Hapkido Falling Techniques

[Mixmastersenior]

I was recently looking through the Hapkido DVDs from Turtle Press, the ones with GM Kim Myung Yong. The throwing and locking techniques were very impressive. Espesially when the uke flys and flips through the air. And the falling techniques taught were unbelievable. It was almost like gymnastics.
As impressive as it looks, it seems that this type of exercise is somewhat misleading. I mean these techniques are spectacular for demonstrations, but I can't begin to flip like that. And when I perform an outside wrist lock or a 4 directional throw, my uke falls to the floor but he certainly doesn't flip. I have a friend who is very athletic and has some HKD background. when we workout together, he performs those fabulous flip falls. It's very cool, it makes me feel like Steven Seagal (Oh God!). My question is how inportant is it to learn or teach those high acrobatic falls? I understnad breakfalls are extremely important. But I teach more Judo style breakfalls. But on the street, you don't expect that kind of reaction from your opponent do you?

[moogong]

It's my view, any throw I would do in a self defense situation would involve as much body to body contact as possible. There would not be enough space between us for the attacker to throw his legs over his head and make a good showing of my technique. The close contact would give me the control of his fall..which would be a good thing. A good judo or hapkidoist has ways of throwing someone and ensuring they can not land properly (for example: speeding the throw up, wrapping the slapping arm, etc...) Judo and hapkido both have a duel side to their throws, IMO...the practical and the aesthetically pleasing. I enjoy practicing both.

[Michael Tomlinson]

I teach two kinds of breakfalls personally..I teach the basic judo style breakfall for the dojang and then I teach a strange spinning variation that I actually got from Ninjutsu and wrestling many years ago...you get as low to the ground as fast as possible to protect your limb from being broken and bashing yourself hard on the concrete but instead of slapping out on the ground you use a spinning motion that makes your body come back into a crouching position facing your opponent....works really good for the street...this is what real falling during a fight is all about..protect yourself and be able to counter...it is hard to explain but easy to demonstrate....

the big gymnastic falls are awesome but like you I lump them into the Hapkido category that holds the 540 degree jump spinning back heel kick---really cool but not practical at all IMHO.... I'm 47 years old...hell I got tired just typing all of this!!!!!
Mike

[sidekick]

As lots of folks already know, I am not a big proponent of breakfalls. Do I teach my people them? Yes, in a half hour class at the beginning of their training. Why? Because they have come to expect this from this discipline. Do we practice breakfalls in training? No. Why? Because breakfalls are only good in the dojang and I feel take up to much valuable training time.

Now all that being said, in the street, you are the one using your training on your attacker. Do you think that this person knows how to go with the flow? Highly doubtful. So what will happen? You will either break the wrist, elbow or shoulder or any combination or all three. In addition, they will most likely suffer some additional injuries when they do hit the ground, the wall, the truck bumper or whatever is handy to assist in stopping their movement. This is what's supposed to happen though. My personal opinion is that by teaching breakfalls and having your partner stay ahead of the technique, you are not getting an honest feedback as to what will really happen if you do the technique on someone untrained. As strange as this mindset may seem to some, it was given to me by my first Korean instructor. He would take the technique right up to the point of pain and stop. Then we would examine the body positionings and it wouldn't take an MIT grad to see and understand what would actually happen if any addition torque was applied. We also examined what also happens if the angle of application suddenly changes. That unto itself is an eye opener.

Just my viewpoint on the subject. I will now go and secure the door to the hurrican room and wait till the storm abates....

Mike Dunn

[wab25]

Learning to fall is important for many reasons. First to protect yourself. If you learn them correctly, they work on concrete as well as the mat. I know many people who saved themselves lots of injury by learning to fall. These people were playing sports, working in the back yard, walking in the rain, in car accidents, bike accidents.... all kinds of non-fighting related situations where they hit the ground hard. The breakfall training paid off.

Learning to fall is also important, to help the other guy train. If you only punch the air, and never hit a heavy bag, then when you really hit a person, you are in for a big surprise, and a lot of pain. One of the big problems with point sparring too much is that people start to pull their power in real fights. Then they get beat up cause the other guy doesn't care that he is losing in points, all he cares about is that you are hurting more than him. By learning to fall correctly, I can allow my training partner to throw me much harder, thus he gets to practice his throws at or near full power. This also lets me practice falling from full power throws. I have seen many people who "know" how to throw, they can show you the position, and how it all works, but they never practice the actual throw, it would be "too dangerous." I have yet to see one of those guys pull off a successful throw. Throwing someone who is skilled at falling, lets you practice your throws harder, faster and from more realistic setups.

That whole flipping thing is important too for a number of reasons. First, when you learn to flip, you learn to control the speed of your fall in a throw. As you get good at this, it doesn't matter how fast tori throws you, you can take the fall at your own speed. (within reason, but you can certainly slow down the fall from the speed of the throw quite a bit, or speed it up quite a bit as well) Also, by learning the cool, pretty looking flip, you can then allow your training partner to break your wrist or arm, with full power and follow through. By flipping correctly you protect your limb. True, no one on the street would really react that way. And you would be very lucky indeed to react that way yourself on the street. But, for training, it allows you and your partner to really apply the break, with out having to worry about injury. Tori uses the same motion, speed and power as he would to break the arm/wrist. Uke, stays just ahead by flipping, thus protecting his arm. Due to ukes weight and motion, tori gets resistance very similar to what he would get by actually applying the technique.

Its a training method. A way to practice your throws with much more force and speed. It also trains your response. In reality, chances are that you won't be able to respond that way. But, the more you practice it, the more chance you have.

[howard]

...in the street, you are the one using your training on your attacker. Do you think that this person knows how to go with the flow? Highly doubtful. So what will happen? You will either break the wrist, elbow or shoulder or any combination or all three. In addition, they will most likely suffer some additional injuries when they do hit the ground... My personal opinion is that by teaching breakfalls and having your partner stay ahead of the technique, you are not getting an honest feedback as to what will really happen if you do the technique on someone untrained....

Just my viewpoint on the subject. I will now go and secure the door to the hurrican room and wait till the storm abates....

Mike, would you settle for a gentle breeze?

I've found that what you say about untrained people taking Hapkido techniques is almost universally true. They react in very unpredictable ways... and its' a real eye-opener. They often lean right into locks, because they're losing their balance in the other direction (which, of course, is designed into the technique). They fall very awkwardly, because they don't know they're about to be taken down... and so on. I completely agree with you, we go with the techniques and stay a little bit ahead of them in training because we know what's coming, and that allows our partner to apply the technique a little more forcefully, but the downside is that it can create an unrealistic expectation on the part of the person doing the technique as to how somebody untrained will react in a real situation.

I also agree with your logic about elaborate falls. When the old Yawara techniques that were the original Hapkido are applied full bore, it's basically impossible to do those gymnastic falls out of them. The techniques are designed to take your opponent to the ground very fast, very hard and in a way that probably injures him. I just saw a few excellent examples of this very principle in some seminars recently. As the master teaching them said, "Real Hapkido is not beautiful." Well, I think it is in its own unique way, but I bet you know what he meant.

[sidekick]

Well I know who just made my Christmas list....

I realize that lots of folks really enjoy breakfalls and train very diligently with them. I also realize that lots of folks get needlessly hurt, because timing was off or it was just a bad day all around and they landed wrong for some reason. Perhaps it's in the concept of how one approaches the application of the technique. My students are taught to enlighten the attacker via some form of counter strike, prior to attempting any technique. I do this for one and only one reason. It eliminates the "Oh s--t it's not perfect" concept. Even on a trained partner, if prior pain / discomfort is introduced, there is not enough time to recover to take a fall safely. Perhaps this is just my distorted view of reality, but most of the people we train will not be with us long enough to become super proficient with just applying the technique for technique sake. It eliminates the small person who can't make the technique work against the bigger opponent, for now it works much easier. I'm sure we've all run into the "here, try that on me person" and it became a struggle because he was not a willing participant. You had to either use some overcoming physical force or you introduced him to your little friend - disassociation pain.

I understand what wab25 feels about learning to fall will help in other endeavors. Alot depends on what is taking place at the time the fall is occuring. As I pointed out above, even a trained person who responds physically to something prior to a technique being applied, will not have enough time to recover to take a fall safely. So even being a great breakfall practicioner will not pre-empt injury if other factors are involved. I also look at people who for some medical reason cannot do breakfalls or should not do them. Does this mean that this people are now unfit to study an art that uses breakfalls?

Mike Dunn

[wab25]

Just to play the advocate here......

Pick a technique, any technique........ Will you ever get that one technique down perfect enough for it to work in every situation, every time? So, why even practice it at all? Sure, breakfalls don't work 100% of the time, in every conceivable situation. However, they have worked for me, personally, falling off a mountain bike, getting in a car accident, running into the office during the rain and slipping on the tile floor, playing basket ball and volley ball. Did I do each fall perfectly? No. Did I do it well enough that I could get up with injury? Yes, if you don't count my pride. Many of those instances, I would have been seriously hurt, without knowing how to fall.

My other point is that how are you going to practice, catching and breaking someones wrist or arm, with out ever trying it full force or full speed? Waving your arms about in the air is only so good. If you have not tried grabbing a sweaty arm that does not want to be grabbed, you will find it annoyingly hard to catch. Not only do you have to catch it, but keep it long enough to break it. By learning advanced falls, we can practice this catch, keep and break at near full speed. If you always practice to stop when you meet resistance (from the bones locking) you are very likely going to stop there on the street, only to have the thug take his arm back and beat you with it. Furthermore, by getting good at the basic breakfalls, your partner can get better practice throwing, develope his speed and power. This is how judo players get so good at throwing, they get a partner good at falling, and they throw them a LOT.

In addition, there are 3 places to counter a throw. First is before the throw is set up. Which is where sidekick likes to counter them. Believe it or not, there are people out there good enough and fast enough to throw you before you can counter. Which leads to the next two places to counter the throw. Second, is in the air. Third is just after the throw. If you never learn to take a fall, you will never learn the other two counters. Your first counter better be good.

[sidekick]

OK, we'll continue to play the advocate here......I'm not debasing breakfalls in general. I have taken my share of oops in normal everyday affairs and have fallen without injury. Do I base that on breakfall training? To a degree, but I also remember other training that hits the ground a lot harder and faster than any throw and the catch words were "stay loose". Lots of people don't have breakfall training and successfully take a fall and are not injured. I have no qualms about people who enjoy and wish to do breakfalls, but as a prerequisite to making or knowing how a technique will work is less than reasonable. As for stopping when meeting resistance, it's very doubtful. The amount of movement from initial resistance to blowing it out is very, very small. Now equate that amount of spacing that must be added and mix in the adrenaline dump of real combat and you have "Blast Off". When people spar, if they don't wear protective padding, they pull their strikes or only attack specific area's. The same could be said for these folks, that they will not hit full bore or the more tanagable targets because they hold back in training. Hitting a heavy bag is a far cry from actually hitting another human being and knowing that you will / can induce serious bodily injury.

As for catching a sweaty arm in mind air, perhaps the aspect of a counter strike prior to the catch was overlooked in the last post. As for the 3 places to counter a throw, again I refer back to the initial counter strike. Understand here, for this aspect of many discussions seems to get overlooked or totally discarded. We are not training to fight in competition, but rather to fight on the street against someone who is in all probability is far removed from martial training. Yet, even if we should encounter someone who has taken the dark side (always wanted to use that in a discussion ) they don't know that we know, so it dosen't matter even if they know (Now I sound like Yogi Berra )

Speaking from a purely observational standpoint, judo players seem to have a lot more body controling perspectives to their throws than that of Hapkido or Jujitsu.

Enjoy reading your viewpoints. I understand where your coming from, because I was once there myself. I doubt we will influence one another to rethink our positions, but a good discussion is a good discussion. Thanks for taking the time to post.

Resprectfully
Mike Dunn

[Mixmastersenior]

Funny you should mention the 'Oh S**t" factor. One of my students was getting ready for his brown belt test. One of the techniques to be performed was a full shoulder throw (seo nage?). At the test, the Kwan Ja Nim had me uke for the throwing portion of the test. No one else had enough breakfall experience. He gets into my armpit good, lowers his center of gravity and does a great throw. Then just as I come off his back, he turns sideways. I landed directly on my breakfalling arm. I got a second degree shoulder separation and was out for 3 months. Now I now what a quarterbback feels like getting sacked.

[American HKD]

Greetings

........Speaking from a purely observational standpoint, judo players seem to have a lot more body controling perspectives to their throws than that of Hapkido or Jujitsu..............

In HKD we combine most throws with a lock and pain for control or a vital point strike.

Judo ussually doesn't use our tatics and technique so they're focus is much different and they need more overall control of the opponents body movements. (sport oriented not combat oriented).

[Rasputin]

At the test, the Kwan Ja Nim had me uke for the throwing portion of the test.

Wow, talk about a real "put your money where your mouth is", eh? That's an interesting spin.

Learning breakfalls=good. In our jujutsu class the injured list breaks down like this, approximately:

60%--injured off the mat (sports, weightlifting, general life)
20%--failure to relax while receiving a technique or practicing ukemi
20%--general mishap (lose balance while performing throw and drop Uke on self)

Were we to stress ukemi less than the 20 or so minutes that we do each and every class, I would see far more injuries on the mat.

One point which I think has not yet been properly stressed: you do not learn Ukemi to use during a fight, other than the ability to get back to your feet immediately if you are knocked down or thrown. You are not training to become some sort of acrobatic monkey who bounces all over the street, rolling about.

The traditional jujutsu, from which Hapkido was mostly derived, imagines the practitioner making contact with the opponent (uke), taking control of their body through the use of atemi, joint locks and other balance-breaking techniques, and never returning control of the person until they are either broken or pinned. During this procedure, the jujutsuka/hapkidoist is almost an island of stillness in a storm of motion as uke spins out of control around you in a vain attempt to get his balance back under his own power.

[Michael Tomlinson]

Peter writes:
I got a second degree shoulder separation and was out for 3 months. Now I now what a quarterbback feels like getting sacked.>>>

mmmmm I love sacking quarterbacks...I still miss running full speed and drawing a bead on one of them,, concentrating on their midsection so it doesn't matter where they go...they can't fake you out,, and right before you make contact you lower and explode while still running as hard and fast as you can...the sound of their bodies cracking and the air going out of them..and when you look down at them there is usually a chunk of snot or spit coming out of their nose or mouth because of the sudden impact.....MAN THOSE WERE THE DAYS!!!! I still miss it and sometimes dream of it while I'm deep asleep....good fun in the old linebacker days....nothing like it bros...
Michael Tomlinson

[wab25]

As for catching a sweaty arm in mind air, perhaps the aspect of a counter strike prior to the catch was overlooked in the last post. As for the 3 places to counter a throw, again I refer back to the initial counter strike. Understand here, for this aspect of many discussions seems to get overlooked or totally discarded. We are not training to fight in competition, but rather to fight on the street against someone who is in all probability is far removed from martial training. Yet, even if we should encounter someone who has taken the dark side (always wanted to use that in a discussion ) they don't know that we know, so it dosen't matter even if they know (Now I sound like Yogi Berra )

You have based a lot of your strategy on this preemptive counter strike. While that is a valid strategy, and works well, it will not work all the time. What about when the other guy gets the preemptive strike first? What if he blocks your preemptive strike?

As long as you brought up Yogi and baseball, why would a pitcher with a 98mph fast ball ever need to learn another pitch, like a curve or change up?

Just because you have a hammer, does not mean everything thing is a nail. (even if you got a really good hammer)

Frankly, I believe that there is someone out there who can throw any of us, hit any of us, kick any of us. Relying on the idea that "I will always hit him first, and throw him out of his plan with that hit," is a bit naive. There are people out there known as counter punchers. They are waiting for you to throw that preemptive strike, as it sets up their finishing blow.

If you watch any MMA matches, you can see very trained strikers unable to stop a grappler from throwing them. Sure, some get knocked out, but most of the time, the punch that should have stopped him, didn't and they must use their grappling skills, and usually they both end up on the mat.

[moksha]

Mike,

Are you talking about counter striking as you being the Uke?

[wab25]

Are you talking about counter striking as you being the Uke?

I think he is talking about both. If you are uke, you can strike tori, as he tries to set up the throw, thus breaking tori out of his set up. If you are tori, then you use a preemptive strike to setup/offbalance uke, so you can set up your throw.

Maybe I am a little slow here, but it seems that a little sparring would show that when both are trying to strike the other guy to setup or stop whats going on, one of them will hit first. If your whole strategy is based on you always being the one to hit first, then what do you do when the other guy beats you to it? I also seem to think that MMA has shown that stopping a grappler from getting a throw or take down, with a single strike is possible, but much harder to pull off then most people thought. Same goes for keeping the distance needed for such a strike.

[moksha]

My personal view is this. Sometimes I show my students striking to set up a throw, and sometimes not for 2 reasons. 1: I don't like getting into the habit of always doing something, so I don't want to get in the habit of always striking first, and 2:depending on what type of attck it is, strikes sometimes are not even necessary to execute a throw. Alot of types just certain redirections, body positioning, and foot work is all you need.

Now in the case of practicing pre-emptive strikes as the Uke. Well, I don't really se the point in that either as far as Hapkido is concerned. It is a defensive art, so unless I am the attacker I don't see what purpose it serves.

As far as break falls are concerned. I believe they are a essential part of the art. Infact some techniques you really, really don't have a choice in the matter. Take for instance a straight arm "Shio Nage" as seen in Aikijujutsu. If you don't breakfall with that throw, I garantee your going to have some major problems. Plus I just plain like em damn it . Anyway, that's just my opinion.

[DragonMind]

Peter writes:
I got a second degree shoulder separation and was out for 3 months. Now I now what a quarterbback feels like getting sacked.>>>

mmmmm I love sacking quarterbacks...I still miss running full speed and drawing a bead on one of them,, concentrating on their midsection so it doesn't matter where they go...they can't fake you out,, and right before you make contact you lower and explode while still running as hard and fast as you can...the sound of their bodies cracking and the air going out of them..and when you look down at them there is usually a chunk of snot or spit coming out of their nose or mouth because of the sudden impact.....MAN THOSE WERE THE DAYS!!!! I still miss it and sometimes dream of it while I'm deep asleep....good fun in the old linebacker days....nothing like it bros...
Michael Tomlinson

Just out of curiosity (and maybe a bit of self preservation), how big are you?

[Michael Tomlinson]

Barry,
Not that big,, about five feet ten and right now around 245 lbs... my ideal weight is about 220 so I am back on the low carb stuff..I am 5 days in to it now and feeling good... did the low carb thing for several years and stayed in really good shape..since my knee is defunct I can't get my quality cardio in and my belly has grown...it should take me about three to four months to drop back into the good shape weight...

I just used to love playing football... hey come to think of it you are up in the Tallahasee area...by the way...Florida States Seminoles starting middle linebacker..number 7 Buster Davis is one of my old students from Daytona...I just ran into him the other day...he is a tank...and a good guy...but you don't want to get hit by him
Michael Tomlinson

[DragonMind]

Whew! I'm trying to schedule a visit over to your area to roll with you guys and see Dan Strickler. You had me worried there because I just attended a Modern Arnis camp where the organizer was 6' 8" tall and had a stick and a knife.