Your Stance You will want to have your weight evenly distributed between your left and right leg, with your passive side facing your opponent. If you are right handed, the left is the passive side. Your opponent will most likely do the same; if you see him leaning forward, you can take your chances and swipe kick the leg nearest you, throwing him to the ground. Stability is 90% of staying up.
Kicks A kick to the chest is sure to take nearly anyone down. But if you aren't fast, your opponent can grab your leg and pull it, throwing you to the ground. A kick to the shin is much easier, especially when your opponent has his eyes on your upper body. When he lowers himself after the shin kick, uppercut him.
Punches Most basic rule of punches: keep your thumb outside your fist, lest you wish to break it. If you're hitting something hard, do a flat fist (fingers and back of hand at ninety degrees;) if your target is soft, angle your fingers at fourty-five degrees, striking with your knuckles. Always go for the money shot. Right in the face, preferrably on the nose. If you can get to the side of his face, a good strong hit has the power to dislodge his jaw or even break it. Always punch with your whole body - since your passive side is facing your opponent, by swinging around you can put an extra 1xx pounds into the hit.
Pressure points With a bit of practice, you can end any fight in five seconds flat. There are tons of these, the most practical are between the jaw and ear, on either side of the neck, aside the shin... You can pick up a book on them or just poke yourself =) - They can save your ass if you're in any sort of lock and can liberate a hand.
Blocking We will assume that during the course of this, your opponent will try to distribute some bodily harm in return. It is amost useless to block kicks (unless you're a friggin' monster, and then why would you be reading this,) instead, try to move out of their way. If a straight-on punch is approaching you, use the outside of your arm to "smack" it out of your way, preferrably striking with the other one. Any sliding hit (coming from the side) should be blocked on the inside of your opponents arm with the downside of your hand.
When I created my original writeup, I was describing a fight that would not lead to the death - merely the consummation of a heated argument; the kind of thing that gets stopped by both parties' friends before it gets too serious. Of course one should avoid fights when possible, I used to think otherwise until my jaw was broken with someone's first punch - but, we're young, we're men and in the quest for knowledge and nubile young women things tend to get out of hand, a good fight can be cathartic at times.
A kick to the genitals is always a good first move. REMEMBER: You should be fighting to save your life, not to look cool. If your opponent has good facial and lower-body coverage, try hitting the throat or the back of the neck. The former could leave your opponent incapacitated, while the latter hurts a WHOLE LOT. Consider taking a self defnse class. Ju-jitzu, karate, and judo are good Eastern-fighting style options for self-defense. When in doubt...run like the wind!
I got in a fight two days ago, and while the guy who had me pinned to the ground 'won,' when we were there, my rabid method of swinging my arm from the ground to nail him in the small of the back repeatedly left him more sore than I the next day.
Basically, pressure points are good, things that people aren't looking for you to hit, their ears, their eyes, their wind-pipe, their sternum especially. People think, 'aww, he's just punching at my rock hard stomach,' and then that little bone breaks off at the tip and it's off to the emergency room with 'em.
My last piece of advice, also a lesson learned from last night, is to wear contacts if you can. I had glasses, so to avoid damage to them, I threw them off to the side before we got rough. I've got amazingly bad eyesight, and I blame my getting caught by him on the fact that his arms were just blurry grey things to me.
I cringe somewhat when I hear people speak casually and technically about which bones to break, and how to best maim another person. I do not wish to draw conclusions, but I can only assume that, judging from society as a whole, most of the people who espouse these techniques have never been forced to employ them. I do not wish to give off the impression that I am some pacifist wimp who believes that all violence is inexcusable and would gladly turn the other cheek... In fact, I myself have been practicing martial arts for three years. But the fact is that if presented with a dangerous situation, my first intention would be to end the fight as quickly as possible with a minimum of permanent physical damage.
It's not even a matter of fair fighting, whatever that means (in taekwondo, my sparring opponents often yell at me for blocking with my knee... it's painful to them, but effective and not against the rules). It's merely a matter of pragmatism. Do you really want to kill someone? Murder is a big thing, legally, emotionally, and otherwise.
That is not to say that there will not be certain situations in which one's own life will be at stake; this is undoubtedly true. However, to approach every physical encounter in one's life in this manner is both vain and can only do more harm than good.
I couldn't help adding my thoughts on ass kicking...
Fighting is not necessarily a good thing but sometimes it happens. What you really should remember about fighting is: If you think you are going to get into a fight, hit first and very hard. A good straight punch to the face, don't swing your arm like a roundhouse punch or something like that, they'll see it coming. Aim three or four inches behind their face when hitting them. Go hit for the nose or jaw or eyes, you want them to be in a lot of pain. Hopefully, you'll immediately floor them and it will be over with that first punch. If they don't crumple and fall to the floor within a split second, hit them again and again until the fall down.
That is your pretty basic, no-nonsense method of fighting. I'll move onto a few other techniques that are a little more destructive.
1.) Compounding. Compounding a strike is very simple. What you want to accomplish is stopping the sway of your opponent's body when you hit it. This can be done firstly by backing someone into a wall and hitting them or grabbing the back of their head in one hand and elbowing them in the face with your other arm. I recommend the first method for people who don't really fight often, as there is a lot of risk in grappling with you opponent.
2.) Blocking and Trapping. If you can't floor your new friend with one or two hits you're going to want to know how to block. Hopefully, the person you are fighting will throw roundhouse punch or take a big swing at you. Step in closer to them and hit their punching arm with your forearm and hit it hard. It'll hurt you a bit, but it will hurt them a lot more and probably knock them of balance. Punch them in the face. From here you have two options, either punch them again, or, if they leave their arm hanging in the air, hyperextend it and hit them in the elbow. You'll break it, it only takes seven pounds of pressure to break locked elbow. The second option is essentially trapping their limb.
3.) Kicking. Never, ever kick above the mid-thigh. Kicking any higher puts you at high risk. The last thing you want is to be thrown to the ground. You can kick to the groin. A hard kick mid-thigh causes little long term damage and lots of short term pain. This is a good thing. A well placed kick will discourage anyone from continuing. Go for the sides of the knees if in doubt.
4.) Dancing fighters and how to move. Some people move around a lot when they are fighting. You can use this to you advantage, but always remember, they are moving around to "fake you out." Don't look at their face. Look directly at their chest if you are fighting a guy and around the belly button if you are fighting a woman. They won't be able to fake you out. You also could try dancing around, though you should stop immediately if they start watching your center of gravity. They know just as much about fighting as you do so you should end the fight as soon as possible. I generally do not approve of dancing about; it really wastes a ton of energy you could be breaking your friend's face with. Keep your feet about shoulder-width apart, your knees slightly bent, one foot six or so inches in front of the other. If you have to move shuffle, don't pick your feet up off the ground; take your weight off it and slide forward.
5.) Being particularly nasty. Here are a few evil tips. Slap someone in the side of the neck. Your neck has %400 more nerves and sensors than any place else on your body, besides your naughty bits. Put you knee into your opponent's leg halfway between their knee and hip on the outside of the leg. You'll hit a nerve. Poke them in the eyes. Grab their throat between your thumb and index finger. Whether they live or die when you have their throat is up to you. If you squeeze too hard, you'll most likely break their windpipe. They'll die, that's bad.
Going psycho. Don't. If you are really pissed off and aren't thinking you are going to get hurt. Bad. Don't talk trash either. Keep your mouth closed and you jaw clenched. It'll save you chipped and broken teeth and maybe even biting off your tongue.
There's your basic guide to fighting. Let me recount a few essentials. Hit hard and don't hold anything back. Don't kick above the thigh. Don't mince about like a fairy.
Disclaimer. I've studied a good amount of martial arts for a good amount of time. Karate, American Kenpo, Jiu-Jitsu, animal kung fu, and Pak Mei with a little Muay Thai for good measure. I never learned any martial art for the sole purpose of kicking ass and don't think anyone should fight using any of the above techniques unless their life is threatened. Hurting people is bad.
