Casual`s Guide to Art of Fighting : Part 1
Discover the concepts behind the combat sports!
“Aren`t you afraid of getting punched in the face”, a friend once asked.
We were on a long road trip to a mutual friend`s wedding, killing time by trading stories with each other. When I casually mentioned I had competed in a kickboxing bout, he brought up this question which had got me thinking about the martial arts and how they are perceived by others.
Our interactions made me realize that most people don’t understand what’s going on in the fight. Fighting is not as random as many believe it to be, there is science behind it. Do I hate getting punched in the face? “Absolutely yes”. But that’s a problem I am solving in the ring, as the fight unwinds.
Chapter 1: Introduction
Over the past decade, the popularity of the martial arts has been rising slowly and steadily. Each martial art has its own rulesets and scoring criteria. Think of rulesets as an inventory check which dictates the weapons that athletes can bring into the ring while the scoring criteria sets the incentive for an athlete to use a particular weapon. The scoring criteria in most unarmed combat versions of martial arts generally fall into one of three categories:
- Based on damage: The one who does more damage to the opponent wins. This is judged by reaction, visible damage per round. Widely used in Mixed Martial Arts promotions such as UFC
- Point System: Landing hits or takedowns to score points, and the one who has most points win, e.g. karate, wrestling
- Finish Oriented: The match goes on till someone gives yields, e.g. submission grappling
In unarmed combats, the primary weapons available to athletes are their limbs and rulesets determine which of these limbs can be used. Boxing uses only hands, whereas kick boxing include hands and legs.
Practitioners of a particular martial arts, dedicate their life to understand the nuances of the weapon available to them, teach their body to use them under pressure and learn to create situations to leverage the weapons for their advantage while minimizing the damage taken.
I am writing this article to share my insights on what I have learned over eight years of practicing different martial arts. The readers can understand the fundamental dynamics of striking such as range, stance, footwork etc. and how these variables are incorporated to solve the problem presented by the opponent. By the end of this article, I hope to give you a mental framework that helps you appreciate the sport on a much deeper level the next time you watch a fight.
Few terminologies to know before we get to the meat of the matter.
- Weapon/ Strikes: The tactical use of limbs (hands, feet, knees, elbows) to inflict damage.
- Neutral Position: A clean slate where both athletes face one another, neither holding an immediate positional advantage.
- Centre line: An imaginary plane extending straight out from the center of a fighter’s body. In combat sports, controlling the centerline means controlling the fight.
So, what determines the dynamics of a fight?
Disclaimer: This article won’t go into fine details about mechanics of the strikes, power, footwork etc. Only intended to give an overview and will strictly limit to striking aspect of the combat.
Chapter 2: Range — Can I use my weapon to damage my opponent?
As you might have already figured out, just staying out of range of an opposition trying to take your head is a great solution. But there is a problem with this, as the goal of the game requires you to actually fight back and put some damage or score on your opponent. Unless you happen to be a long limbed creature, who possess significant range advantage, it is necessary for you to understand the effective range of strikes.
Point to Note: To make the concepts easy to understand, I am sticking to the most basic weapon from lead hand (the hand in the front) called jab. Why jab? This is the strike commonly used to find the range for offense as well as used to control the range.
To explain the range, lets have a look at the above diagram.
He is throwing a jab at his opponent and the points A,B,C,D shows the position of the opponent.
- At point A, Opponent is too far to be hit, you have to move towards your opponent to hit. Pretty obvious isn't it!
- At point B, you can still hit the opponent but the punch does no damage, even if you have one shot kill power. To effectively hit and cause damage, the punch has to go through the opponent.
- At point C, opponent is within range and power generated can be transferred to the opponent and hence the optimum range for the jab.
- At point D, you can still hit the target and punch can go through the target but wont be able to generate power from a jab. Jab gets jammed before it could fully extend to generate maximum power. (More details on the power chapter)
So for a jab, opponent needs to be around the point C to effectively inflict damage.
Point to Note: When someone has more range than the opponent it gives them a reach advantage. Why advantage not disadvantage? Well you can hit the other from a place where they can`t hit back
Now based on the weapon and you throw/use it, there can be different ranges for each of it. For Eg: you can throw a jab while leaning forward to increase the range but you lose balance (More details in the chapter Stance).
Range due to angles
We looked at the linear distribution of the power, i.e. in simple words we are assuming the opponent is standing right in front of us in the same line but what if opponent is slightly towards the side we are facing.
As shown from the top view of the diagram, there is an effective range determined by angles. If opponent is standing at an angle from the centerline and beyond the arc given in image, the power generated from the jab will drop even if they are standing at a range for punch to pass through. You will need to reposition the feet, so the opponent is present inside arc to hit effectively.
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Point to Note: When someone has taken an angle and is facing the opponent, then they have created an advantage due to angle. Why advantage? That person has his power line (centerline) facing the opponent while opponents power line (centerline) is staring at nothing.
Range identification
Based on the weapon you choose there can be different effective ranges for each. Elite fighter understand the range of their weapons as well as opponents weapons. They have a means to identify the range they want to operate in a match and the range they have to operate in to deny their opponent their best weapons. For: e.g., they may throw a jab just to judge the distance with no intention to land.
Knowledge of effective range of opponent`s weapons helps in strategizing against the opponent. Similar, analysis can be done for kicks and other strikes. As I mentioned before, this article is just an overview of the variables you need to keep in mind. I encourage the readers to take up any martial arts and learn its nuances.
As you may have noticed the understanding of range is incomplete without the understanding mechanics used to generate power. In next chapter I will address the foundation of getting power in the strikes.
Chapter 3: Power — How do I generate power to cause damage?
You might have come across a scene in anime or movies where the character slams the ground with the feet, as if to signal something big is about to happen. I would say they have got one part right, the power comes from the ground. The harder you push at the ground, harder the ground reflects back at you, which you need to channel it across your body to generate power. Remember Newton! he once said:
“For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction”
Point to Note: There are different nuances to generating power based on the weapon being used. The objective of this section is to make you understand how to use the ground to generate power in the punches.
Point to Note: The diagram is intended to convey the idea of reaction force based on the direction you push the ground.
Types of Power
There are two ways the force generate by the normal reaction is used to generate power,
Rotation power: The power comes from using this normal reaction force to twist the body to land the strikes. Think of a tornado being generated in the body and as hip spins, arms spins along with it
Normal reaction -> Used to twist the hips -> Twisting of hips causes the upper body to rotate-> this rotation is channeled into hands
Point to Note: See it for yourself, stand straight with arms loose, just rotate the hips fast and see the arms following the rotation of hips. Here there is a conversion of the reaction force into a rotational torque through the kinetic chains
Once you learn to connect this rotation of upper body with the shoulder blade and to stiffening the arm just before the impact, you have successfully mastered the basics of rotational power.
Examples of strikes that are rotation dominant, hooks, cross, round house kicks
Momentum power: This is pure linear acceleration. You push off the ground, launch your body mass forward, and intentionally create a collision like a battering ram.
Ground push-> Linear acceleration-> Braking-> Force Transfer
Examples of strikes that are momentum dominant are jab, knees, push kicks
Point to Note: In reality, power generation is a combination of both rotational and momentum based power. This is given so the readers can understand how power is generated without going into the technical details of each strikes.
How can the power generation be disrupted?
Disruption of power generation can be done in 2 ways and this is applicable to both type of the power.
Disruption of the kinetic chain: When the power of a strike is being generated across the body from the ground, and if any part of the chain gets interrupted then power in the final strike will be reduced. For e.g. If you watch the fights, you may notice fighters throwing calf kicks as an investment in early rounds. Once calf gets damaged it reduces the ability of opponent to generate power from the leg.
Lack of rigid/stiff point of contact: If the final point of contact does not act as a rigid body then it fails to transfer the force. Remember, in last chapter we talked about jab getting jammed and hence no effective power. For the linear momentum to create maximum impact there needs to be an stiff point of contact. At full extension, you can lock the arm and the jab gets to act as a rigid body transferring momentum. When the jab doesn’t get to extend and lock, its as if the ram of a battering ram turning into a sponge and fail to transfer the momentum onto the object. This is the very reason jab loses it power as you move away from the centerline as well.
Shot selection
Typically the bulk of the power lies in the green zone, and depending on where the opponent lie in that zone determines the shot selection. If a person is standing in red area, then both of them are close to each other almost hugging chest to chest, and usually grappling takes over in this zone and strikes get jammed before they could generate any sort of damaging power. Secondly most strikes power peak towards the centerline (the blue line) and slowly regress opponent creates bigger angle with the centerline.
If you notice, there is vast area apart from the green zone, not marked , this areas are places where you cant either reach or generate any meaningful power. If the opponent is consistently staying away from the your range and never in the green zone, then to land any meaningful shot, you need to adjust your positioning or move to reach the required range for your shot using footwork.
In the next section we will look at the footwork, which decides how to get into the effective range, how to get out of the range.
To be continued
Quick note: I did want to finish this article in one go, so every pieces start connecting together but its taking way more time than I had anticipated. So I am writing this in parts. Writing is tough! In the meantime, I would appreciate feedback from my readers.
