When practicing self-defense techniques in Jiu-jitsu, we often have to play the role of attacker so that our partner can play the role of defender (described in more detail in my post, The Importance of Role-playing in Martial Arts Training). In our dojo, our students are quite friendly with each other, and as a result, they sometimes have a tendency to take it easier on each other when playing the attacker role, particularly the newer students. This phenomenon was happening on the mats the other day.

A Side Headlock Gone Sideways

A number of my students were working on defenses against various types of headlocks. I noticed that many of them were struggling to get a feel for the technique. Something looked odd about the way a couple of them were doing it so I stepped in and had one of the students in question do the attack on me, in this particular case, it was a side headlock, so I could demonstrate the defense again for them. As I suspected, the student playing the attacker role was only taking on the position of the side headlock, but not really applying it with any intent. (more…)

Tags: role of the uke