A No NO In MY Books When It Comes To Self Defense

Hi everyone,

When it comes to combat there are a few principles that I try to emphasis to all my students when they are in an altercation. One principle I emphasis is to avoid bending down or going on top of your enemy (mounting him) when executing your assault on him.

To many times I see inexperienced combat instructor’s leaning over or mounting their enemy or dropping down to the ground to strike or knee the back of their enemies’ neck or base of the skull to take them out. Now the tactic itself of striking the back of the neck or base of the skull is effective, what’s not effective is to lower yourself down to the ground to execute your tactic.

The reason being is that in a street fight there are no rules so by lowering yourself down closer to ground level makes you vulnerable to an attack by multiple attackers or vulnerable to falling over and ending up in a grappling match. Instead stay standing upright on both your feet and just stomp on the base of the skull or back of the neck using the heel of your foot. That way you’re quicker at executing your tactic because you are using the principle based around the economy of movement. Also just incase multiple attackers come into the picture you are in a better position to protect yourself and escape.

So the next time you see a tactic and it involves having to bend over and lower yourself or to drop down to the ground to mount someone try to find another way to execute the same tactic while staying upright.


Remember there’s no such thing as a dirty fighter only an educated one.

Norm Bettencourt