Fundamental Combinations With Kyle Bochniak
There is a long standing saying in pretty much every sport in the world, that being that “Fundamentals win matches” or in terms of combat sports “fundamentals win fights”. This is, fortunately or unfortunately depending on who you are, the truth. While everyone does love to see a spectacular technique that rocks or knockouts out their opponent, it isn’t the best idea to be constantly throwing those techniques.
Techniques like the jumping knees, spinning kicks or elbows and showtime kicks are great to look at and are awesome when they land but are generally less practical due to them being more obvious techniques due to their telegraph. They are also inherently high risk and high reward techniques, hence why they are crowd pleasing and have a high chance of getting a knockout if they land, but there is a massive risk of danger if they don’t land.
If a high risk technique gets countered, it is also likely to lead to a knockout and a missed technique like a jump knee is likely to leave you in a bad position to counter or defend yourself from any strikes that your opponent might throw after.
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This is why the fundamentals are the fundamentals and why they are so important. Fundamentals are low risk and can be fairly decent in terms of reward. They are also what get the most points, score knockdowns more often, are generally harder to see coming and defend against and they even set up those more flashy techniques.
If you stick to fundamentals for 80 - 90 percent of the fight, your opponent will think that you are a more straightforward fighter. This means that they won’t be expecting you to throw any number of flashy techniques that are at your disposal. This is where throwing a flashy technique makes sense, as they won’t be expecting it and will likely either not have time to react to it or will freeze because they weren’t expecting it, making the shot land.
But like we said, to land those big shots you first need to land and be good with the fundamentals of striking. Part of being fluent in the fundamentals of striking is putting together simple combinations that have a high chance of landing.
That being said in this video feature top UFC Featherweight Kyle Bochniak, Kyle goes over just that kind of combination. This combination is about as day one kickboxing as it gets being a jab-cross-lead hook-right kick to the body. This is the first combination that a lot of people learn and it’s for a good reason, that reason being it teaches a lot of concepts in striking that are important to know in one’s marital arts journey.
The starting punches of this combination, the one-two, get your opponent thinking that you are only going to be punching, so they bring their hands to their head to protect it. Then the lead hook, which if it lands that’s great but that isn’t important, gets them heavy on their lead leg, whether they block it or it lands cleanly. This means that it will be a lot harder for them to bring up their leg to check your kick, meaning their body is wide open for your right kick.
When you are throwing the body kick, make sure to step out on a 45 degree angle and pivot on the ball of your foot and torque your hips to make sure you get as much power and body weight into the kick as possible.
Keep in mind that after you land that rear kick to the body you don’t just want to be there waiting for your opponent to counter. This means that after you retract your kick back to your stance you should move as quickly as possible to avoid any strikes that your opponent might throw at you in retaliation.
If you want to learn more striking combinations and drills like this one from UFC Featherweight Kyle Bochniak, then check out our complete instructional series featuring him, available now!