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I haven’t seen any discussion on this and it’s not really talked about in the CKM book so I’m seeking some input on this.
As I have seen it demonstrated in the past, most of the time the front break fall is taught where your arms are straight out from your shoulders and your elbow are bent about 90 degrees. It looks as if you are making both sides of a goal post with your arms.
I see some serious flaws with this and have actually seen a student get hurt during this tupe fo break fall during a live sparring/grappling session. What happened was when two students were sparring, it was understood that if a takedown could happen, then both would pause only long enought to remove headgear and gloves, then the session would continue.
Student A got the side/back of the student B and executed a front trip take down. B student that was being taken down had one trapped and was only able to use one arm as part break fall. even though student B turned her head to the side, she still collided pretty hard to the mat and ended up with a slight concussion.
Since it was my sparring/grappling session, I took this injury very hard and personal so I have made it a mission to find a solution to this dilema. After much research and trial, I’ve found that by practicing the front break fall by angling my hands in towards each other so that my elbows are more at a 45 angle, the break fall is more effective, especially with only one hand. You are still landing on your forearms but your arms from the shoulder to the elbows are no longer 90- degrees from your sides but slightly higher than shoulder level. The hand postion is similiar to traingle push-ups.
I’m curious if anyone else has had this issue, and if so, how did you rectify it?
Re: Front break falls
I do applaud you dugfoot for having the ability to look inward as an instructor and try to find ways of preventing this in the future. It sounds like a front fall break may have not been done correctly. You really should use both arms for the fall break to evenly distribute your weight. Hence why she probably smacked her head and caused the concussion.
The best way to defend against a takedown is to keep your hips square to the attack. She got caught. It happens. You get hurt… its good training. Better to get the lumps and bumps in training. It sounds from your description though that she was caught off guard when removing her pads. Perhaps the issue is with the drill or her partner not waiting til she was ready.
My suggestion would be if you are going to do takedowns and grappling in the sparring, to use mma gloves and grappling shin pads, no headgear and light contact if they are worried. To have to stop and take off pads in the middle sounds like where the incident occured..
Re: Front break falls
Kirsten,
Thanks for your response.I understand about keeping hips square to avoid the takdown but, in this case, one student got the side/back of the other student and executed a front trip. Also, the student getting tripped had one arm pinned by the other so as she was going to the ground she could only use one arm as part of the breakfall. Little mma gloves, etc. made no difference to the breakfall, but we have found through experimentation that arm position does make a huge difference. This is why I now teach the front breakfall with the arm position that I described in my previous post.
Within the past year, I have seen this very thing happen at least twice in mma events, both of which I believe were UFC/WEC. In both cases, however, rather than executing the front trip, the person who had the back and the other’s arm trapped lifted their opponent off the ground and slammed them sideways. In one of the fights, the person who was slammed landed at least partially on his head and never fully recovered during the fight.
Re: Front break falls
When training the forward break falll we have our recruits angle their arms as you said and slap the ground with their hands/forearms to help reduce impact to the face and body.
Re: Front break falls
From what you are describing I am not sure that there is a perfect fall break for this senario… you just have to do the best you can given the situation you are presented with.
My best option for thinking through this situation would be to rely on 2 points of contact still but instead of both my arms, use the shoulder of my trapped arm as one point, the opposite arm as the second and make sure to tuck your head and use your shoulder (similar to an arm-drag) in wrestling. Use caution as you risk breaking your collarbone. This fall break is similar to the stick defense against a baseball style swing.
Re: Front break falls
“use the shoulder of my trapped arm as one point,”
Don’t think so, too much chance for shoulder injury. A fall like that is basically how I ended up with a type-2 shoulder seperation in my left shoulder.
Re: Front break falls
yep, as I already stated that’s a risk… but compared to smacking the head, its better. You risk injury to your arm on a stick defense if your late with your defense, but given the risk to the head- you make it. It’s the lesser of two evils.
If you are falling to the side with the arm free, you don’t have that problem. But you have only one arm to make the fall break, so its weaker and you still risk injury to the arm or collarbone.
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