"fighting stance" during sparring

[Waza]

I've just looked up some random Wado Ryu & Wado Kai Kumite on YouTube and almost every fighter keeps their hands low and leaves their centre line open.

By contrast, I (a very inexperienced fighter of about 4 months ) keep my leading hand around nose height, quite far out, but with the elbow still bent and tucked in, with the whole arm coming slightly across my centre-line. And my ready-hand slightly away from my body at belt height just in front of my navel. Mimicking, some what, the fighting stance done during drills.

Am I just doing it wrong or being too defensive?

Thanks.

[tenshinka]

Either way trains bad habits...When someone attacks you, do you take a stance??? No! You should practice the same way....Stand naturally (hands at your side, feet one shoulder width apart), and execute technique that way...Makes for better timing, and understanding of body movement...

A true "fight" looks nothing like kumite...

fwiw,

--josh

[Waza]

For use in "street fights" we train from natural stance(Shizentai), quick, stunning strikes that bring you into a more conventional fighting stance (i.e Tobikomizuke, Nagashiuke).... but fighting with your hands by your side (i.e failing to provide any defence) was an immediate disqualification at the last tournament I fought in.

Sorry I probably should have made my self more clear: This is purely for sparring and kumite.

[tallgeese]

Here's how I do it.

Hands up, around the chin/cheek area. The lead hand is SLIGHTLY forward, never extended far enough for a bad guy to iniate contact without either moving or breaking posture. Also, never let you hands cross your centerline. This allows for a simple or even accidental trap to force your guard from it's postion of "resposibility". A hand on each side of the center line. Elbows are kept at the sides. You are to keep "fluid" in this posture, not rigid.

As for the rest of the stance. Feet about shoulder width, with the lead slightly forward. Fron foot turned in slightly perhaps. Knees bent with an athletic posture. Back is relitively straight, but not ramrod so you can't bob and weave.

This, btw, should be a kind of psycological profile for you to acheive during conflict. No, you probibly won't move to this stance when attacked. However, you should be trying to get there, it's natural enough that it actaully happens fairly easily if you train it fludily enough. It's the principles that reamin the same to the core. Athletic foot postion, legs bent. Hands/elbows cogniznat of where they need to cover. Cernterline maintained.

[joesteph]

This sounds like what I try to do, tallgeese, although when in motion, especially if in a circling motion instead of a linear one, it does break down a bit--but I think that's expected. If there's a split-second break in the sparring, I try to recover, to get back into that stance.

A loose stance, even if you're doing non-contact as my instructor has us do, can have you looking at someone's knuckles two inches from your nose, or someone's foot saying hello to your ribs.

It's both "on guard" and "ready for action."

[tallgeese]

As always, we're talking best case scenarios, joesteph. I agree, things do break down in the reality of training hard and fighting. The best we can do is try to train to minimize the time that those breakdowns occur. Good point.

[bushido_man96]

Either way trains bad habits...When someone attacks you, do you take a stance??? No! You should practice the same way....Stand naturally (hands at your side, feet one shoulder width apart), and execute technique that way...Makes for better timing, and understanding of body movement...

A true "fight" looks nothing like kumite...

fwiw,

--josh

I think that this is a good training focus, for that moment when combat begins. After that, training the Boxing guard, like what tallgeese mentions, is one of the better ways to cover, in my opinion.

[Zanshin]

I've just looked up some random Wado Ryu & Wado Kai Kumite on YouTube and almost every fighter keeps their hands low and leaves their centre line open.

By contrast, I (a very inexperienced fighter of about 4 months ) keep my leading hand around nose height, quite far out, but with the elbow still bent and tucked in, with the whole arm coming slightly across my centre-line. And my ready-hand slightly away from my body at belt height just in front of my navel. Mimicking, some what, the fighting stance done during drills.

Am I just doing it wrong or being too defensive?

Thanks.

Hi Waza,

If its the same clips I have seen on you tube, in the most part it is "Shiai" or semi contact point scoring karate.

As such, it is a game, where the objective is to beat / outwit your oponent in order to score the points (very much like fencing).

These guys train purely to compete in this type of event and as such they utilise specific techniques and "tricks".

The lowering of the guard and opening up of the center line are just a couple of these , and are used to entice your oponent into an attack, and/or set up for a counter technique.

In this type of Kumite its all about gaining the upper hand in the tactical exchange, and therefore the "fighting stance" has evolved as the most effective to this sort of kumite.

It is also not unique to Wado. It is the way that most of the major styles fight in competition under WKF regulations.

Shiai Kumite should not be confused with Jiyu Kumite (free sparing) which most good Wado dojos will practice.

Have you ever trained in a Wado dojo? just out of interest.

[AikiGuy]

I've just looked up some random Wado Ryu & Wado Kai Kumite on YouTube and almost every fighter keeps their hands low and leaves their centre line open.

By contrast, I (a very inexperienced fighter of about 4 months ) keep my leading hand around nose height, quite far out, but with the elbow still bent and tucked in, with the whole arm coming slightly across my centre-line. And my ready-hand slightly away from my body at belt height just in front of my navel. Mimicking, some what, the fighting stance done during drills.

Am I just doing it wrong or being too defensive?

Thanks.

It seems to me that you are on the right track. The fighting stance used in drills is there for a good reason. You should be developing the habit of fighting this way. No stance works on every opponent but the standard Karate fighting stance is a solid one to start with. Keeping the right distance between your body and your hands is something to pay close attention to as some have mentioned though. Don't go out too far or you may get grabbed, etc. on the lead arm.

Most MA schools teach 2 modes of fighting: Waza and Kumite. Waza includes surprise attacks (usually with your hands down) you might encounter on the street as well as other situations. Kumite is sparring which seems more like what you're asking about. Someone pointed out that you should practice fighting with your guards down because that is how you would be attacked in real life. Well that's true if you're talking about Waza/street tactics. For Kumite, I think a "guard-up" stance (used in my style) works well. After all, sparring is never a surprise. You and your opponent know you are about to fight and you prepare for it. So getting caught off-guard is irrelevant. Not all styles use this stance and some switch back and forth to confuse an opponent (which I also do occasionally for distraction). If you see someone with a low guard or no guard at all, it's probably a specific strategy he/she is trying or just part of the style he/she trains in. But that does not mean that the more traditional higher guard is a bad thing. I have used a standard Karate high guard very similar to yours against practitioners of Karate, TKD, Kung Fu, Boxing, and Muay Thai. It works well enough that I feel comfortable using it in most cases. However, I do practice other variations like lower postures/guard just in case I encounter an vastly different fighting style (like Wrestling) that may have some inherent counters to my high guard.

If you are new to MA, I would just keep practicing your normal guard as used in class for now. You will be getting other variations as you progress. But this is a decent one to start with.

[Waza]

Thanks for all the info guys, that really helps!

@Zanshin, I train regularly in a Wado Dojo but our sparing is largely un-guided by our sensei.

The most formal guidance i've been given in the months I've been doing it is to remain calm and not to put all my weight on my front foot all the time. I guess this is good because we're not all fighting the same because sensei told us X or Y was the best attack, etc.

So when sparing I take what I learn in drills, kata and pair work and try to make it work in a "fight". On top of that we have plenty of black belts from purely Wado backgrounds, Shato backgrounds and people who cross train in Wado + Shato or Judo + Wado who offer (some times conflicting, but otherwise good) advice during sparring.

But I may be entering another tournament soon so I'm starting to examine my blocks and stance, which is when I turned to YouTube for references and found people doing it WAY differently to the way I was...

When I did my first tourney I used a more boxing-esq stance but after my first round a guy from our club (who's a black belt in Shato, Wado and Judo) advised that I use a block that also covered more of my body (as per a drill like fighting stance) as the most common moves I would encounter would be: front snap kicks to the body, side kicks to the body, jabs to the face and reverse punches to the body... his advice did work for me (I won men's 3rd Kyu and bellow ) ... But I started to re-* that advice after visiting YouTube and seeing this very relaxed, low guard used so often.

I've since watched this(Kyokushin): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7cHghqmUEg

and I can certainly see a high guard working very well in their style of karate; very few "linear" or straight attacks are used, lots of high round house, crescent and axe kicks and a lot of the punches are a bit "hooky" or at least don't come out as straight as the ones I see in sparing in Wado.