Real Street Fighting Moves

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Done wrong, the thumb gouge to the eye is almost useless . . . but done right, it is one of the most dangerous and effective self defense techniques that street fighting or WWII combative training has to offer. Read on, to learn the five simple guidelines to the effective use of thumb gouges to the eyes:

1. Don’t “poke” the eyes, gouge past them–Regardless of whether you are trying to control someone through the use of pressure against his eyes or are actually trying to destroy the eyeball, don’t ever just poke at the eye itself like a little kid. Rather you should try to force your thumb between the eye socket and the eyeball into the skull.

This will cause more pain, more fear and continued, increasing pressure will either destroy the eyeball or pop it out of the skull.

2. Thumb the eyes from the inside–If you were to place your thumb between the eyeball and eye socket on the outside of his eye, near his temple and he were to push your hand away, that would be the end of your thumb gouge.

If you had chosen to gouge the eye between the eye and the nose, on the inside of his face and he were to force your hand to the side, he would have to rake your thumb across the entire surface of his own eyeball, causing pain and damage to himself.

3. Don’t gouge with one hand, keylock around his head or neck–I hate it when I see pictures of inexperienced trainers just grabbing a person’s head and forcing their thumbs into his eyes. If you were to do that, he could easily just push or pull your hands away.

Now imagine holding his head in a sort of headlock, keylocking your arms (a keylock is a way to cross both forearms to control a part of an opponent’s body and simultaneously combine the strength of both arms on a hold) and then thumb gouging his eye. Its hard to explain a keylock in words, but, if an aggressor were to try to push you away from him, a keylock will automatically force your thumb even more forcefully into his eye.

4. Aim your thumb gouges with your palms and fingertips–If you were to try to shoot your thumb directly out into an aggressor’s eye, you would miss much more often than not. Instead, first make contact somewhere on your attacker’s body with the palm of your hand.

As soon as you have made contact with your palm, you should be able to run you hand along his body and find his head, even with your eyes close or in the dark. When your palm is on the side of his head, find his ears with the tips of your fingers, which will bring your thumbs automatically into position to gouge the eyes.

Try it on yourself right now:

• Put the palm of your right hand on the right side of your face and touch your right ear with your fingertips.
• Now circle your thumb around and it will automatically go between your nose and eyeball, as when using a thumb gouge to get out of a choke from behind.
• Put your right palm on the left side of your face, fingertips on your left ear and your thumb automatically goes into position to gouge the eye, like a thumb gouge to someone standing in front of you.

5. Make hooks with your thumbs–As you can imagine, the optimal body weapon for causing pain to and / or damaging the eyes is a small or pointy one. Therefore, you need to be sure that you are always using the tip of your thumb and not the wide and soft pad to apply pressure.

A very simple way to make sure that you do this is to make a hook with your thumb. In other words, curl your thumb in so that contact with your opponents head is only made with your palms and the tip, not the flat pad of your finger. This holds true regardless of whether you are attacking with your thumb or the other fingers.

Charles – I am really excited about tonight’s topic and interview because what follows will explain what I think is the biggest mistake of the average street fight which is going toe-to-toe and trading punches with an opponent.  And our resident expert with us here now is going to give us 3 reasons why going toe-to-toe is crazy.  How are you doing today, David?

David – I am doing wonderful, Charles.  How are you?

Charles – Just fine.  Alright, tell us, help us out on this.  Why is going toe-to-toe in a fight crazy?

David – Well, Charles, this is the thing you see all of the time.  You see people that are ready to go at out in the street, inside of a bar, where ever.  And they always wind up trading punches while standing right in front of each other.  And the reason why this makes no sense to me is because -

First of All – #1 – You Don’t Know That Other Person or What They’re Capable Of – You don’t know if they’re a good striker.  You don’t know if they got good kicking skills.  You don’t know anything about them.  So, to just stand toe-to-toe with them, you’re basically going into the boiling water.

The 2nd Reason Is – When You Are In The Center of Their Body, Is That You Have To Deal Directly With Their Weapons – You have to deal with both of their hands, both of their feet.  You are exposed to not only strikes and kicks but also grabs, headlocks, jabs, pokes.  Any and everything that they want to do, you are in the center of all of their bodily weapons.  This makes no sense to put yourself through that.

The 3rd Reason Is Because Now, You Are Not In Their Blind Spot – I have what I call:

• Worst Spot
• Better Spot
• Best Spot

The worst spot you can be again is toe-to-toe.  The better spot you can be is when you are to the side of them off to an angle because then you only have one arm and one leg to contend with.  They have to come at you on your angle.  You’re making them fight your fight.  The best spot you can possibly be is behind them.  You can see them, but they can’t see you.  This is one of the first secrets of ninja invisibility, for your opponent not to be able to see you.

Charles – Wow.

David – So, to be behind them, they are either going  to try to hit me with some kind of weird back fist, or some strange back kick which I am going to neutralize from jump. Or, you’re going to have to turn around, and get to me which in the process, I will take them out anyway.  If I’m behind you, I am in  total control.

Charles – Wow.

David – So, this are the 3 reasons, the major reasons why going toe-to-toe makes absolutely no sense in a street fight.

Charles – Wow, no this really makes a quantum leap into understanding what reality-based fighting and self protection is really about.  Thank you, David, so much.

David – My pleasure, Charles.

Click here to listen to the complete 10-minute live BlogTalk Radio interview now.

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When I was about 21 years old, I was going home on the public service bus after an evening of working from 4:00 p.m. to midnight as a room service waiter in New Orleans, Louisiana which I did during the evening as a way to put myself through the university where I studied during the day.

Anyway, I was seated on the bus going home one late night when these two young guys in their 20’s were walking down the aisle of the bus asking everybody for spare change. Most people would either give them a few coins or simply say that they didn’t have anything.

On the bus was a gentleman, maybe in his early 60’s who worked at the same hotel that I did as the doorman. He was a gruff serious type of person who liked to be left along and mind his own business.

He was sitting alone with his umbrella propped up on the floor with his two hands resting on top the handle like the way one would rest his hands atop of a walking cane. The two guys asking for spare change finally made it down to where this particular gentleman was seated.

“Hey, dude, you got any spare change?”
“Get out of my face, I ain’t got no money to give to you!”
“Hey, old man, you running a lot of head. You want to step off of this bus and deal with us?”
“Okay, let’s go,” the gentleman quickly retorted.

This got the attention of everyone on the bus including the bus driver. All three of them, the two young guys and the older gentleman walked to the front and got off the bus. The bus driver paused and didn’t drive off.

The two young guys got off, and before they could say anything or react–”Pow!”–the gentleman whacked the first guy across the head with the handle-side of his umbrella. Then quickly–”Pow!”–he hit the other guy also across the head with the umbrella. The two young guys were both stunned as the gentleman aggressively and relentlessly continued to attack with his umbrella.

One of the two guys started to run off, and the gentleman then again whacked the other one remaining, this time breaking the umbrella handle over his head. Then both of them started running while the umbrella-clad warrior chased after them like a pit bull on crack.

The bus driver drove up a bit, and the two young guys ran and caught up to the front door of the bus, banging and pleading for the bus driver to let them in as the gentleman with the umbrella was catching up with them.

The entire bus was in an uproar with laughter, including the bus driver who took pity on the two youths and let them back on the bus to safety.

This altercation may have turned out very differently for our umbrella-armed warrior had he not instinctively or consciously understood the 3 most important reasons to strike first.

The 3 Most Important Reasons To Strike First:

Reason #1 For Striking First – Striking First Puts Momentum On Your Side - Our umbrella warrior knew this, so as soon as they all set foot on the ground, there was no need for talk or negotiations, he went into action striking first, creating momentum and putting his multiple opponents in a defensive mode which is really the purpose of any offensive that you execute.

Reason #2 For Striking First – You Get To Choose How And Where To Strike - It’s your choice now. Do you want to strike to tickle him, or to stop him? Just as one picture is worth a thousand words, one good first-strike is worth a thousands second and third strikes that are not as effective.

Reason #3 For Striking First – It Is Almost Impossible To Recover From A First Strike If You Keep On Striking - If your preemptive strike is well-placed in a vulnerable and vital area of the body, that is, the eyes, the throat, the groin and if you continue striking, there is little or no come-back to a good offense which, as it is said in martial arts circles, your best defense.

If you must, and when all attempts at diplomatic negotiations have failed…Strike first! Strike fast. Strike hard– and where it hurts–and keep on striking until the fight is over–or until you have put somebody to sleep.

I welcome your comment and feedback.

Respectively,

Charles Prosper aka “The Street Fighting Sifu”