Clinches.

[Mr Punch]

I'm confused.

For a change.

Over the years I've picked up some good clinch tips, but I don't know where they've come from.

I assumed the main one I learned in my MMA classes was basically wrestling, but a slightly straighter back so I could fire off kicks/knees and protect against the same. My head was flush against his for closer control in grappling and further away if I wanted to jerk him about for knees. The more wrestly one (I can hear the wrestlers reading this groaning at the gheyness of that expression already! ) 'started' with one hand under and one over; and of course we did swimming drills to get control of the middle, and to find the underhooks. Didn't work so much from overhooks (yet another weak point).

I can't confirm any of this with my ex-teacher as he's out of the country (again) in filming for a reality MMA show.

For the chunners reading this, I have a (barely) modified fuk sao clinch from my wing chun, which is slightly offset from square-on, hand hooked around the back of the head/neck (depending on his reaction), and elbow tight in to his chest to enable me to jerk him about (and nut him if necessary). If I want more control for throws etc, I go for the other hand too, but usually one or both hands will alternate from fuk sao (elbow in) to lan/bong (elbow out) to keep his hands from coming over the top. I don't want to maintain this clinch for any length of time. I want to sweep, stamp, takedown or elbow asap. I also want control over pulling his head forwards and back if necessary.

What flavour is your clinch? Does your art even have one, and what do you do if someone comes into that range if it doesn't? And what the hell am I doing?

Thought we'd have a slightly more technical discussion for a change.

[Oso]

lol...i like to see someone else with as random a posting style as my own at times

cheers


as far as clinching

my base is folk wrestling from high school so I suppose I use a basic collar and elbow thingie. nothing I've done as far as jj has changed that too much. though, with a gi on I've tried to pick up some stuff to play with there.

i do a little more of a loose hook with my forearm/hand around the neck versus a grab though...I like to be able to use my forearm against the collarbone/upper chest to check duck unders and highcrotch type moves.

i do suck at defending the knees in the clench though so I'm doing something wrong there. if the knees start coming I basically try to get closer and throw, lift or heel trip.

basically, while 'clinch happens', I don't think you should strive to spend a lot of time there.

[SenseiShellie]

Honestly, I like the Muay Thai clinch. It's soo controlling when used correctly.

[Black Jack II]

I love the clinch, it's a very usefull transition. For me it would be a mixture of thai and the over and under.

Thai is really good for the striking game, has good control if done right and has some ok takedown potential but the over and under can be worked with blade defense training with some suprising results and it offers striking and control on top of that.

The old irish collar and elbow is a wrestling standard. It's got some neat short range shots in it like shoulder shrugs and forearm strikes.

[yenhoi]

I try to punch and kick my way into the clinch, then mainly thai plum or some sort of neck and elbow tie so I can start smashing with elbows and knees, and then get the person to the ground while passing their legs to finish. I try and spend as little time as possible out kick boxing, and as much time as possible smashing things in the clinch. If I really out-skill someone then I will throw them instead of going to the ground.

My knife/stick offense/defense is very similar. Get to clinch to control and then dominate and destroy from there.

[Black Jack II]

I try and spend as little time as possible out kick boxing, and as much time as possible smashing things in the clinch

Same ideal here. Infighting is where a lot of the power tools can come into play.

[D-FENS]

Dumog. Control the elbow and shoulder, get him in position and pelt him with elbows and knees. Then take him down.

[Becca]

Haven't gotten into my system's ground fighting far enought to lern it's clinch yet. But I do use a basing wrestling clinch when I roll.

[Mr Punch]

When I said I don't want to spend much time in the clinch, it7s because I'm assuming that I'll have taken them out or taken them down before too long.
If your system doesn't have any clinch work that7s a flaw. Even if it doesn'T, you can work it into training and see what tools your system has for dealing with it. That7s what I did with my chun.

I always figured, why don't we do clinch when at chun's ideal range it HAS TO have one... then I realised when I did MMA that chun works beautifully in the clinch.

BTW to Sensei Shellie, for those of us who don't do Thai, please explain the dynamics of the Thai clinch briefly, if you've got the time. Cheers.

The collar and elbows a beaut. If I have time I7ll dig up some nice links to youtube Scottish wrestling later.

[Black Jack II]

Dumog. Control the elbow and shoulder, get him in position and pelt him with elbows and knees. Then take him down.

De-Fens,

I have trained in a little dumog through a couple of teachers, which method do you work with, the Vunack/JKD method or something like Tuhon Leo Gaje's?

The material I learned was a bit of the Vunack material when training in JKD and some taught to me by another guru in San Diego which looked similar in certain respects but a had a couple of differences. Besides the inside and outside arm drags, something which is very common in wrestern wrestling, shoulder controls and headtwist/neck clinch takedowns that you see in the jkd verison, I picked up some other variations on dumog takedowns, he called them panumba, dislocations called pag-kalisa and a little joint locking called trangkadas.

[D-FENS]

De-Fens,

I have trained in a little dumog through a couple of teachers, which method do you work with, the Vunack/JKD method or something like Tuhon Leo Gaje's?

The material I learned was a bit of the Vunack material when training in JKD and some taught to me by another guru in San Diego which looked similar in certain respects but a had a couple of differences. Besides the inside and outside arm drags, something which is very common in wrestern wrestling, shoulder controls and headtwist/neck clinch takedowns that you see in the jkd verison, I picked up some other variations on dumog takedowns, he called them panumba, dislocations called pag-kalisa and a little joint locking called trangkadas.

Black Jack, I work with the standard JKD format, as taught by Vunak, Hartsell et al. Never been exposed to any of the Pekiti stuff, although it seems fascinating. Would you mind describing how the training methods compare? And do the panumba, trangkadas etc come directly from Gaje's system?

cheers,
Wes

[Black Jack II]

D-Fens,

No, its not the Gaje system. The instructor I learned some of my second dumog experiances from came from a mix of systems, I believe his own stuff came from a mix of the Villabrille-Largusa eskrima material, which would make sense as this was in California at the time, Doces Pares, and Largo Mano as we only used the 5 angles and not the Cacoy 12.

His dumog looked more like jujitsu than the jkd material, the trangkadas were used in weapon removal, come alongs and standup submission holds like in chin na. He was a jack of all trades and did things a little different, he had cross trained in jujitsu in the past, it may of been some vee-jujitsu but I have no real idea on the ryu, but I can see where the influence was and I know he had some gung fu training and it would not of suprised me to see some chinese chin na in there to make up for some other material.

He just called his stuff arnis de mano, he kept it simple, single stick, simple angles, he liked redondo a lot, hubud-lubud, the typical female/male triangle stepping, basic forward and reverse knife on the same angles lines but with some dirty tricks and specific targets involved, dumog for stand up grappling and entries and we worked a lot of panatuken.