With the current heat wave and the upcoming July 4th holiday, it has been hard to come up with something to write about this week. In an effort to find inspiration I turned once again to youtube and the result surprised even me.
On June 22, 1937, Joe Lewis fought James Braddock for the boxing Heavy Weight Championship of the World. Braddock, the subject of the Russell Crow film “Cinderella Man” was defending his title, which he had won from Max Baer only two years before. Little did he know that Joe Lewis would finish the fight in round eight with some great martial arts. This video shows the second half of the fight. Take a look in particular at Lewis’ last two punches, thrown around minute mark 7:50 in the video. They show it again in slow motion afterward.
The second to last punch is described by some commentators as as body shot but what I see is a punch to the arm. Lewis knocks Braddock’s left arm out of the way and makes room for a crushing right hand to the head. Often in martial arts practice, we are so focused on hitting the head, or hitting the body, that we forget the techniques that make those shots effective; strikes to the hands, arms, and legs; attacks that off-balance our opponent; techniques that clear a path, or pull them forward, or push them away.
If you make some time to train this weekend, keep these sorts of techniques in the forefront of your mind, especially if practicing kata. Study your movements for the unexpected applications. Visualize your opponents arms and consider how to get past them to those sweet finishing shots. And, most importantly, bring lots of water because it is going to be hot.
Interesting. Braddock is on his heels the entire round and his body language makes him appear defensive and intimidated. Louis, on the other hand has his weight forward and is initiating attacks. As Wayne Gretzky once said, you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. If you have the skills to deflect, it always seems best to me to be steadily attacking vs. defending and looking for errors and openings. Boxing is a great sport that sadly seems in decline now, in favor of ultimate fighting.
Nice observations. When we move out of the world of sport and into real world fighting, our civility usually means that we are not the attacker but act in defense against an aggressor. One key to overcoming this inherent disadvantage is to defend and attack at the same time in order to take away the advantage and turn the tables on your attacker.
I wonder if the left hook was thrown to hit the arm, or was aimed at the solar plexus and missed since Braddock was stepping backwards? In any event it had the desired effect.
In my own training I’m always looking for ways to strike or grab the opponent’s arm to off-balance or make room for a more decisive shot.
Gerry,
Thanks for your comment. You may well be right about the punch. One idea that has been presented to me and which I find interesting is to look for a “decisive shot” to the arm itself. Once I let go of the body or head needing to be the primary target, a whole list of options opens up that are very interesting.