Attacks Off The Jab With Jake Mainini
The jab is one of the best techniques in all of striking and maybe even all of martial arts. The jab can be used offensively and defensively, as a rangefinder and a tool to keep your distance, it can even help set up your other strikes.
In this video, striking coach of several UFC, Glory and Lion Fight competitors, Jake Mainini is going to use the jab in that way, to set up several different Muay Thai style attacks. The first of these that Coach Mainini shows us is actually based on feints. A fairly standard combination, one that you would probably learn in your first Muay Thai or Kickboxing class, is the jab to a rear outside low kick.
To start off, Coach Mainini throws that combination. This causes his opponent to think that the jab will always set up the low kick and they will become likely to check after you throw a jab.
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Instead of throwing the low kick after the jab Jake feints by shifting his hips, making his opponent think he is about to kick and hopefully force them to block by checking. After his opponent flinches and hopefully blocks, Jake steps forward with his rear leg and grabs onto his opponent's garud with his rear hand. While he holds their guard, exposing their face, Jake throws an upward elbow. Holding their guard, plus them being stuck holding up their leg to check, will leave them with no option to defend, as they can’t block or move away in time.
The second attack that Jake shows has the same set up. First you land a solid jab to rear low kick to get your opponent to respect your power and try to block it. Then you are going to jab and again feint the rear low kick and then step in. This time after the fake low kick you are going to step in and double frame, putting each of your hands on each of your opponent’s. This way they are unable to defend with either hand and if they brought up their leg to check the kick, they will have no hope of stopping the attack that you are about to throw.
After double framing and holding onto your opponents hands or gloves, you are going to throw a knee strike with what was your lead but is now your rear leg at your opponent’s body. You can even pull them into your knee if you have a solid enough grip on their arms which will make the strike even more effective.
If you aren’t a big fan of framing then you can actually go for a jump knee , also known as the Masvidal special. The set up is the exact same, make your opponent respect your jab to rear low kick combination then jab to low kick feint, but instead of stepping forward after and framing on your opponent’s arms you bring your rear knee up as a chamber and launch into that jump scissor knee to the head.
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