Defense against side headlock

How do you guys plan to defend against the good old fashioned side headlock?
The type seen in this picture...



It's something I'm currently thinking about and wanted plenty of ideas to sift through for inspiration.
All ideas considered.

 

I'd say find a book on jiu-jitsu. Heard they're quite good at getting out of the things.

Either that or buy the aggressor a beer?

 

Try pulling backwards on their opposite shoulder and kneeing the back of their knee

 

What's your MA? Do they teach you about this stuff in class?

Before I answer, I'd like to get a handle on what you do since I suspect you'll get as many bad replies as good.

 

Well, not a good situation to be in, but worse if you are on the ground, at least you can still move your feet and hips.

1. Start with immobilizing his right elbow so that it can't be used to choke you. Basically one method you can use is to squeeze his elbow between your right shoulder and chin. You have to try to get your chin tucked down anyway to give you some time and blood flow. (I have found that this move by itself against some, if done early enough, neutralizes their grab, leaving my hands free to punch them in the spine and groin.) --- edit, also take short shallow breaths to keep conscious longer.

2. Very important that you also position yourself relative to their body to release pressure on your head. In the above picture, move your right foot forward passed the plain of his front foot (basically move your hips towards the front of him by walking a circle around him until the grab is loosened -- from the above view, the circle around him would be counter-clockwise just enough until his grab is loosened).

3. Take your left hand, reach over the top of his right arm and use your fingers to apply pressure under his nose, lift his head back. Then when the time is right, you feel some range of motion, stand up straight and use your right palm strike under the side of his chin to knock him down.


Note: You may have to use your hands to protect your eyes as well as help to immobilize his elbow. You might want to apply pressure to his knee so he cannot move his leg. Punching to his liver, spine, groin, etc. may come but don't strike if you will be giving him a better lock on you. Use strikes at the right times combined with your movements.

Hope this helps, again, not a great situation for you to be in.

P.S. if you try to slip under his armpit, that can work but it really hurts on the ears. Better, IMHO, to lock his elbow in place and control it until he has no leverage on you.

 

Prevention better than a cure.

If he more or less got the hold but not applied pressure, work one of your hands in so to stop the arm applying pressure to your neck and lift head out.

Another is to grab the leg closest to you taking it to the ground (making sure youre on top) and go side control on his back. And lift head out.

Or a Belly to Back suplex aka the German. Actually I've only ever done this...not the other two/ Sounded like too much work.

 

Go a big rubbery one, for he has given me his back.

 

use your far arm to guard the face from being punched, swing the close arm up and around and use your hands to pull up and back under his nose (really painful) to swing him over your knee and from there you can strike the throat, solarplex, or groin if you like. Just another option

 

Couple options:

1. That thing someone suggested earlier about swimming an arm over, pushing his face back, then standing up (I know it's more technical than this, just cut it down for brevity). That thing works, provided you don't get your hand anywhere near his mouth. Kinda hard when you can't really see.

2. From the side pictured, put your right foot on his right foot, put your left foot behind his left heel, and sit down, spinning to the right. He'll fall right over your leg and you should end in side control.

3. (My favorite) Reach the left arm across in front of him and grab the back of his left knee/thigh. With the right arm, hook underneath his right knee/thigh, lift him in the air and sit out, using his body to break both of your falls. If he hangs on, you rotate to side control; however, most people will let go, allowing you to come up in the mount and pound the crap out of him. If you've ever watched WWE, think 'sidewalk' slam.

 

If I was in that situation I'd grab his neck or face, pull backwards then buckle his right knee. The few seconds during and when hes fallen should be enough time to wiggle your way out of the lock since it wont be such an effective grip in the newfound position on the floor.

Either that or just punch him in the Balls over, and over again.

 

I was in that situation once, but he was to my right with his left arm around my neck. He was also bigger and stronger than me. I grabbed him around the waste and started running forward. He stumbled for a few yards, let go, and fell over with me on top of him. Then I pummeled him. It wasn't pretty, but in that situation on that day, it worked. Not saying it's the best, most efficient, most effective solution, but it's the one I used and it worked.

 

One word of caution with the hand-under-the-nose face peel thing: make sure they don't bite your hand! (this happened to me recently) Angle the bottom of your hand away from your opponent's mouth. I believe the same technique can work using your opponents hair (assuming it's long enough to grab) or eye sockets (assuming you can get a handhold in them) as levers instead of the nose. Still, that's my favorite headlock escape I've seen. I just love being able to break down someone's posture.
The leg lifting one I find is difficult to do against opponents who have much of a weight advantage. And as a 140 pound guy, I can expect to generally be faced with a larger opponent.
Wayward Son - that's an interesting one. I'll keep it in mind.

 

The fingers under the nose has an ideal timing of BEFORE they get the head lock on you or right after you start to stand up freeing yourself. Basically, when you can see the target and the attacker is not thinking about biting you because they are thinking about getting the head lock to work and it is failing them.

As soon as that arm comes around, stand up straight and put the fingers under the nose and follow with the palm strike. Do this before they have you good.

On the other hand, if they bend you down, immediately trap their elbow between your shoulder and chin/head as you circle out (right foot forward) as if moving hips forward and backing out under their armpit in the same movements. Yes you have to lift your shoulder up and tuck your chin down, it is like a vice grip on them and it will make most want to let go as a reflex. Slip out and apply sankyo or a hammer lock on them.

The basic escape is how I originally described but in real application, that is more like what I described in this post. You need to figure this out for yourself.

 

this one's real easy if you are a decent grappler/wrestler. first make sure you're not in any danger of passing out or anything (protect your neck), then just get your hips under you, grab a leg, and slam the hell out of him.

it's easier with a side headlock since your feet are in about the right position anyway, but you can do it against a choke from behind too if you catch it early enough or are stronger than him. protect your neck, drop the hips, step behind him with your left leg, and then it's pretty much the same thing as the side headlock from there.

 

Control the arm furthest from you so he can't punch you in the face. With the arm behind him you can always pull on his hair really hard and don't let go, hit him repeatedly in the groin/stomach/solar plexus. One of the many escapes we learn in jj.

Remember that all your limbs are free. Use them.

 

One of the key things is not letting them get it sunk in tight.
So that means keeping that chin down so they can't get their forearm under your chin and onto your trachea or your neck.

 

*NOTE: Not really the kind of stuff I learn, just telling what I'd be likely to do.

I'd probably tuck the chin in and charge ahead in a tackle/takedown (if distance allows it). In the picture, it's probably too late to tuck the chin in, though. Going for the knee sounds like a good idea, but the thing I worry about is not having enough range to do it.

Maybe if I felt lucky/fancy, or desperate, I'd attempt to jump and get my legs around his neck, but I don't get the feeling my neck would appreciate it if I failed.

Honestly, I have trouble imagining how such a lock can occur in a fight unless you are taken by surprise. And personally, if I'm taken by surprise in such a lock by someone that knows how to apply a lock effectively (pulling with the other hand), I don't think there's much to do.

 

hhmmm... suprise is one of them, another is if they've just thrown a losers' haymaker at you and knocked you out of your senses and are bending over to recoup. A stupid thing to do once you're hit, but I myself am guilty of it.

a few things i've learned just from dealing with it...
turn your head so your neck is in the crook of his/her elbow to allow yourself a little more breathing room. as said before, tuck your chin accordingly and try and make as much room as possible so you don't pass out.

now, if the situation was close to that in the picture initially posted, i've probably just end up whacking them in the pills, just because it looks like a pretty open shot.
I managed to land a decent kidney shot before, but that was a once in a lifetime kind of deal, I think.

just my two cents (it's late, i couldn't post more >.<)
-kat

 

i know several different ways to get out, but as your teacher or a higher ranked student. thats what i did

 

"What's your MA? Do they teach you about this stuff in class?

Before I answer, I'd like to get a handle on what you do since I suspect you'll get as many bad replies as good."

It's not stuff we really cover in class but just one of those things I'm thinking about just now. I like to cycle through things and see what I come with and how that fits with the rest of my game. If I can't come up with much I research and see what's out there.
It's always good to hear other's views while doing this as they can touch on things I might have missed or think along different lines to me.
I've done a bit of BJJ and Hapkido in the past so I do have my own answers to this.
I just want others.

"Honestly, I have trouble imagining how such a lock can occur in a fight unless you are taken by surprise"

As said before I'd say the biggest entry to this is a haymaker that loops round the back of your head (due to two bodies coming together quickly and/or bad accuracy) but doesn't really knock you down. It also happens in clinch range as a fairly natural untrained response. I've heard it referred to as the "school boy headlock" as it happens in school fights a lot. I'd say it's one of the common street situations EVERYONE should know how to counter.

"turn your head so your neck is in the crook of his/her elbow to allow yourself a little more breathing room"

I'd disagree with that completely. The crook of the elbow is EXACTLY where they need your neck to be in order to choke you out. Turn into them I'd say. Unless you mean turn into them so that it's the back of your neck rather than the front in the crook. In which case ignore me.

My current thinking on this is to analyse what THEY are trying to do with this technique and then trying to neutralise that. Then I can go on the offensive.

I've come up with 4 possible things that the headlocker is trying to do (there might be more)...

1. Linking his hands together and trying to choke you. Possible ways of stopping this would be to control his furthest arm round his back, tuck your face and chin into his body (so he's only squeezing the back of your neck..painful but not threatening).

2. Hitting with the opposite hand. Again a controlling arm round his back could help here. Tucking the head into him also helps here as it would present the top of your head rather than your face...again, painful but not immediately threatening. Hopefully he'll bust his hand on your cranium trying this.

3. Attempting to move you around with your head. Either to spin you into the floor or bash your head into things (or eject you from a nightclub!). Something that might help here would be to lower your hips and sink back.

4. Keeping hold of you so his mates can give you a kicking. Not much you can do here but get out as quick as you can so you can give them a kicking back.

From that list I come up with a posture to stop those things from happening. Legs wide, hips low, weight back, head tucked into his body, far arm controlled (or as many of those things as you can get). From there I'd say most of the suggestions can come into play.
My personal favourite is to reach over and grab his eye socket, nostrils, cheek or chin and pull back. At the same time collapse and lift his nearest knee and lift him up. Then slam him onto a body part of your choosing. If you can't lift him bodily you should still be able to lift his nearest leg and then sweep or knee his supporting leg and go over to the side. Or just fall back and valley drop throw him.