Boxing Gloves

At Jiu-Jitsu we sometimes put on big boxing gloves and test each other's technique.

One person is gloveless, and uses their best technique. The other plays a punching opponent.

It starts slow, and over time we ramp it up.

Everybody started having trouble covering the ground and clinching against punching opponents.

The instructor was unhappy, and made us work on it a lot more. He had trouble, too.

I had trouble at first, in spite of my Karate training. Now I'm more relaxed, and it's pretty easy. I get hit sometimes, but usually not. Somehow I am blending the two arts.

I can easily manage distance so that the punches miss, but not by all that much. I then zip in. Karate people are known for fast footwork and against these Jiu-Jitsu and Hapkido folks it seems true. They are mostly moving with a shuffle step similar to boxers.

When I'm the puncher, I find the others can all handle looping, hooking punches. However, straight punches cause them all sorts of difficulty.

The Jiu-Jitsu solution to the problem is limited. It doesn't seem to work well for the others, and I've pretty much abandoned it. Not totally, of course. That would be silly, but have blended it onto what I already do.

Nothing wrong with a subtle mix.