Post by pathwinder14 on May 15, 2013 9:09:02 GMT -7
Self Defense primer 4: Feints, Fakes, and Traps
In martial arts and self-defense training courses people often talk about feints, fakes, and traps. These are means of disrupting the timing of your opponent or briefly tying them up in order to create an opening in their defenses. These are finesse techniques that may or may not always work.
Safety caveat: Do not try wihtout proper instruction. Serious injury or death can occur!
Feints:
Feints are small jerky movements that cause your opponent to flinch. You can create a feint by issuing a short jerking motion with your arm or leg as though you are going to punch or kick. Think back to childhood when bullies or older siblings would hit you because you flinched at their feinted punch. It’s the same thing here. You want to cause your opponent to flinch. You can then take advantage of their flinch response to attack them.
Fakes:
Fake = Diversion. Fakes are simply prolonged feints. You issue a complete attack, however it lacks power. Think if it as a half-hearted punch or kick. There is no commitment to it. As your opponent blocks it, your real attack is following up.
Traps:
Traps are prolonged fakes that seek to tie up an opponent’s arm or leg long enough to attack them. These can be accomplished by pushing on your opponent, laying an arm or leg across their torso, or pulling on part of them. To put it into pictures a good example would be the common down-block-trap used in Wing Chun. You can see a good example in the Bruce Lee Vs. Bob Wall fight in Enter the Dragon.
Better yet, go watch the scene here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri_r9ktEh-8
Go to the 55 second mark and watch. Go ahead…I’ll wait. Done? You may have had to watch it several time but you'll see Bruce uses his right arm to push Bob’s leading hand down and then his left arm to pull on Bob’s leading hand…pulling him into the follow up strike.
In my training we often used that one as well as a repeated back fist that laid across the opponents face and head doing no damage but tying up their arm (and vision) allowing us to repeatedly punch the opponent’s ribs with the opposite arm.
In martial arts and self-defense training courses people often talk about feints, fakes, and traps. These are means of disrupting the timing of your opponent or briefly tying them up in order to create an opening in their defenses. These are finesse techniques that may or may not always work.
Safety caveat: Do not try wihtout proper instruction. Serious injury or death can occur!
Feints:
Feints are small jerky movements that cause your opponent to flinch. You can create a feint by issuing a short jerking motion with your arm or leg as though you are going to punch or kick. Think back to childhood when bullies or older siblings would hit you because you flinched at their feinted punch. It’s the same thing here. You want to cause your opponent to flinch. You can then take advantage of their flinch response to attack them.
Fakes:
Fake = Diversion. Fakes are simply prolonged feints. You issue a complete attack, however it lacks power. Think if it as a half-hearted punch or kick. There is no commitment to it. As your opponent blocks it, your real attack is following up.
Traps:
Traps are prolonged fakes that seek to tie up an opponent’s arm or leg long enough to attack them. These can be accomplished by pushing on your opponent, laying an arm or leg across their torso, or pulling on part of them. To put it into pictures a good example would be the common down-block-trap used in Wing Chun. You can see a good example in the Bruce Lee Vs. Bob Wall fight in Enter the Dragon.
Better yet, go watch the scene here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri_r9ktEh-8
Go to the 55 second mark and watch. Go ahead…I’ll wait. Done? You may have had to watch it several time but you'll see Bruce uses his right arm to push Bob’s leading hand down and then his left arm to pull on Bob’s leading hand…pulling him into the follow up strike.
In my training we often used that one as well as a repeated back fist that laid across the opponents face and head doing no damage but tying up their arm (and vision) allowing us to repeatedly punch the opponent’s ribs with the opposite arm.