Around the Clock

[Dana Sheets]

Courtesy of Mr. McCarthy I learned a drill that shows a variety of impacting strikes from most basic angles - similar to the attack patterns in kali.

I'm curious how folks tend to train their students to be familiar with strikes that are not straight punches. As folks probably know by now - I'm a big believer that the brain needs to see a variety of attack patterns beyond a straight punch to be able to twitch correctly when attacks do come.

The clock pattern works well as a template:


And then asking students what kinds of attacks come at them from the various angles.

[JimHawkins]

Chi Sao does not really use circular attacks, it trains close range control.

I like progressive sparring... I use also like and use JKD concepts when I can..

Start off slow and obvious then make it more natural.. Folks catch on faster if you do it naturally and talk them through the drills and changes in motion as you fire at them too.. See talking CAN work!!!

Starting off with Single Direct Attacks..

Then adding in Indirect Single Attacks...

Then adding in Indirect Attack by Combination..

You can also break it down more for folks...or make it more complicated by doing drills where there are two attackers..etc.

[Dana Sheets]

Well is more than one clock face to think about for sure. There's the one on the floor where you're standing/facing - and then there's the one in front of you (suspended in mid-air) whichever way you're facing.

So someone throws the overhand haymaker swing from directly in front of you (12:00 on the floor) to your 10:00, their 2:00 position. Now they move over so they're at the 1:00 position on the floor and throw the attack at the same place towards your head.

Notice what changes. Notice what doesn't. Continue around the clock on the floor with the same attack. Then start again using a different attack.

[2Green]

I like this a lot!
Good way of visualizing the angles. Lately I'm seeing more real life attacks done by punching "up and over" so that the punch comes down at your face from above.
Been thinking about Uechi defenses for this.

I seem to have picked up a penchant for hooking punches, apparently I throw them automatically. My senior training partners (ok, they're all senior...) actually love this because they get to test their techniques against a different type of strike.
I don't know where this habit came from but it seems natural to me.

So now you have the clock face you're standing on, the one you're facing, and also one beside you as well!

NM

[Stryke]

Dana do you employ the McCarthy tegumi type drills/practice in regards to the angles ? , just curious on how you see some of that material .

Arm pounding taken to different angles ? different forces etc ?

[JimHawkins]

Continue around the clock on the floor with the same attack. Then start again using a different attack.

Well in standard sparring drills <however one works them> the chance to address variations in angles is still there with the exception of extreme angles such as from 4 to 8 o'clock which is outside the visual range.. How does the drill work when the 'defender' cannot see the attacker?

[Dana Sheets]

Slow motion attacks from behind and responses can't begin until touch contact. Responses are to stay in slow motion.

You can't really learn to defend against a pistol-whip to the back of your neck that you didn't hear coming.

However you can learn how to recapture your balance and focus from a stagger.

Stryke- Mr. McCarthy has a clear progression to his version of this training that he calls his Quadrant drill. I'd highly reccomend his DVD on that drill, which is now available, to anyone. However most of that drill is toe to toe alignment until the higher levels when then training becomes more contiuous motion.

Just last night what we did was partner hojo-undo. Except the attacker stood at 9 o'clock or three o'clock and the receiver faced 12 o'clock. So we just worked two angles with two attacks (head punches) and the receiver worked through 12 ways to receive the attacks. Once everyone got more comfortable we threw the fixed hojo-undo responses out and folks were allowed to use the best response that came to mind (to body). That moves the training from passive to active, ups the error quotient (which is good) and gives lots of opportunities for people to see what they're struggling with.

So on Thursday I plan to do basically the same thing - but this time students will be receiving sucker punches, open handed slaps, and back-handed slaps from 10 and 2, and 12 and 4. (The left-handed back slap often coming from someone who is holding a drink in their dominant hand.)

Since that first twitch in a fight is oh so important, and because as a woman I know that the attacks that come at me may not come from someone standing directly in front of me - for now I'm looking at this as more of a free-form exercise.

My teacher used to have us do a drill where one person was in the middle with their eyes closed and someone from the circle around them could attack them. They could open their eyes as soon as they "sensed" the attack. However I like to use the clock faces because they can add a paradigm and way to keep track of which angles have been thrown (and thus trained) and which haven't.

For the 4-5 o'clock position it is very important that people try to thow the low to high sucker punch going into the body. This is one of the most difficult attacks to learn to receive if you get behind the timeline and once landed often does a good job of disrupting your balance.

So I think that starting at slow speeds and speeding up using the clocks helps people build an awareness of a sphere of possible attacks rather than just lines.

I had a terrible time seeing lines of force when I first did judo. I could do circles of force quite well - that's pretty much what judo does. But mixing lines and lines and lines and circles was not something I did well until I started thinking of it as angles on the clock. For some reason that connected to something in my brain and i was able to see everything better. Doesn't mean I do the right thing about it most of the time - but at least I'm able to see it.

[Dana Sheets]

FWIW I see this drill as mostly about the body shifting and footwork. If you can get that going - then the hands usually take care of themselves.
-d