Pummel To Better Combat

There are five different areas of combat: kick boxing range, close quarters combat, ground fighting, weapons defense and mass attack (or multiple opponent defense). If I had to choose only one range to teach to a loved one, I would choose close quarters without a doubt.

I’ve written before on my reasons, so I won’t repeat them here. However, I will cover a simple drill you can do to help you become more comfortable and effective in this range. The main drill which I use is called the pummel drill. This drill is so important, because it mimicks the position many people find themselves in when they get into a less serious scuffle or a more serious attack.

To do this drill, you start off locked up with your opponent, where you grab their neck and arm, and they do the same. You put the drill in action by “pummeling” back and froth, and going back and forth, switching the hand you are grabbing their neck and arm with.

From this one drill, you will find out that you have a myriad of different tools and moves, which span the whole force continuum. Here are a couple examples I would like to cover. Because there are so many, please check out this video link where you can take your training to the next level, and put this drill in motion by seeing the details and flow that these pictures can’t show.

We’ll start with a move that is lesser on the force continuum, which is the Single leg take down. To do this move, instead of grabbing their arm, bend at your knees and grab their leg. As you stand back up, pick up the leg and use your other leg to trip and take them down.

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The next move is the Side head lock which is a great “injuring to a degree” move as we can dial up or down the intensity, by increasing or decreasing the pressure of the choke.  To do this move, we bob under their arm, and wrap both of our arms around their neck and arm.  Initiate a figure four lock where you can squeeze their neck, constricting blood flow as needed.

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Lastly, the Straight arm shove is a brutal move, where instead of locking your arm around their neck, you straight arm them under their chin, and walk or run them backwards.  The brutality comes in with a finish off move, where you simply drag your elbow across their throat, causing severe damage that area.

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There are obviously dozen upon dozens of other moves from this proximity and position, but these three give you some nice choices depending on the situation and goal of the altercation. The point I want to make, is that by using the pummel drill as the “shell” of the training, we are able to put whatever we need to into the drill, and practice it off of motion.

I also included a quick instructional video, as the techniques can be seen better in motion: https://youtu.be/pycLEOdftKA