up. How do you stay off the ground if hes determined to get you there, either get good at running or get good at wrestling.

So your question "what I should train and drill when if I mis-manage my punching and distance and I end up in with my attacker grabbing onto me and grappling."

You answered it yourself at the end of the sentence. Practise grappling.

the SHUT DOWN -PUT DOWN principle is NOT just dumping. throwing the guy on the floor, but an ATTITUDE.

Stop what he is trying to do IN CLOSE, and put down any other moves he might try by DOMINATING him

30 minutes none stop work out/drill-

I get my students to face of and number themselves one and two then the ones will try and take the twos to the floor and twos try and stay standing. Then swap- do this for five mins per person

Face off on knees and repeat.Then swap do this for five mins per person

Then number one on back and number two on top one tries to stand two tries to keep them down.Then swap do this for five mins per person.

Swap partners for each different drill get used to fighting all shapes and sizes.

If you do get up in the allotted time start again

No technique really just get them down or get up using lots of aggression.

Ok you get bruised and bloody and knackered and confused but hey who'd have it any other way!

JUST GET UP OR GET AWAY FAST! DO NOT COURT THE GROUND IN THE STREET.

Peter Skillen wrote:I always teach basic stand a clinch drills, release drills and ground escapes the most important thing is to stay off the ground.If you do go down get up fast!

Gotta agree with that....

geordiedave wrote:Advice on what I should train and drill when if I mis-manage my punching and distance and I end up in with my attacker grabbing onto me and grappling.

An excellent way to circumvent this problem is to train every strike/punch/attack from the possible sticking points that occur in a confrontation. This training model is what Hock Hochheim calls the Stop 6. These six “sticking points” are defined as:
1. Showdown/Interview
2. Fingers or hand contact
3. Forearm to Forearm
4. Shoulder to neck
5. Body to body
6. Ground
At the moment, Hock is weaving this concept into all pre-existing material in the Scientific Fighting Congress and is offering these program updates for free in PDF format. You can get these level outlines here:
http://www.hockscqc.com/shop/product449.html
http://www.hockscqc.com/shop/product450.html
http://www.hockscqc.com/shop/product451.html

These are the first 3-levels of the Unarmed Combatives course. If you are interested, he also has these outlines for knife, stick and gun which are available from his website:
http://www.hockscqc.com

The objective of this training model is to avoid falling into a “sports mindset” when someone tries to clinch with you. If you try to play that “clinch game” back you had better be a bigger and stronger guy than your opponent is. Also important to remember: these positions will be “non-sportive” on the street; only trained people will fall into any Greco style positioning. In other words, never box a boxer or grapple a grappler. All combat contact sports rely on fighting a mirror image of themselves.

Best- Joe

Joe Hubbard wrote:[The objective of this training model is to avoid falling into a “sports mindset” when someone tries to clinch with you. If you try to play that “clinch game” back you had better be a bigger and stronger guy than your opponent is. Also important to remember: these positions will be “non-sportive” on the street; only trained people will fall into any Greco style positioning. In other words, never box a boxer or grapple a grappler. All combat contact sports rely on fighting a mirror image of themselves.

Damn fine point!!!

As someone who practices 'self defence' (for want of a better term) because of my trade rather than as a sport, I have drilled (and drilled and....) to not fall into the 'sports mindset' mentioned by Joe..

Ooh I haven't been on here in a while, let's keep this one short (I have a habit to ramble).
All great points guys and all very valid. In my experience (and I do have some), clinching and knees to 'sensitive' areas works an absolute treat, so although clinch does happen in a ring sports environment, it can be adapted very fast by changing your targets. It also opens up the assailant to further finishers if necessary.
Just my 2p worth.
Enjoy.

We ran a couple of workshops on this lately. We found the main point with the clinch was to break it as soon as possible (given the possibility of multiples, weapons, etc) and try to stay on your feet. Head control works well, knees and elbows already mentioned. Point work can be some use but not as a first line response perhaps. I think the most important thing is not to clinch back - unless of coruse you want to hang on to the guy as a shield!

cheers
Rob

[youtube] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0m8AhiiKR6Q[/youtube]

Hi Rob, thanks for posting but one thing I'm curious about is when you say - don't clinch back unless you are using him as a shield

Perhaps not a great example but in your clip - there is a point where a guy wearing a red blindfold is seen, "not clinching back" with his opponent and he quite clearly has no idea where his opponent is at times.
The only time he knows to turn into the guy is when they touch

For me, being a grappler, if I am being clinched by someone then the best option for me is to clinch back and dominate the grip. By dominating the grip I can feel where he is even when I can't see him, I can also then choose to break free from the clinch, strike from the clinch or takedown from the clinch.

I do agree though - you do not want to remain in a clinch for any length of time when faced with multiple assailants unless you are truly up against it and needing some human shield body cover.

Just my observations - hope you don't mind.

Always interested to hear other views from other arts - thanks again for posting

Al ;-)

Hi Al

Thanks for the observations, they are welcome. I think what I mean is you don't have to clinch back. Often we see people under pressure do the same thing back as what is being done to them - even when it might not be the best thing. If you can clinch and dominate, that's good - you can keep hold of him while you hit him!

The blindfold drill is designed for a couple of purposes - one is to develop tactile awareness, in which case the guy should have been clinching more lol. I think at that particular time Matt was working more his close-in strikes. It's also a psychological test, obviously you have no idea where or when the next grab is coming from and, when ramped up a bit, it's a good test to see how long you can stay on your feet - or, when you go down, can you take the other guy with you

cheers!
Rob

Hey Rob

Thanks for the response, all makes perfect sense.

Cheers for the post

Totally agree with the "what he does to you, you do back to him" trap that we can all fall into.
We see this in all aspects of martial arts, all ranges and styles.

Look how easy it is to let the intensity of a "relaxed roll" escalate to full on fighting when two guys grapple. One ups the pace a little to make a technique work, the other matches this and up's it a little more.
Takes alot of self control to keep a spar at the pace and intensity agreed with the partner regardless of how much you want to step it up a little.

Trying to get guys to relax is a classic where, when their opponent gives them a little resistance, stiff arming or using muscle on muscle, they immediately follow suit and fight strength with strength, when all they need to do is relax and let the technique do the work.
Or when you're sparring and the guys picks up the pace and the weight of his punches a little, you do the same until it's a full out brawl

A classic trap in all ranges and one to be avoided - thanks for pointing this out