Making someone bend over

[drop bear]

What should the instructors do instead? It is generally useful to give a few options to students that generally work in the situations they will encounter, say if you are training them to be on a security team.

Mostly you manipulate their head. Or you pull their arm with body weight.

If the lock fails you take their back generally with an arm drag. Which you are pretty much doing with the lock.


So manipulatethe head. This couldalso be things like head snaps. Thai clinching, whatever

Take the back.

Pull the arm.

I can't find a video. But there is a back take where you are behind them and you grab their wrist and the crook of their elbow. Which does a bunch of cool wrestling things.

But it also makes their forearm in yo a lever that you can just muscle drag a person backwards.

And the advantage with a lot of these is you can train them live without snapping on standing arm bars or wrist locks and injuring people as much. (Or if you do you are hitting those locks from a position of positionional dominance. And not injuring people as much)


And none of this really requires hitting. Unless you just like to hit people.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

making him bend over. How do you do this?

You can use elbow lock to bend his body backward. When he resists, you borrow his resisting force, add your own force, and apply shoulder lock to bend him forward.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

I have a couple of practical questions. If you want to apply various armlocks from a straight-arm position or force someone down on his face, the tricky part is making him bend over. How do you do this? The obvious answer is to strike him, but is there another way?

On a related not, is it possible to apply a wrist lock on a strong person who is resisting? Mostly it would seem not, although I once trained with people who transport prisoners for a living and they could do it, suggesting it is a matter of practice.

If they prefer having their arm broken or shoulder separated to bending over, I guess they could resist.

If you have leverage, I haven't had that happen. It's a good way to test your armlock, though. Have the uke try to resist, but not to the point of injuring themselves.

 

[jayoliver00]

It's crazy that choke holds are illegal for LE.

 

[Hanshi]

What is the context where wristlocks and joint manipulation to control position are typically effective? Often situations security people find themselves in vs self-defense situations.

I have been both a dojo owner and a LEO, and agree that everything is not a nail. So rather than carry only a hammer one needs a full tool pouch. At my school we practiced a number of techniques for situations where control without injury is necessary. We called these (non attacking) scenarios Funny Uncle, drunk brother in law and loudmouth pest. The idea was what to do at a family reunion, wedding or other types of visitations.

These techniques could be used to 1. Gain someone's attention. .2 Stop arguments 3. Correcting bad/naughty activities 4. All the way up to taking someone outside or simply away from the others. Rough control or creating injuries could start family feuds or involve the police or maybe the courts. The idea, of course, is to handle family matters peacefully. This training was specific to family matters but is also similar to what is being discussed.

Typically they are when someone is "being a problem" to the point physical control is necessary or at least reasonable. AND the person is unaware of what is about to happen (even if it should be obvious to an intelligent or sobber person). Sometimes you even tell them you are going to take them down and it doesn't register in their minds, weird but not uncommon. Boom you nail it. He is restrained without injury, nobody gets hurt. Beautiful.

 

[JowGaWolf]

I think the magic of striking first, then joint lock, is "good cover" for instructors, to get around the fact that joint locks are often low percentage.

I always took this to mean that the student should use a variety of strikes to hide intent. For example, I would tell you that I would put you in a joint lock. Everyone of my "attempts to lock your joints" would be followed by a strike. I would be using what appears to be an effort to lock a joint to hide my true intent which is a strike. If I want to actually apply a joint lock then I need to hide it in the same way.

BJJ does the same thing. The technique often allows a "hole to escape from" from an inexperienced person it's not really a hole but a trap that leads to lock. I know this from experience because of me training with my MMA sparring partner. Some things I knew weren't really escapes but others I got caught in when I thought I was escaping I was actually being led into something else. I use this same concept against my MMA sparring partner when it comes to striking. I will sometimes initiate grappling for the purpose of setting up a strike. But there have been times when I've thrown a strike as an entry for a grappling technique. Allowing my sparring partner to try to get an over hook actually gives me a path to strike his jaw and to initiate head control.

When I was twenty I used to apply an elbow joint lock off my opponent's punch to my body. If I can ever find that VHS tape then I can show you. This is similar to the lock that I used but I applied it to the elbow. When a punch slipped under my arm.

This is the wrong way to try to apply a lock.

If I was going to apply a wrist lock it would be in the disguise of something else. I could fake an attempt for arm control and then slide my hand to the wrist to initiate the wrist lock. The sliding of the wrist gives the opponent comfort that he is freeing his wrist. The problem I see with some of the martial arts schools is that their students lack the strength and sparring time needed to be good at applying a joint lock. The other issue is that there are way too many walk-through demos.

 

[JowGaWolf]

But it's not effective in many other situations, and your chances deteriorate quickly once the element of surprise is lost.

Yes this. Even in striking. I agree with this 100%

 

[skribs]

I have a couple of practical questions. If you want to apply various armlocks from a straight-arm position or force someone down on his face, the tricky part is making him bend over. How do you do this? The obvious answer is to strike him, but is there another way?
On a related not, is it possible to apply a wrist lock on a strong person who is resisting? Mostly it would seem not, although I once trained with people who transport prisoners for a living and they could do it, suggesting it is a matter of practice.

Striking him would not be the obvious answer for me. If anything, it's going to make it more difficult in some cases, because you're giving up grip or leverage to strike.

In any grappling situation, there are generally three ways I've found to achieve success:

1. Be bigger and stronger than the other person, such that they cannot resist unless they have vastly superior skill
2. Surprise your opponent, so they are not resisting
3. Set up or read your opponent, so they are applying force in the wrong direction to read your technique

The first is something we can control in the weight room before a fight. It's not something we can do on the spot. However, it's a reason why weight training is a great supplement to martial arts, if not a valid alternative.

The second is (I believe) the reason a lot of self-defense arts or self-defense portions of arts train the way they do. The goal is to catch an adversary off-guard and overwhelm them before they can react. If someone throws a punch and I dodge it, and then square up, now we're effectively in a boxing match and in a neutral position. If someone throws a punch and I can use that as an opening for a throw, now we're in a situation where I have a dominant position before they realized I was fighting back.

The third is something you'll find much more in grappling sports, but you'll also see more and more of in self-defense arts as you get higher up. Nearly every martial art that includes some sort of grappling will claim that you fight by using your opponent's strength against them. This isn't exactly true. What it means is that you need to read the energy of your opponent to decide where to take them. Alternatively, you can feed them one technique in order to get them to go in the other direction. I'll give you examples from Taekwondo, Hapkido, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

In Taekwondo, one of my typical sparring tactics was to throw a head kick that I knew wouldn't land. I would do a few of these to gauge my opponent's response. 90% of the time, they would go for one of two responses: lean back to avoid the kick, or bring up their arm to protect their head. If my opponent's default was to lean back, then I would hit them with a second kick (a side kick) when they straightened up. I call this the Spiral Kick. Alternatively, if they would bring up their hand, then I would fake a high kick, and sharply turn into a roundhouse kick into their ribs.

Bill "Superfoot" Wallace did a seminar where he's said basically the same thing. How can you land any kicks if your opponent knows all of the kicks? Well, you get their hands in the wrong spot. Do low kicks until they're conditioned to block low. Then high kicks until they're conditioned to block high. Then high and low until they block with both hands (one high and one low), so you can hit them on the other side with a hook kick.

In Hapkido, we would train several defenses from the same grab position. For example, if you got me in a cross arm grab (your right arm grabbing my right), I would have techniques that start with me moving our arms to your left shoulder or left hip, or ones that would open you up by dragging your arm to the right or pulling your arm towards me. Lets say I wanted to pull your arm to your shoulder, but I felt you resisting that technique. Then I would open you up instead, because if you're resisting an up-and-in technique by pulling down-and-out, then if I pull down-and-out, you're helping me open you up.

Alternatively, I may pull up-and-in for a split second to get you resisting in the other direction in order to purposefully set up pulling you down-and-out. This is a trick I've used a few times in BJJ to get out of mount. I will bump left, and if my opponent centers their weight further to the right to compensate, I will continue bumping left until they're so far off balance I can easily tip them over. I've done this to people that are quite a bit stronger than me.

This is a big part of how practice helps. Knowing several techniques to a high enough level to use them effectively takes practice. Knowing how to quickly read your opponent's energy and react to it appropriately takes practice. In my Hapkido classes, there was a difference between a white belt that couldn't do the technique at all, a purple belt that could do the technique properly in a drill, a blue belt that could properly read an opponent and select the right technique, and a black belt that could come up with their own interpretations of the technique based on the situation. All of this is because they had seen and done things more and more compared to the lower rank.

 

[Johnkungfu]

I have a couple of practical questions. If you want to apply various armlocks from a straight-arm position or force someone down on his face, the tricky part is making him bend over. How do you do this? The obvious answer is to strike him, but is there another way?

On a related not, is it possible to apply a wrist lock on a strong person who is resisting? Mostly it would seem not, although I once trained with people who transport prisoners for a living and they could do it, suggesting it is a matter of practice.

Kazushi off balance & bait them to grab or touch you. Handshake many ways

 

[Johnkungfu]

Mostly you manipulate their head. Or you pull their arm with body weight.

If the lock fails you take their back generally with an arm drag. Which you are pretty much doing with the lock.


So manipulatethe head. This couldalso be things like head snaps. Thai clinching, whatever

Take the back.

Pull the arm.

I can't find a video. But there is a back take where you are behind them and you grab their wrist and the crook of their elbow. Which does a bunch of cool wrestling things.

But it also makes their forearm in yo a lever that you can just muscle drag a person backwards.

And the advantage with a lot of these is you can train them live without snapping on standing arm bars or wrist locks and injuring people as much. (Or if you do you are hitting those locks from a position of positionional dominance. And not injuring people as much)


And none of this really requires hitting. Unless you just like to hit people.

Scenario training

 

[wab25]

In order to standing locks to be effective... you have to understand what that means and what your drills are.

Most people will agree that one of the most valuable strikes is the jab. But, less than half of the jabs thrown actually snap the other guys head back. Does this mean that jabs are not effective? Is a jab only successful when the other guys head snaps back? Is a jab only effective when the other guys head snaps back? Yes, the jab is successful and effective, even when not snapping the other guys head back, because it is doing lots of other things as well... measuring distance, interrupting his breathing, interrupting his flow, giving him a problem to deal with, hiding a follow up movement, causing the other guy to move, or to freeze, taking the initiative, picking his hands a guard up...

Let's start with the drill, grab the guys wrist and twist like this. Really, that is a drill to learn an effective way that the wrist needs to be twisted... not necessarily, the most efficient way to apply the twist. Its a good way to see and feel how twisting the wrist, captures and effects the elbow, then the shoulder, then the spine. I find that through doing these drills, I can refine the way that the joint needs to be isolated, and the specific directions that it needs to be moved in. I also get to refine how to keep the other guys structure broken and off balance. When I go to the more effective, BJJ/MMA/wrestling version.... I find that if I can apply the same refinements, with respect to the other guys wrist/arm it becomes a lot easier to be successful. I see many of the same refinements show up in lot of different versions of different locks.

Let's go back again to the drill. Usually the drill involves the other guy reaching / punch for you... you get offline, blending with their extension, securing your grab and then applying the lock. Getting offline is a very good skill to develop, all by itself. Depending on the distance, you can either set up a nice hook to the head or kidney / liver with the off line movement. This part of the drill alone can be practiced and you should learn to make adjustments to hit various targets with hands, elbows, knees, feet. This movement can also be used to take the back, with some sort of arm drag being added in. Is the drill for getting the wrist lock not effective? Even though it is opening up all kinds of other opportunities for me? In my opinion, if I don't see and practice those other opportunities... thats on me, not the drill, the kata or the art.

Let's go back again to the same drill. When we do this in class, we do as above, catch the wrist and apply, the other guy taps and we move on. But, really he taps because you achieved the position and he stopped moving. Most of the time, if I apply a standing lock and then hold my position, you can just walk in the right direction to unlock the lock. That happens, because I stopped moving. This is an important thing. If I always train this way, I will always stop and the other guy can keep moving to escape and or reverse. We in the TMA side do this to ourselves, by always stopping there. We need to keep it going further. See, all the things we do to get there are important and correct... breaking their structure, taking their balance, isolating the joint.... it all makes getting to the position possible. But, we also need to practive maintaining those things as the other guy moves. When he moves, you can move in such a way that you keep his structure broken, you keep his balance and his joint isolated. But only if you practice this.

Let's go back again. Is this only effective and successful if I do as above... applying the lock, and maintaining it indefinitely? The truth is that they can counter and they will counter. In boxing, you are destroying your opponent if you are landing 1/3 of your jabs and 45% of your power shots... And these are all proven effective techniques.... Remember when I talked about how this was about learning to get to the spine through the wrist? If I can catch the wrist, and effect his spine, to momentarily disrupt his structure and or balance... that gives me a ton of openings.... even if it does not end in the classic wrist lock tap out that I got in class, doing a drill. The trick here is to understand what you got, (broken structure and off balancing) and what you don't (just lost grip on his wrist)... don't go after something that is no longer there, take an option that is there... (strike, throw, take the back....) Even if you only get him to react to your attack, you are taking initiative... he is reacting to you instead of you reacting to him. You need to let go what is gone, and take what is presented, to keep him reacting to you.

The success of these techniques is based on what you take away from them and how deeply you look. But you do have to get past the idea that it is only successful if it looks like the kata.

 

[Jared Traveler]

In order to standing locks to be effective... you have to understand what that means and what your drills are.

Most people will agree that one of the most valuable strikes is the jab. But, less than half of the jabs thrown actually snap the other guys head back. Does this mean that jabs are not effective? Is a jab only successful when the other guys head snaps back? Is a jab only effective when the other guys head snaps back? Yes, the jab is successful and effective, even when not snapping the other guys head back, because it is doing lots of other things as well... measuring distance, interrupting his breathing, interrupting his flow, giving him a problem to deal with, hiding a follow up movement, causing the other guy to move, or to freeze, taking the initiative, picking his hands a guard up...

Let's start with the drill, grab the guys wrist and twist like this. Really, that is a drill to learn an effective way that the wrist needs to be twisted... not necessarily, the most efficient way to apply the twist. Its a good way to see and feel how twisting the wrist, captures and effects the elbow, then the shoulder, then the spine. I find that through doing these drills, I can refine the way that the joint needs to be isolated, and the specific directions that it needs to be moved in. I also get to refine how to keep the other guys structure broken and off balance. When I go to the more effective, BJJ/MMA/wrestling version.... I find that if I can apply the same refinements, with respect to the other guys wrist/arm it becomes a lot easier to be successful. I see many of the same refinements show up in lot of different versions of different locks.

Let's go back again to the drill. Usually the drill involves the other guy reaching / punch for you... you get offline, blending with their extension, securing your grab and then applying the lock. Getting offline is a very good skill to develop, all by itself. Depending on the distance, you can either set up a nice hook to the head or kidney / liver with the off line movement. This part of the drill alone can be practiced and you should learn to make adjustments to hit various targets with hands, elbows, knees, feet. This movement can also be used to take the back, with some sort of arm drag being added in. Is the drill for getting the wrist lock not effective? Even though it is opening up all kinds of other opportunities for me? In my opinion, if I don't see and practice those other opportunities... thats on me, not the drill, the kata or the art.

Let's go back again to the same drill. When we do this in class, we do as above, catch the wrist and apply, the other guy taps and we move on. But, really he taps because you achieved the position and he stopped moving. Most of the time, if I apply a standing lock and then hold my position, you can just walk in the right direction to unlock the lock. That happens, because I stopped moving. This is an important thing. If I always train this way, I will always stop and the other guy can keep moving to escape and or reverse. We in the TMA side do this to ourselves, by always stopping there. We need to keep it going further. See, all the things we do to get there are important and correct... breaking their structure, taking their balance, isolating the joint.... it all makes getting to the position possible. But, we also need to practive maintaining those things as the other guy moves. When he moves, you can move in such a way that you keep his structure broken, you keep his balance and his joint isolated. But only if you practice this.

Let's go back again. Is this only effective and successful if I do as above... applying the lock, and maintaining it indefinitely? The truth is that they can counter and they will counter. In boxing, you are destroying your opponent if you are landing 1/3 of your jabs and 45% of your power shots... And these are all proven effective techniques.... Remember when I talked about how this was about learning to get to the spine through the wrist? If I can catch the wrist, and effect his spine, to momentarily disrupt his structure and or balance... that gives me a ton of openings.... even if it does not end in the classic wrist lock tap out that I got in class, doing a drill. The trick here is to understand what you got, (broken structure and off balancing) and what you don't (just lost grip on his wrist)... don't go after something that is no longer there, take an option that is there... (strike, throw, take the back....) Even if you only get him to react to your attack, you are taking initiative... he is reacting to you instead of you reacting to him. You need to let go what is gone, and take what is presented, to keep him reacting to you.

The success of these techniques is based on what you take away from them and how deeply you look. But you do have to get past the idea that it is only successful if it looks like the kata.

I think getting off line and striking is a critical skill. It is a core Muay Thai skill, practiced thousands and thousands of times. To do this well takes more micro foot work, both before and after the pivot than most people realize. But I definitely agree it's a great skill to have.

I also agree that following up a failed wristlock with a strike is a very practical skill. Of course to do that takes a big mental jump for using controlling force to damaging with a strike. But definitely effective.

 

[wab25]

I also agree that following up a failed wristlock with a strike is a very practical skill. Of course to do that takes a big mental jump for using controlling force to damaging with a strike. But definitely effective.

It does not have to be a follow up with a strike... it could be a take down, a throw, another control technique, or even another lock. The biggest mental jump is to go for one thing and then abandon it when it is gone, and truly see the new opportunities. Those opportunities only last an instant... if you don't take it now, you missed it and have to start over.

I see too many people trying these locks and giving up on them, because they do not produce the "kata tap out" when rolling or sparring. They miss all the other openings and opportunities that present themselves during the "failed" attempt. The few times they do get the lock, they don't realize the the motion it will take to maintain that lock. They either have to keep moving to take away the other guys movement.

The times when I do get these standing locks when sparring is not when I went for lock A. Its when I went for something, they slipped out and for an instant lock A was right there. When I can make the mental jump to abandon what I was trying, for what is there... I have a pretty good success rate. Most of the time, when I am still stuck on what I started, I have too much trouble with the gear shift to get there.

 

[Jared Traveler]

It does not have to be a follow up with a strike... it could be a take down, a throw, another control technique, or even another lock. The biggest mental jump is to go for one thing and then abandon it when it is gone, and truly see the new opportunities. Those opportunities only last an instant... if you don't take it now, you missed it and have to start over.

I see too many people trying these locks and giving up on them, because they do not produce the "kata tap out" when rolling or sparring. They miss all the other openings and opportunities that present themselves during the "failed" attempt. The few times they do get the lock, they don't realize the the motion it will take to maintain that lock. They either have to keep moving to take away the other guys movement.

The times when I do get these standing locks when sparring is not when I went for lock A. Its when I went for something, they slipped out and for an instant lock A was right there. When I can make the mental jump to abandon what I was trying, for what is there... I have a pretty good success rate. Most of the time, when I am still stuck on what I started, I have too much trouble with the gear shift to get there.

Yep. The trick is to incorporate this into a real training program, where students have this ability.

For me personally I have found it important to transition to either a strike or a body throw, instead of doubling down on a second joint lock attempt.

 

[Holmejr]

Coming from a FMA modern combat judo perspective when defending against knife. Our take on it is to soften up with some choice strikes including elbows and knees. This hopefully makes the attacker more compliant for other things in store for them. Of course this is with a weapon(s) mindset where there is no room for passivity. Waki Gatame is your friend.

 

[Holmejr]

It does not have to be a follow up with a strike... it could be a take down, a throw, another control technique, or even another lock. The biggest mental jump is to go for one thing and then abandon it when it is gone, and truly see the new opportunities. Those opportunities only last an instant... if you don't take it now, you missed it and have to start over.

I see too many people trying these locks and giving up on them, because they do not produce the "kata tap out" when rolling or sparring. They miss all the other openings and opportunities that present themselves during the "failed" attempt. The few times they do get the lock, they don't realize the the motion it will take to maintain that lock. They either have to keep moving to take away the other guys movement.

The times when I do get these standing locks when sparring is not when I went for lock A. Its when I went for something, they slipped out and for an instant lock A was right there. When I can make the mental jump to abandon what I was trying, for what is there... I have a pretty good success rate. Most of the time, when I am still stuck on what I started, I have too much trouble with the gear shift to get there.

Good point.
That’s where lock flow drills really pay off especially when not choreographed and with as much resistance as possible.