14 posts / 0 new
Last post
Andrew Sheldon-...
Andrew Sheldon-Thomson's picture
Should You Switch Legs Or Keep The Same Foot Forward When Sparring?

Should you keep the same foot forward when sparring or should you step through as you move?   If so why?

Most people keep the same foot forward all the time.   Lots of champion boxers, mauy thai people etc.   But is this really the best way to move?  After all your body is not built to accomidate you shuffelling forward.   You would not suffle forward if you wanted quick movement in most other sports.   You would step through.   This would be the natural and most efficent way to move.   

What are the advantages of shuffelling over stepping through on moves?   I ask because although I see the vast majority of people teach people to shuffle  rather than step I am not sure why it is seen as more advantageous.   I am being asked to practice with one lead leg forward all the time but is this actually the best method?

My vector is exactly the same with shuffeling and stepping.  But with the step I can create greater weight shifts well remaining stable to take my head of line etc.  Shuffelling also causes you to bend both knees at the same time.   This means you must disengage your core which you don't need to do if one leg stays locked.   Something you can do with a step through.

Unless I am so close there is not space to step through and therefore shuffelling is required I don't see why I wouldn't step through.  There tends to be a notion that when you step through you are momentarily exposed as you do so - but does this hold up?  If I just shuffle forward and do nothing else am I not equally liable to get hit?

You see some pratitioners with great footwork eg Dominic Cruz, TJ Dillashaw step through some of the time but not always.  If there are advantages to both when should you do one over the other?

Any ones thoughts on this would be of interest as it is an idea I am playing with.

Zach Zinn
Zach Zinn's picture

It really depends on the purpose of your sparring.

I think for self defense there is a priority to training ambidexterity more than there is with sports-based training methods. IME doing live training based more on self defense, people move around in all sorts of random ways and you really need to know how to switch stances and transition in different ways without needing to think about it or be bound to any rigid preference. In short, you often won't have a choice in the matter.

Training for combat sport tends to be a lot more specific, you have to remember these guys watch eachothers tapes and have detailed long-range strategies, as well as timing differences and approaches that don't really exist in self defense at all. The long range game of most MMA fighters is not a thing that exists in violent encounters, other than maybe for the initial second or two. Favoring one stance as a part of fighting strategy is a thing which is based on this range. In fact, it is so specific in boxing that fighting a southpaw becomes a very different thing than another orthodox boxer. In MMA once they clinch, are against the cage, etc. preferring one stance is kinda out the window. Some of the same strategies can apply I think, but not the way they do in the other arenas.

So in other words, if you are doing consensual fighting the rules as I understand it (limited though that is) is that in Boxing it is quite important to fight from your chosen stance and base your strategy primarily around that. In Kickboxing I think it is a bit more malleable, but someone else would know better than me.

So, IMO if people are drilling/sparring for self-defense (following Iain's stuff or some similar approach), this question largely starts to answer itself. Preferring a certain stance is sort of a long range thing and it goes away quickly once you stop training at that distance, in my experience. Like I said, if you are training close range it becomes obvious real quick that you have to learn to do your stuff from whereever you are at, as there is no picking of shots, no in and out footwork unless one is trying to get away, and the only real timing is (to quote Mick Coup, I think) "Go Like F**k".

On the other hand, if they are sparring for consensual longer-range fighting then the methods employed by boxers and kickboxers are the ones to look at. For long range competitive sparring, it makes the most sense to favor one stance, and have a little flexiblity to switch up when needed, from my perspective, especially where kicking distance is involved.

When I was at the Boxing gym you kept your same stance, now when I do stuff on my own (even if it's boxing combinations) I tend to devote 30% or so time to the "bad side" so that it is familiar enough to be functional, and I have my students do the same thing. In live stuff we just do what we need, as there is no real time to plan one's approach there.

By my understanding shuffling as taught in boxing, etc. is almost exclusively pre-contact footwork, it is for essentially preventing the other person from gaining a footwork advantage to launch an attack from, but is not stable enough for anything beyond that - providing I am understanding what you mean by shuffling.

The only place I have found it relevant in self defense is longer-range stuff with multiple opponents in order to gain positioning. If you are going to actually hit someone or might be hit you need a more solid stance/step than shuffling (as I know it, at least) provides, in my opinion.

Andrew Sheldon-...
Andrew Sheldon-Thomson's picture

It seems like one of the major reasons people stick to one side is simply to get more practice in on the side you are using.   If you only keep one side forward then 100% of your practice is on the side you are using.

But this has reached the point where some coaches treat changing feet and some sort of cardinal sin. 

Zach Zinn
Zach Zinn's picture

Andrew Sheldon-Thomson wrote:

It seems like one of the major reasons people stick to one side is simply to get more practice in on the side you are using.   If you only keep one side forward then 100% of your practice is on the side you are using.

But this has reached the point where some coaches treat changing feet and some sort of cardinal sin.

It's not just that I think, in boxing for instance since much of the the time an orthodox fighter will be fighting another orthodox fighter, there is a certain strategy employed. An orthodox fighter against a southpaw requires a different approach, otherwise they will just run into the southpaws power hand.

Once you break that and try to switch up stances all the time you enter into a land with too many variables. Again, in my very limited knowledge of kickboxing people also choose to fight from one primary stance, but there is more malleability due to kick exchanges and longer range footwork.

So, in combat sport it kind of makes sense to train that way given the extended long range game. For self defense it doesn't make that much sense because the long range, predictive game has such a reduced role. Also unlike sport, in self defense you do not get to choose how you enter on someone because there is no "sizing up" or moving in and out to figure out someone's timing.

We don't do that much long range sparring these days, but we do it occasionally, and I did a lot of long range Karate kumite as a kid and teenager. I will say that both now and then I had very different abilities depending on stance used. Weirdly enough with my good hand forward I had excellent defense, but somewhat poor offense.

If I were to try going after someone actively, I needed to switch my stance so the good hand was in the back. I found that (even with training the other side some) my ability to judge distance with the  left hand off the back foot was -maybe- 50% of the orthodox stance (left foot forward right hand back - me being right handed), even with using the front hand backfist/jab to time it. Today when we practice something longer range it tends to be more continuous than what I did as a kid, but I find basically the same thing, I am faster with my good hand in front, but something feels very "off" offensively.

Just subjective experience of course, but my subjective experience seems to illustrate that generally speaking the orthodox way of determining stance (strong hand on the back foot) makes the most sense in long range sparring, ymmv. Like I said, I think the argument for ambidexterity is much better if we are talking sparring for self defense.

Heath White
Heath White's picture

So there are two questions here.  (1) Should you switch stances when sparring, and (2) should you step through.  Obviously stepping through is one way of switching stances.

On the first question: I think the ability to fight ambidextrously is always an advantage.  It comes at a cost though: you will not be able to hone your technique as well on your dominant side (holding constant the amount of training you do).  I like Zach's suggestion that the ability to fight ambidextrously is more important in a self-defense context than a ring-sport context.  So it would make sense that traditional karate defaults to training both sides, while ring sports (boxing, Muay Thai, kickboxing) default to honing the dominant side.  

On the second question: I think you will find in all martial arts sparring contexts that stepping through is pretty rare, for two reasons.  First, it is a relatively slow way of moving a long distance, and much more often you want to quickly move a short distance.  Second, anytime you cross your legs you are vulmerable.  I am doing some Muay Thai training now, and crossed legs will get kicked--you can't defend well, you might fall down,  you might get your groin squashed.  No fun.  

Zach Zinn
Zach Zinn's picture

Figured I'd mention Boxings Gazelle Punch since we are on the  topic of stepping in vs. shuffling: technically (as far as I understand it) you do bring your legs together as you transition to the punch, though you don't cross them. It's almost a long range, curved oi-zuki, except that instead of stepping through, your bring one foot the other and move forward:

 I mentioned that by my understanding shuffling (as I learned it in boxing at least) is mostly a pre-contact thing, but this is an exception because the gazelle punch is basically shuffling footwork.

 

I actually think there is a place for simply stepping through when attacking, but again I'd say it's more self-defense than ring craft related, and it definitely makes you vulnerable either way, stepping through is a very dedicated and agressive motion (think superman punch I suppose, but less air) that you can't really pull back from the same way that smaller, same side stepping can. For that reason, I think smaller steps with the dominant stance makes the most sense for longer range consensual sparring.

It's like with anything though, there is always stuff that is a bad idea for most people, but some famous guy or other is able to make it work. So we have to differentiate between possible and probable. If we want to go with probable then the small stepping and one-sided stance is taught in combat sports fundamentals for a reason.

Frazatto
Frazatto's picture

I have a friend that trained traditional Muay Thai (or at least what we understand for traditional), he explained to me it's a matter of muscle memory. You want to specialize "your weapons" as much as possible so there is not a flinch of doubt or confusion when using it. It's not simply a matter of dominant vs. dumb side, a jab uses a slightly different mechanics and have a different function than a cross, a hook from the leading is different from a hook from the rear, etc.

And that is more or less the same explanation I got from boxing athletes , when some one trains all day everyday as a job, the differences between two fighters in the same category can some times be so small that the time you take to rearrange yourself can mean defeat, being a little slower on one side when changing stances can take you back some points at the end. Specialization for a sport context  means less preparation time too, you can focus an athlete on a smaller set of moves and he is good to go start a amateur career in less time. He will also be good on those moves wile someone with more variety may just be average for the same time of training.

But personally, I feel very limited when being forced to train that way. It's like I'm losing something, being less versatile perhaps.

There seams to be a consensus here though that it's a question of sport versus "real world".

Zach Zinn
Zach Zinn's picture

Another aspect is that favoring a specific stances/sides is predicated on the idea that your opponent will be facing you, and that you are only allowed to hit them when they are, minus the angles you take with them facing you. This is just a truism in combat sport (i.e. you cannot hit the back of the body or head), but in self defense it is 1) a very good idea to launch an attack should you manage to get them turned away from you, and 2) it is almost a given that they will do the same to you given the opportunity. In fact, it is likely they might even use your back or side to initiate attack, rather than standing in front.

Rory Miller has an interesting little blurb where he talks about social vs. asocial violence, one of the things that he mentions as defining social violence physically is that it is a contest of sorts where people willing face one another and test skills. Combat sports stances are built on the assumption that your opponent is facing you, and you are doing the same. This goes along with the notion of two higly skilled athletes testing one another, being fully aware of the rules of their engagement, etc.

One simple drill to play with the difference is just to do short exchanges (say 5 -7 seconds or so, more than that and it loses it's focus) where one opponent attacks from behind or from either side. Even with complete foreknowledge of where the opponent is, etc. it completely and totally changes the notion of a preferred stance. If you are working with students who are not comfortable with much contact, you don't have gear available, etc. you can just do it with open-handed slaps and "touch" style contact, just to get an idea of what the positioning is like. Add in additional people and it gets more interesting.

It can also be tested or experienced with simple padwork to some degree, just have two people each holding one pad, and have them slowly migrate behind or to the side of the person hitting.

Andrew Sheldon-...
Andrew Sheldon-Thomson's picture

I am not convinced that you move any slower stepping though than you do by shuffling.  Your velocity is no different.   However I think the point about distance is a very good one.   In order to maintain your stance (even if it is on the other side) you need to step through at least the length of your stance.  So the movement of stepping through must be for longer ranges.   Closer in you have to keep the same stance forward or you would lose your stances structure.

Tim Larkin has some interesting stuff on self defence.  One of his observations is about the type of violence.  For consenual fights or fights for status and dominance people are more likely to trade blows (ie maintain at least a puching range).   For fights with someone looking to actually injure someone they just go through their oponent.  It makes sense that if you were defending your self in the most effective way you would step through and attempt to obliterate your opponent not move around like your would in a sports senario.   Or in Tim Larkins mind set cause them a catastropic injury so their size, speed, strength no longer matters.

Zach Zinn
Zach Zinn's picture

Andrew Sheldon-Thomson wrote:
I am not convinced that you move any slower stepping though than you do by shuffling.  Your velocity is no different.   However I think the point about distance is a very good one.   In order to maintain your stance (even if it is on the other side) you need to step through at least the length of your stance.  So the movement of stepping through must be for longer ranges.   Closer in you have to keep the same stance forward or you would lose your stances structure.

Tim Larkin has some interesting stuff on self defence.  One of his observations is about the type of violence.  For consenual fights or fights for status and dominance people are more likely to trade blows (ie maintain at least a puching range).   For fights with someone looking to actually injure someone they just go through their oponent.  It makes sense that if you were defending your self in the most effective way you would step through and attempt to obliterate your opponent not move around like your would in a sports senario.   Or in Tim Larkins mind set cause them a catastropic injury so their size, speed, strength no longer matters.

I can -definitely- move faster shuffling, there is no comparison at all. The same is true of anyone I have played around with doing the same thing. In fact, shufflinf is so fast that once I started working it in boxing I was sort of amazed by the distance I could cover in a short amount of time. I am big guy -and- I have a neurological issue with one foot, and even with that I am much faster shuffling. It depends what kind of stepping you are talking about too though, what do you mean precisely by shuffling vs. stepping? I mean a small step is faster, but of course covers less distance per time.

Also, if you are talking about just moving straight into someone, that is not something that anyone does by shuffling really, that I am aware of. Shuffling me means evasive, lateral outside movement like so:

 

Mike Tyson's footwork was arguably a combination of shuffling and stepping, often used more offensively:

 

 

You can see that he uses the "D'amato shift" and a kind of sidestep/shuffle to change angles of attack.

Generally though,the footwork that boxers, etc. do when they step back or out of range, prior to re-engagement is what I think of as "shuffling". IMO it's demonstrably much faster than stepping, but it is not stable at all, and so when they get back into hitting range, they go back to stepping. This pretty much tracks with exactly how I was taught both shuffling and stepping in Boxing as well. Shuffling is a longer range thing, and stepping is how you move when you actually punch, etc.

PASmith
PASmith's picture

Most people keep the same foot forward all the time.   Lots of champion boxers, mauy thai people etc.   But is this really the best way to move? 

If this wasn't the best way to move then said champion boxers and Thai's woudn't move like it. There are millions of dollars worth of incentive for them to find the best way to move possible. If one boxer worked out that stepping through worked better than shuffling then he'd prevail and then all the boxers would do it to catch up.

It's the same when people criticise olympic taekwondo fighters for having their hands down all the time. Sure having your hands "up" rather than "down" is generally a good rule of thumb (and "busy" rather than just passively "up" is even better!) but context changes what is good for that particular context. In their competitive context hands down works better and getting an olympic gold medal is the incentive to work that out. A fighter going into a TKD comp with their hands up would lose to body kicks.

There are fighters who "switch hit" but ones that can work equally well off both stances are very rare. The late Marvin Hagler was probably the best switch hitter and changed stance freely and often. But there aren't many Marvin Haglers in the world. Lomachenko's footwork is such that he appears to switch stances. Tyson did it with his shift to the outside for his famous hook/uppercut combo IIRC.

But generally learning to fight from one stance means you end up with good technique and skill on that side rather than just OK technique and skill on both sides. And good technique on one side beats OK technique on both sides (by and large).

PASmith
PASmith's picture

Not stepping through (or more like choosing how and when to step through as appropriate) is more about stability than anything else for me. Any time your feet come together you are less stable. Get hit when you are unstable and you'll fall over.

I came from a points TKD background into modified knockdown Karate sparring (with clinching and groundwork) and I had to change a LOT of what I did to counter low kicks (guard, stance, weight dsitribution, etc). But one thing I retained was a front leg side kick if I managed to notice anyone stepping through into range. It doesn't even need to be a hard kick. Catch them at the right moment (pretty much mid-step) and they fall over. :)

Andrew Sheldon-...
Andrew Sheldon-Thomson's picture

Yes the stability thing when you have that moment your feet are together is an issue.  It might explain why many of the people who do step through do so when then going off line, or when their opponent is clearly occupied covering or backpeddling.  

When I say shuffeling I mean simply keeping the same leg forward.   It can be stable or unstable depending on how it is done.  Being determined by how you use the foot and the dimentions of the stance.

Frazatto
Frazatto's picture

PASmith wrote:

If this wasn't the best way to move then said champion boxers and Thai's wouldn't move like it. There are millions of dollars worth of incentive for them to find the best way to move possible. If one boxer worked out that stepping through worked better than shuffling then he'd prevail and then all the boxers would do it to catch up.

Yes, sure, but specialization leads to stagnation.

Once a technique is THE BEST, everybody starts using, trainers get used to training it and once again everybody is on a even playing field. It's easy to see even if someone had an great idea, trainers would be hard to convince to let their fighters try it afraid of messing with things, fighters would be resistant to change because it would take time to adapt and they may lose many fights till adapting to the different patterns.

Let's remember that we are creatures of habit! And we have a fairly modern example of this problem very well documented, the modern clicking ice skating boots.

If I remember correctly, it was very difficult for the professionals to learn to use it despite being theoretical MUCH more efficient. The research team had to train an entire group of skaters to show to the community that it really worked and only after some years of very insistent "propaganda" they started being used and records being broken.

I believe the bicycle seat is another example, it's a horrible thing based on a saddle, because that was the only reference people had for a seat that goes between the lags. There are a staggering amount of patents and prototypes for better seats, but it's almost impossible to make professionals (or amateurs) try them out because it challenges what they expect a good seat to be and creates an adapting period that lowers the highly specialized professional results for a wile.