Break falls...not so good?

[ps1]

Seems like an interesting question. Of course, the only reason for slapping is to increase the amount of surface area that hits the ground at once. It also makes you less likely to "reach" for the ground. This decreases the potential injury caused by hitting the ground with a small point of the body.

As someone else pointed out, however, the liklihood of being thrown in such a way that you need to "slap off" with both arms is slim. That would mean they are throwing you directly to your back. Usually, a person is falling to their side and the "slap" just amounts to extending the arm out from under the torso to avoid breaking the arm/ wrist/ elbow on the ground. Also, a breakfall that stops momentum completely is just painful. You really shouldn't stop all motion with it. The only exception to that would be the front breakfall, which I've never seen used other than in drills. As far as falling on rocks or cement, that hurts alot no matter what.

Someone else mentioned the desire for the opponent to retain your arm and armbar you as you fall. If the opponent is good skilled enough to perform a takedown and followup with an armbar, you were probably outclassed anyway.

I guess what I'm saying is that a proper breakfall should leave you in a position of defendability. Anytime you get taken down, you're in a bad position. It's more important to know how to fight properly from the ground once you get there than to worry about wether your arm slaps off or not. Personally, I'm a slapper. Just my opinions though.

[bushido_man96]

Good points, ps1. I slap a lot, too, but I am also working with the rolling out option as well.

[cross]

It obviously depends on how you are falling, but instead of automatically going into the "oh no, im gunna fall over, better breakfall" defensive mindset, try doing some offensive while being taken down. Put your hand in their face, even if its just to disrupt them.(keep in mind it wont work all the time, if your about to fall straight on your head do something with your arms to lessen the impact). But in most cases you will be able to do something that will give you the advantage the moment you hit the ground. Its common to see people kind of freeze up and accept the takedown then try to work for a position when they reach the ground. It makes more sense to me to do something to put you at an advantage and keep attacking while you adjust positions to get back up. Drill it slow to start with isolating a basic tackle and looking at what you can do offensively, from their build up gradually to full out.

[Ottman]

Someone else mentioned the desire for the opponent to retain your arm and armbar you as you fall. If the opponent is good skilled enough to perform a takedown and followup with an armbar, you were probably outclassed anyway.

I'm not sure if you were referring to my earlier post or not, but I meant that the person being taken down should try and maneuver for the armbar, or at least try to capture something on the way down to prevent their opponent getting a totally dominant position.

As cross mentioned in the post above, people tend to freeze on the way down, and I agree that getting yourself into a defensive position and then focusing on the ground game is best to prevent this 'freeze-up'. The good thing about getting in the habit of focusing on positioning or possibly capturing an arm, etc. is that you're getting in the habit of reacting to your opponent, rather than just defaulting to a break fall, which (as cross also mentioned) may not work depending upon the position you're in. Also, as a few have mentioned already, being taken down hurts (at least a little) no matter what you do, so just getting used to the shock, whether you are executing a break fall or not will give you the poise to continue working through the pain rather than tightening up and panicking (which hurts more anyway.)

[lordtariel]

I do see slapping a little like the formal strikes in a kata. You practice them, but when sparring, it's a little different.

Just because it's impractical in a fight though, doesn't mean you shouldn't learn to do it. In fact, you should probably spend some time training to do it since most people are far more likely to fall sometime in their life than they are to get into a fight where they're thrown.

[Ottman]

I think you've hit the nail squarely, and firmly on the head with your last post lordt.

[cross]

Just because it's impractical in a fight though, doesn't mean you shouldn't learn to do it. In fact, you should probably spend some time training to do it since most people are far more likely to fall sometime in their life than they are to get into a fight where they're thrown.

Good point, i suppose if your option is to fall and extend your hand out like most people do resulting in broken wrists etc, or to slap, then the slap is a good skill to have.

[ninjer]

Seems like an interesting question. Of course, the only reason for slapping is to increase the amount of surface area that hits the ground at once. It also makes you less likely to "reach" for the ground. This decreases the potential injury caused by hitting the ground with a small point of the body..

ps1 summed it all up for you there-thats the reason that theres breakfalls in judo/jiu jitsu.

A friend of mine and I have been practicing some Combat Hapkido, along with a blend of some concepts from J. Hock Hocheim's self-defense system.

We began discussing breakfalls, and Hock likes it when martial artists do a slapping, traditional breakfall, because they can then "die like a martial artist." What he means by this is that the breakfall has become so ingrained in the martial artist that when he is taken down, he will fall and slap (the traditional breakfall), stopping his momentum, and leaving himself in place to be attacked and taken advantage of.

When he slaps the ground, hes doing exactly what ps1 explained- increasing his surface area and preventing himself from reaching for the ground. There is no momentum to be taken advantage of when you're thrown. You have no control of what happens to you when you're getting thrown, its all up to how your opponent has control of you. When your feet arent touching the ground you're at your opponents mercy and he can throw you how he sees fit. Perhaps Hock overlooks the fact that either way, you're going to be "in place" once you get thrown. The difference is the person who knows (and it accustomed) to getting thrown is going to hit the ground and be in optimal condition still prepared to fight from his back, whereas the person not accustomed to falling is either ko'ed or disabled from having the wind knocked out of him.

What my friend was talking about along with this was the idea of rolling out or away during the fall, in order to get away from the assailant, and keeping your body as far away as possible from an ensuing attack once you are taken down.

After discussing it with my partner, and seeing some ideas of what he was talking about, I think I agree with him. Anybody else have any thoughts on this?

Sounds like a great plan, however most falls go this way

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Not this way ----->

As such its quite difficult to roll out or away from your opponent, especially considering the fact that your opponent is often falling on top of you at the completion of the throw.

Heres a Judo highlight from youtube:

What you're seeing when people are "rolling" out of the throw isnt a result of any technique they're doing, but rather the person executing the throw. Its known as "overthrowing" your opponent when you generate too much momentum during the throw. The throwers momemtum is often going forward or backward while the person being thrown has momemtum going straight down. The overthrow is just a result of the person on the bottom who still holds on to the person who threw him- if that person generated too much momentum and is unable to base out he falls over and his opponent just hangs on for the ride and comes on top. This is not a concious decision though. Often the throw happens so fast that the person getting thrown never released their grips from the feet.

Heres a wrestling highlight

As you can see its in a wrestlers best interests if he can do what you explained. Most of the time though, the other wrestler maintains control when he hits a good takedown

[bushido_man96]

That's a good post, ninjer. Thanks for the information and the links. I think that both the Judo/Jujitsu players and the Wrestlers all have something in common: they don't have to worry about being struck after the takedowns. On the street, that is a definite possibility to deal with.

However, I can understand the points you are making in your post, and they have merit.

Upon landing, you have to be ready to deal with being struck or jumped on, and each would be dealt with differently, I think.

[bushido_man96]

Just because it's impractical in a fight though, doesn't mean you shouldn't learn to do it. In fact, you should probably spend some time training to do it since most people are far more likely to fall sometime in their life than they are to get into a fight where they're thrown.

Good point, i suppose if your option is to fall and extend your hand out like most people do resulting in broken wrists etc, or to slap, then the slap is a good skill to have.

This is a good point. Perhaps being able to train both the rollout and the slap is finding the happy medium.