How To Take Down Your Attacker

In today's class, we worked on very basic techniques of taking your attacker down to the ground.

But before practicing our take downs on our fellow training partners, we covered the art of falling first.  This is an important part of training for a beginneer, because over time, students who train in karate must learn how to fall properly as well as take their training partner down to the mat safely as well.

Falling

For beginners learning how to fall, we practice the 4 "B"s....

1. Bite down
2. Bear down (bend neck so that your chin touches your chest)
3. Breathe in
4. Break fall (breathing out at the same time)

1.  Bite down simply means clenching your teeth so that they are together.  This will protect you from biting your tongue as well as prevent your jaw from being moved violently.

2.  Bear down with your neck.  It is important in falling that you protect your spine (neck) and one of the best ways to do this is by tucking your chin down to your chest.  This curves the spine and protects the back of the head from hitting the ground on impact.

3.  Breathe in.....it's important to get as big as you can, to slow down the take down.  When you are small and compact, you can fall with incredible force and hit the ground hard, which translates into potential injury.  We look to get big, to try and slow the actual take down.

4.  Breakfall means to hit the ground (mat or floor) with your open palms up to your elbows on impact.  They should hit at about a 45 degree angle to your body.  (4a)  You should practice breathing out on impact.  This will tighten your core and protect you from getting the wind knocked out with a hard fall.

The main principle of falling, is to allow your bottom to absorb most of the impact, with your arms dissipating much of the remaining energy during the fall.  Of course, your back is in position to take some of the fall, but you want to be careful not to land on your spine, rather, the impact of the fall should fall on the shoulder blades. 

Always, protect your head! 

You never want to fall like a big old tree.  In most instances, as you start to fall, you want to get to a squatting position, so that your bottom absorbs much of the impact.  Don't forget to kick your feet straight out, to prevent yourself from doubling over as you land on your back.  Pushing your feet out, also helps you to stay in a defensive posture.  You may have found yourself on your back, but that doesn't mean you still can't defend yourself from the ground.

 

Take Down

The basic take down that we worked on today, has the defender stepping forward with their outside foot slightly past the attackers right foot, the inside foot is used to seal the attackers right foot and to place your hip tight against the attacker.  Your hands will be holding both shoulders in a push/pull fashion.

What you are attempting to do is seal the hip and the foot, while rotating the upper body (spinning the spine on its axis) so that the attacker becomes unbalanced with, a resulting fall.

The defender should almost always carry their partner to the ground for safety.  On the street, in a real assault, you could just throw your attacker to the ground, or drop to the ground beside them, usually on one knee (closest to the attacker) so that you can follow up the take down with a strike.  Be careful never to just stand over your attacker when they are on the ground, as they can strike you or even worse, pull you to the ground if you are not careful.

Like everything else in the martial arts, falling requires some practice until you reach a point where you are confident and don't really have to think about what is happening as you are falling to the ground.  It is an important principle, as it might save you from serious injury in the event someone is attacking you and pushes you to the ground.

As for the take down, there are many other options to use to take your attacker down. We start off with this technique, as it is a good safe way to learn how to take your opponent to the ground regardless of your size or that of your attacker.

Sensei Chris Feldt

Samurai Karate Studio

803-462-9425