One subscriber responded to the most recent wrist locks blog post. You might find his insights helpful:
Hey Keith,
Really enjoyed this article on wrist locks and the video clips as well. I really really hope that everyone will pay close attention and apply the different keys that you pointed out.
Daily stretching is a must if one wants to have healthy and able wrists to have a higher success rate in applying wrist locks. Also I have found that applying wrist locks, like you said, has always been a very sneaky stunt to pull when I am sparring against a wrestler or Jiujitsu practitioner.
I find it interesting how many of those who do Brazilian Jiujitsu seem to not know how to counter a wrist lock. I think it very well may have to do with the fact that they are more in for the sport of it. The whole time they will be focus on forcing an armbar, triangle choke, omoplata,… but the entire time they are already grabbing each other!
[features_box_light_green width=”75%” + border=”2px”]Editor’s Note: I know a few of them who have bought Wrist Locks (revised) and incorporated some of the reversals and counters.[/features_box_light_green]
If that ain’t the perfect opportunity for a wrist lock I don’t know what is. And of course, like you say, we ought always to be open minded to strike vulnerable target areas, whether it be to assist applying a wrist lock, or even simply to end the fight all together. Lol, like I need to be telling you that.
[three_columns_1]I think one more thing that I would want others to be aware of in their own training in wrist locks (or any technique for that matter esp. control techniques) is that it’s easy (especially for young martial artists in a controlled environment) to have in our minds that a wrist lock seems to magically give us complete control over our attacker’s body.[/three_columns_1] [three_columns_2]The important thing to always remember, aside the proper body mechanics of the technique, is while the wrist lock gives me an advantage of dominance and superiority I must actually take that position and actually “take control”. We must always keep in mind that our attacker isn’t all too interested in being the loser and will be fighting just to prove it. There is a point in applying a lock when our opponent’s body will start to react with a spinal reflex.[/three_columns_2] [three_columns_3]
No matter how strong or stubborn the human mind may be, at this point, his body will begin to act like an injured body, if it isn’t already, and without choice his reaction will be to help protect his own body rather than attack yours. It is at this point that you really have the control of the fight as you take away his ability to continue on. We have to remember that we have to actually “take control” and the wrist lock, or whatever you are applying, offers us the position to do that.
I remember getting so frustrated with myself when I first began studying Chin Na….
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It wasn’t until this finally sunk in that I saw a dramatic change in my success rate as a martial artist. I think if Bruce Lee were here today he would say something like, “It isn’t enough to be given an ability, but to do something with that which was given, otherwise, all becomes meaningless.” (Note: I didn’t take a direct quote from him but it sure sounds like something he would say.)
Anyway, it just seems to be something that I see often in martial artists today is a lack of purpose and intent, yet it is this very thing that ought to make us who we are.
Nobody becomes great by accident.
Once again, thanks Keith for writing this article. You’re the best.
Just another martial artist,
Jason Ohler
