Joe Louis and the Blackburn Crouch

[Discipulus]

"Same punches, but don't put anything on 'em."

"Easy, Arni."

I hope, for the sake of the other kid's pride, that he didn't hear that advice. Arni looks like he's got some heavy hands, and excellent balance and positioning to land them. That's kind of the way I'd envision myself boxing, not that I imagine myself to have particularly heavy hands or anything. But it's a style that doesn't require a lot of extreme mobility or bouncy footwork. Rather, it's a stalking, patient style, and I think that suits me well.

I wonder how I can adapt these kinds of things into Muay Thai.

 

[Sinister]

He gave a very good demonstration of how defensive he can really be when he was just throwing single shots and stepping through, which is merely a matter of posture and positioning. The other kid whiffing punches over his head and/or shoulders. He used to be a guy who ate 3 to land one.

 

[nvs1985]

I wonder how I can adapt these kinds of things into Muay Thai.

Ditch muay thai, start adapting straight away and give yourself to the sweet science!

 

[Discipulus]

Ditch muay thai, start adapting straight away and give yourself to the sweet science!

Jabbing is nice, but teeping keeps them so much farther away. And what's this I hear about "no holding and hitting?" :icon_lol:

Seriously, it is tempting. I may someday find myself more of a boxer than a nakmuay, but that's largely due to the fact that there don't seem to be as many Muay Thai guys around here with the sort of intellect for fighting and love of analyzing styles that the boxers around here show.

Still, I love my switch kicks and step through knees too much to give up Muay Thai entirely. Just boxing on the side for now. :wink:

 

[Nuclearlandmine]

lol. I am watching the shadowboxing video. Less than a third way through i thought "this guy is doing Tai Chi dammit"

Maybe tmr or something i should post the picture of me in the classic stance to see if i pulled it off.

 

[Strykerx]

Jabbing is nice, but teeping keeps them so much farther away. And what's this I hear about "no holding and hitting?" :icon_lol:

Seriously, it is tempting. I may someday find myself more of a boxer than a nakmuay, but that's largely due to the fact that there don't seem to be as many Muay Thai guys around here with the sort of intellect for fighting and love of analyzing styles that the boxers around here show.

Still, I love my switch kicks and step through knees too much to give up Muay Thai entirely. Just boxing on the side for now. :wink:

I left mma for boxing, come join the darkside

 

[adirion]

Jabbing is nice, but teeping keeps them so much farther away. And what's this I hear about "no holding and hitting?" :icon_lol:

Seriously, it is tempting. I may someday find myself more of a boxer than a nakmuay, but that's largely due to the fact that there don't seem to be as many Muay Thai guys around here with the sort of intellect for fighting and love of analyzing styles that the boxers around here show.

Still, I love my switch kicks and step through knees too much to give up Muay Thai entirely. Just boxing on the side for now. :wink:

I know exactly what you mean, the problem with doing muay thai is that it's difficult to get knowledge such as this, the working of angles or anything that's more than stand in front of your opponent and prove you have a larger dick than him. I've been trying to take as much away from here(eg bladed stance), but it's extremely frustrating, and getting to the point where if there were serious boxing gyms in here that could teach something like this, i'm ditching muay thai in spite of my love for kicks to learn how to fucking fight as oppose to bang.

 

[Discipulus]

I know exactly what you mean, the problem with doing muay thai is that it's difficult to get knowledge such as this, the working of angles or anything that's more than stand in front of your opponent and prove you have a larger dick than him. I've been trying to take as much away from here(eg bladed stance), but it's extremely frustrating, and getting to the point where if there were serious boxing gyms in here that could teach something like this, i'm ditching muay thai in spite of my love for kicks to learn how to fucking fight as oppose to bang.

Makes you wish you could go to Thailand.

Then again, many of the same principles apply. You simply have more options. If you get into a fight with someone who likes to box, you don't have to outbox him. Instead of slipping and ripping to the body you can tie up hands and throw knee after knee. Instead of simply pivoting out you can throw kicks off of the pivot step while you avoid the opponent's offense.

The real issue is that, if it weren't for Sherdog, I wouldn't have access to this kind of information at all. I'd be covering up and feeling hopeless even in simple jab drills rather than catching jabs and teaching myself to use distance and see them coming.

I went to one of the boxing classes at my gym the other day (it's an MMA gym, mind you), and the coach, who was new as far as I could tell, was clearly not a boxer. He was an amateur mixed martial artist. He was all up on his front foot, leaned over it. Gloves glued to his cheeks, demonstrating slips and the like. I could see it in his demonstration, how damn close his face was to his opponent's gloves. I thought, this is not a stance designed for slipping and avoiding being hit. This isn't good boxing.

It's disheartening to feel that away about coaches, and you can't expect the highest quality instruction from a gym that doesn't specialize in boxing, or even striking at all really. But it would be nice to have either a boxing or Muay Thai instructor round these parts who could point out the kinds of things that get discussed on here.

 

[crossFTW]

It's a little deceiving because if you didn't know any better you'd think he WAS standing in Southpaw position. But he's not, he's demonstrating the right hand. His left thigh appears to be facing to his left because he would externally rotate the lead knee. The right leg appears just slightly inward because there's a slight internal rotation of that knee (when a coach tells you to turn your ankle, really you should turn your hip and only as far as to stabilize the punch, going even an inch further serves no purpose).

The hand is fired from basically, just below the shoulder so that the trunk supports the weight of the punch. Basically, you get hit by that right hand and you get hit in the face with all 160lbs or so of Robinson. The hip rotations are what allow for him to be off-center the whole time he does throw. Hence, it's extremely difficult to hit him back.

3) Rear foot.

4) Not really. Maybe less dramatic knee bends when moving to allow for lighter kicking movements. Most kicking arts that understand principals of balance, and do not depend solely on momentum to provide it have some of these notions in them. I had a client here from the UK who told me the Boxing stuff I showed him was closer to the Karate he learned than the Boxing he was being taught at the MMA Gym he went to in the UK.

How did SRR hold his fist while throwing a straight right? Was is a vertical or horizontal or even diagonal like in the pic?
I've heard he never had any serious hand injuries, which is amazing when you consider how many fights he had.
I tried to watch his videos to see but the footage is not the best and he is so dam fast its too hard to see.

 

[adirion]

Makes you wish you could go to Thailand.

Then again, many of the same principles apply. You simply have more options. If you get into a fight with someone who likes to box, you don't have to outbox him. Instead of slipping and ripping to the body you can tie up hands and throw knee after knee. Instead of simply pivoting out you can throw kicks off of the pivot step while you avoid the opponent's offense.

The real issue is that, if it weren't for Sherdog, I wouldn't have access to this kind of information at all. I'd be covering up and feeling hopeless even in simple jab drills rather than catching jabs and teaching myself to use distance and see them coming.

I went to one of the boxing classes at my gym the other day (it's an MMA gym, mind you), and the coach, who was new as far as I could tell, was clearly not a boxer. He was an amateur mixed martial artist. He was all up on his front foot, leaned over it. Gloves glued to his cheeks, demonstrating slips and the like. I could see it in his demonstration, how damn close his face was to his opponent's gloves. I thought, this is not a stance designed for slipping and avoiding being hit. This isn't good boxing.

It's disheartening to feel that away about coaches, and you can't expect the highest quality instruction from a gym that doesn't specialize in boxing, or even striking at all really. But it would be nice to have either a boxing or Muay Thai instructor round these parts who could point out the kinds of things that get discussed on here.

Honestly, in most camps in Thailand, i don't think you'll learn much of that. Having trained under a few different Thai trainers and having trained in thailand, i find that they work your technique and show you little tricks here and there, but there's very little in the vein of the discussion we're having here. But then again, it could be a language problem. Or i could just be too fat/lazy/unfit for them to bother with me. Meh.

One does agree, you've different options in muay thai like what you've stated above. I wouldn't necessarily say more. As many similarities as they share, i do believe that they're very different kettle of fishes. In terms of strategies, footwork, the kind of guys you end up facing, etc etc.

I know exactly what you mean about the coaching. There are too many people coaching who really shouldn't be. I mean, speaking as a coach myself(for judo) i've found that many coach because they THINK they're fantastic, but lack an understanding of the intricacies of the sport. And they pass on their knowledge to the next generation, most of which would lap up that knowledge gratefully. Why wouldn't they? They don't know any better, and we end up with a lowered level of the sport in the next generation. Frustrates the fuck out of me.

I've no idea what i just typed, i had something relatively witty and relavant planned. But then i started ranting. Feel free to ignore me.

 

[Discipulus]

I guess the best person to study would be Petrosyan. He employs a mix of tactics from both styles.

 

[Sinister]

How did SRR hold his fist while throwing a straight right? Was is a vertical or horizontal or even diagonal like in the pic?
I've heard he never had any serious hand injuries, which is amazing when you consider how many fights he had.
I tried to watch his videos to see but the footage is not the best and he is so dam fast its too hard to see.

How to properly ball a fist and what parts of the fist impact with each punch would be a whole other DVD within the first three DVD's if I made a set of them.

It's incredibly difficult to describe without physically demonstrating it. But I hit stuff bare-fisted all the time. One Coach who doesn't know shit saw me hitting a bag like that once and stopped me to say it's the worst thing I could do. He said I would tear the skin off of my knuckles. I showed him my fist, how the point of impact is minimal, and how there's nice leathery calluses right on them, as leathery as the bag itself. I said "ain't no skin comin' off them knuckles." I don't have anymore hand pains, either. I used to when I first started. Rolled my wrists a lot, got pain when I would land with an improperly balled fist. Now, almost never. I occasionally catch my thumb on stuff, but I have long thumbs that stick out a bit. That one is an anatomical problem.

 

[Nuclearlandmine]

I tried shadowboxing extensively today in this stance. When everything was slow, i definitely note how my punch were lining up together beautifully, especially the rear punches. I sort of get some difficulty weight shifting with some lead hand punches (except the jab) but i managed to figured out what to do. Despite that, i felt like in between the tempo of each of the punch i throw there is ought to me a moment when the hip and the weight are shifitng back and forth to load the next punch. I gurss with practice these moments become shorter and smoother?

Funny thing is that i had to remind myself to keep the chin down, back straight, chest up and shoulder loose as well. Definitely gonna try it out later in sparring.

EDIT: tried out the hooks on the heavy bag. It was powerful than i ever expected Little rotation yet i could feel like i can knock somebody out with this, even though my forms wasnt the best due to unfamiliarity. Although i did it with MMA gloves so my knuckles are a bit sore, but even so i thought something worse should have happened with that kind of power.

 

[sboone**]

We told him to go easy that round because he almost knocked that kid out in the previous round.

Wow, thats freaking beautiful. Wouldn't have guessed who great it works after watching the shadowboxing video before. I'm afraid theres no gym around here where I could learn that. Anyway I can teach it myself (books, drills?). Had to quit boxing due to injury 18 months ago, but just watching that makes me want to go back again.

 

[Discipulus]

Unfortunately, I bet that kid's trainers then told him, "You did better that round." He was winging full-powered punches the whole time, especially when he got frustrated. Even when Arni wasn't hitting him full-power. Then again, he might have realized what was going on when Arni popped him with a serious punch later in the round.

 

[Sinister]

Unfortunately neither he, nor his trainer, have been back to our Gym. Though I heard he broke his toe, so he's recovering from that. But even shortly after this session they started going elsewhere I believe.

 

[IslamicMuayThai]

this is a great thread.

Sinister, when standing like Louis (where the focus is on the bend at the hips, not the waist with a straight back), I feel like almost all my weight is loaded on the rear foot. Is this correct? I have a bad habit of both hunching my shoulders AND bending at the waist.

 

[Sinister]

Yes, the rear weight is initially on the rear foot. The notion of the lead hand is it's just a distraction. The sledge hammer is the rear hand. That's not to say the lead hand can't be used to throw hard punches, but the weight has to shift from hip to hip to facilitate it (in the sparring footage above, watch how Arni shifts when he throws say an uppercut, then a hook right after). Otherwise the weight is loaded on the rear leg to keep the rear hand loaded to punch hard at all times.

 

[Zephyros]

Still practicing these concepts, but already it

 

[crossFTW]

How to properly ball a fist and what parts of the fist impact with each punch would be a whole other DVD within the first three DVD's if I made a set of them.

It's incredibly difficult to describe without physically demonstrating it. But I hit stuff bare-fisted all the time. One Coach who doesn't know shit saw me hitting a bag like that once and stopped me to say it's the worst thing I could do. He said I would tear the skin off of my knuckles. I showed him my fist, how the point of impact is minimal, and how there's nice leathery calluses right on them, as leathery as the bag itself. I said "ain't no skin comin' off them knuckles." I don't have anymore hand pains, either. I used to when I first started. Rolled my wrists a lot, got pain when I would land with an improperly balled fist. Now, almost never. I occasionally catch my thumb on stuff, but I have long thumbs that stick out a bit. That one is an anatomical problem.

Yeah I seem to catch my thumb a lot when I throw with a the palm facing down, I got long thin fingers too so that doesn't help

Does this guy give a good demonstration on balling a fist? he gives three variations