Van's sparring log

[SAAMAG]

Had a new guy come into the group about a week or two ago. He's trained in the past with a couple of amateur's and a pro as a sparring partner (don't remember the guy's name but fights in Strikeforce). He knows quite a bit about theory and technique as well.

I had originally sparred with him a week before where we did anything--punching, kicking, whatever. We used controlled contact because we didn't have gloves or gear or anything and I wanted to get to know him before we went heavy with gear on. He did quite well that day, got a lot of body shots on me while I generally got a few good shots in on the head. That day we had also employed kicks as well, whereby he wasn't nearly as versed. I used boxing hands at first and threw a few light round kicks to see how'd he do.

As he started pressuring more and making heavier contact on the body, I decided to experiment using some different tactics and so forth as staying in the boxing range unattached tended to get me caught in the body. I lowered the guard and waited for an attack, once contact was made on the bridge with his jab, I followed it in feinting a right hand where he reacted and covered, once that happened I switched to wing chun and covered, trapped, and punched him with a few chung kuens. He attacked again, I kept the pressure on using gam, switched to a pressing lan sao as I punched him again. He had no response to the wing chun since I kept cutting him off from going around me and pressed him to the wall. Without distance he lost his ability. Good to know right?

Later when got back to the middle of the area, he started to come on harder pressing the action again and tried using kicks too...wing chun straight kicks worked well to block and intercept, also shin kicked his leg as it came up. Kicked straight into the posting leg too (jing jurk and wang gurk). Of course I threw in thai leg kicks for good measure.

Rolled off a cross and just went with it spinning around with a kick and that went riiiight across his cheek. He was like---"man that was embarrassing!". :p I told him just because he's close doesn't mean I still can't kick him in the head!

Last night I had him doing a waist up sparring session with gear on. Boxing, wing chun, muay thai hands, karate, whatever anyone wanted to use. He is quite good with defenses, moving around a lot, using head and body movement--but again one of the other guys (who is more of a karate man) put heavy pressure with power strikes and put him on the defensive. Once there he tended to just cover up. He still had good body shots though and got a few on my karate buddy. Overall it was a good match up and a good learning experience for both of them.

My match with him I used pretty much straight muay thai hands/boxing hands. Not too much wing chun this time outside of maybe some cutting punches. But when I'd use wing chun footwork / entry to get in close, again he'd cover up, instead of pummeling him I waited till he stood back up...and POW right in the kisser! (He kept dropping his hands to dance around where I always keep mine up). This happened about three times. I switched to southpaw, and did a simultaneous pak against his jab with a lead hook. That pretty much took him out and we had to stop for what he called "a standing 8 count".

Overall...good session for all of us. I learned that I need to improve on countering body shots as I don't really see/pay attention to them (or that he's just good and sticking em). But I also learned that I keep a good guard up and that my hooks are strong and that smothering tends to work well against THIS guy. He learned to keep his hands UP, and I told him he needs to start counter jabbing as he gets pressured.

[bennyvt]

sounds like a good session. I always suck at body shots as i an so small people don't tend to do them. But when they do i get drilled. I try to practice it a bit more and tell people to try it.but i do love when you get them with your elbow every moy and then.

[SAAMAG]

I was surprised myself to get hit with the body shots. I figured he'd catch the elbows but I think he was timing it where I was punching or blocking. He had a far longer reach than I and was pretty quick.

Rushing in prevented him from doing as much wih his reach and got me into mine

[sanjuro_ronin]

I was surprised myself to get hit with the body shots. I figured he'd catch the elbows but I think he was timing it where I was punching or blocking. He had a far longer reach than I and was pretty quick.

Rushing in prevented him from doing as much wih his reach and got me into mine

The only time you get the elbows in body shots is when you uppercut instead of hooks, which way too many people do.
A good hook, "hooks" around the elbow and digs into those floaters or liver.
Typically, uppercuts are inside moves and hooks are outside:
Your left hook will get the ribs or liver, but your left uppercut will get the elbow, to get the liver with an uppercut you use the right uppercut, know what I mean?

[bennyvt]

yes i remember when learning boxing off my step dad, those hooks to the kidneys hurt like hell. I once made the mistake of going for his nuts in training and i ****ed blood for a day

[SAAMAG]

That's the thing, he was throwing straights and whipping punches to the body, not tight hooks that go around because he was trying to stay out of my reach while hitting me.

[sanjuro_ronin]

That's the thing, he was throwing straights and whipping punches to the body, not tight hooks that go around because he was trying to stay out of my reach while hitting me.

Whipping punches ??
Dude, you mean "whipping hooks"?
These are basically, "arm hooks" that have less torque and are thrown with a "whipping action".

[Ultimatewingchun]

Nice first post, Van...Sounds like you're doing very well.

As for getting hit with body shots: I can't talk enough about directly watching the closest elbow of your opponent. And when you bridge - immediately switch your vision to the elbow of the arm you're not touching.

So you've got chi sao-like contact reflexes going on one of his arms and a direct visual monitoring his other arm.

Try it.

[SAAMAG]

Whipping punches ??
Dude, you mean "whipping hooks"?
These are basically, "arm hooks" that have less torque and are thrown with a "whipping action".

Essentially, they're not straight, nor are they what I would call a true hook (in that it's tight and there's obvious rotation of the body). They're more of a slightly curved whipping punch. Taking into consideration that there's going to be semantic differences essentially yea. Long range slight arm hook to the body if you want to put it that way.

This guy punches non-traditionally, using weird angles and unconventional methods.

[SAAMAG]

Nice first post, Van...Sounds like you're doing very well.

As for getting hit with body shots: I can't talk enough about directly watching the closest elbow of your opponent. And when you bridge - immediately switch your vision to the elbow of the arm you're not touching.

So you've got chi sao-like contact reflexes going on one of his arms and a direct visual monitoring his other arm.

Try it.

I will next time and let you know how it goes for me.

[SAAMAG]

Same guy. He's still able to tag me with those long range body punches. When he's going straight in it's no big deal because I just sink the elbow and as soon as I feel contact I punch straight and pop him in the face.

it's the ones that go around and behind my elbow and catch me in the kidneys that are getting through more often than not.

Otherwise pretty much standard issue stuff. I can kick him pretty much whenever I feel like it and just about on any target...but to be fair he's not usually fighting kickers. He doesn't check the low kicks, and I generally kick the body when he's punching high, and I kick the face when I've pressured him enough for him to drop his hands. Swiped his face again on this last session a few times since we didn't have head gear on. So I've not made any strong contact with the kicks and just let him know i could touch him with the feet.

The only real problem I've found in sparring him are those body hooks...even when I look at them because it doesn't seem as it he's hooking around---they LOOK like their straight and that my chum jang will do the job. I may have to start using gaan sao and stepping.

[Wayfaring]

Hey Van,

Thx for posting - it's kind of cool to try and think through your descriptions and relate. Of course it's hard to really see what's up with levels just through descriptions but it's cool anyway.

I have a couple of questions so humor me just for my mind pictures.

1) Does your opponent do takedowns and have you trained with that element in consideration? I'm asking because of all your descriptions of kicks. That tends to tighten up what you want to expose.

2) Boxing range. Same as WCK range? Or are you including one-sided long range jabs?

3) Hooks to body. Was he doing those as a counterpunch to straight in punching to the head? With or without evasion/slipping punches? I'm not getting a decent mind picture of "long range body shots".

4) Opponent seems like more boxing background? Doesn't know MT leg kick covers / blocks, thai clinching, etc?

It is a good writeup. I mean you can glean from it that WCK's areas of strength like dealing with a bridge, centerline and constant forward intent are useful tools. You also seem to have MT training - legs, and maybe legs from other training too?

Anyway, cool writeup.

[Ultimatewingchun]

You gotta watch those elbows if you want to see a straight punch for what it is - and a round one for what that is. :cool:

[SAAMAG]

I have a couple of questions so humor me just for my mind pictures.


1) Does your opponent do takedowns and have you trained with that element in consideration? I'm asking because of all your descriptions of kicks. That tends to tighten up what you want to expose.
We have only been working standup. Next session will be grappling. We're keeping things separate for the time being.

2) Boxing range. Same as WCK range? Or are you including one-sided long range jabs?No, his punching range is different than mine because of his longer reach. He's about 5' 11" to my 5' 7", and his arms are much longer. So if I used wing chun to press, that would indeed solve the problem by not allowing the long range body shots, but it wouldn't solve MY problem of me not being able to defend HIS non-conventional punches. I think he's timing them like I time my kicks, he goes down when I punch his head.

3) Hooks to body. Was he doing those as a counterpunch to straight in punching to the head? With or without evasion/slipping punches? I'm not getting a decent mind picture of "long range body shots".Oops. See above. He sometimes just sticks em out there, sometimes uses body movement combined with the punch timing my head shots. To be fair, when we spar lighter I just throw stuff to experiment. If I go with power, I will knock him out as illustrated by our previous sparring session. I don't want him getting hurt as he's one of the first guys that sticks around after getting knocked about.

4) Opponent seems like more boxing background? Doesn't know MT leg kick covers / blocks, thai clinching, etc?He's a boxing/52 blocks guy. I'm just now starting him on MT. He's learned the leg checks, but he doesn't really see them coming (from me) unless I'm doing it really slowly. In time he'll improve. Haven't started the clinch work yet with him nor have I implemented it during sparring on him. I don't want to do him dirty until he's got the means to deal with it.

It is a good writeup. I mean you can glean from it that WCK's areas of strength like dealing with a bridge, centerline and constant forward intent are useful tools. You also seem to have MT training - legs, and maybe legs from other training too? I had a lot of TKD training as a kid, TCMA training from Shaolin systems through the years, and of course MT for about as long as I've been doing wing chun, which was in my early teens (9th grade). I've been told that I'm pretty decent with my legs :D

[SAAMAG]

You gotta watch those elbows if you want to see a straight punch for what it is - and a round one for what that is. :cool:

Vic, this visual system doesn't work for me. As I stated the punches look like they're straight. He punches so unconventionally that it's not discernible to me right now. I'll figure him him out and start to recognize his punches, the good thing is that is the only time he can hit me. I've been hit with any real contact only once by him in the head, and that was a glancing blow to my forehead.

In MT I learned to eat body shots, meaning I didn't worry about them as much as my core was highly conditioned. His harder punches don't really hurt even in the body, but when they hook around to the backside like the kidneys I can't condition that area.

[SAAMAG]

I will eventually get some vids up hopefully. I want to make sure the others in the videos are okay with it first...and then I'll work on getting a video camera n stuff.

I might as well see what this new Mac computer is capable of. :p