Fighting Techniques for Beginners

Sometimes a fight is simply unavoidable. If you should find yourself in a fight for one reason or another, it's important to keep your head even if some of your opponent's blows get through. Thankfully having a little bit of basic fight sense can go a long way. They say, everyone has a plan until they get punched. But a good plan can see you through even after you have been punched.

  1. Keep Your Guard Up

    • In a real-life fight situation, your primary goal is to hit your opponent while avoiding being hit yourself. To accomplish this, you'll need to keep your guard up. Keeping your guard up means putting your fists and arms between you and your opponent to form a protective barrier. Take a narrow stance with your strongest side trailing, as strikes are stronger when they come from your trailing limbs. Draw your arms in close to protect your torso with your fists held about chin level so that you can duck behind them or raise them to protect your head and face.

    Attack Soft Targets

    • If you find yourself in an actual fight, you want to end it quickly. Striking your opponent in vulnerable, soft points will cause more damage and allow you to follow up with more blows or flee. The nose, eyes, throat, groin, knee and solar plexus are all good targets. Landing a strong blow or strike to any of these targets can stun or incapacitate someone, allowing you to finish him off or to run away.

    Kick Low, Kick Hard

    • There are no rules in a fight, so you want to use the best weapons you have available to you. Kicks have a longer reach than punches and can do more damage. However, don't attempt the sort of flashy, high kicks you see in martial arts movies. Even Bruce Lee himself didn't use kicks in real life. If you kick, keep it low and strike with all your might. Good targets include the knee, the groin and the stomach. If you kick someone in the knee, think of it as delivering a horizontal stomp.

    If You Can, Land the First Blow

    • If a fight is imminent, don't wait for your opponent to strike so you can skillfully avoid being hit and then come back with a clever follow-up. The element of surprise is a huge advantage, and if you can sense things are going that way, hit first, and hit hard. A punch to the face, a knee to the groin or a stomp to the knee, whatever. If you make a good connection, one blow can end a fight or at least slow your opponent down enough for you to get away.