Feints and Fakes
Page 5 of 14
How to Feign
Body drop. Make a movement with the lead hand and suddenly bend the lead knee so the body stoops forward quickly. This causes opponent to react to a perceived lunge attack.
Drawing. Drawing is an important type of feint that few ever develop. In feinting, you make an action to create an opening. In drawing, you expose an opening on yourself to draw the opponent into attacking the open target. When opponent makes a move to attack the opening, you slip inside or outside the attack and counterattack. Success depends on speed, timing, and judgment.
- Against an opponent who is reluctant to attack the opening, apply continuous pressure by advancing steadily while exposing the opening to force opponent to attack. When you draw an attack, you know what the target of the attack most likely is, so you may have your counterattack ready to fire.
- If your opponent is an attacker, you may draw an attack by exposing a target, such as by carrying the lead hand low to draw a head attack or by letting the elbows of your guard get further apart to draw a midsection attack. Once opponent initiates the attack, you close the opening and counterattack.
- Instead of attacking, counter fighters tend to lie in wait. They wait for you to attack and are usually not easily drawn into attacking an opening. If you also prefer to counterattack, then both you and your opponent will be moving around a lot with little action taking place. You need to draw an attack in some way so you will have the opportunity to counterattack. To draw a counter fighter, you attack first, while knowing where the counter fighter will probably counterattack and what target he or she will expose during the attack. Then you block the counterattack and counterattack yourself. Be careful since counter attackers usually counter with multiple attacks.