Striking an oponent in your guard.

So recently weve started doing a lot more sparring with strikes to the body allowed.

I spend a lot of time with people in my guard or with me on to p in sidemount. Do any experienced MMA players ahve any suggestions for effective striking form these positions? Especially strikes to the body (head shots aren't allowed in my training yet, soon though I guess).

Thanks in advance,

Ditto.

I have found it extremely difficult to strike from the bottom, since you can not swing your elbow past your body to gain any momentum, nor do you have any appreciable hip torque or weight transfer to add to it.

The only good chance to strike is when your opponent sits up (so you sit up with him), and even then, he is usually sitting up to begin pounding YOU.

Aiki,

I am not experienced and don't even consider myself a MMA guy. But I do "wrasle" a bit in BJJ. I am mostly a standup guy, but one of the reasons why I wanted to learn BJJ was for the very reason that you describe.

From my limited experience, I don't think you can strike well from the guard since as Matt suggested, there is no ready way to put your body into the strikes.

I have always thought of the (standard) guard as a brilliant defensive technique from which to make the top player try to commit to a technique and allows you time to take advantage of his movements to pass guard...setting up sweeps and chokes.

From what I've seen in mma it's not necessarily how hard you hit when on the ground, it's where the strikes land. I'm not sure how many people can take even light strikes to the floating ribs or pressure points with the fingers.

That's just my thoughts on it, but I may be wrong.

Definitely striking while you have somebody in your guard is hard. Limiting the head doesn't help but I think that trying to hit the body will definitely make you think more and quickly if you want to actually strike them. Good training method.

If he passes your guard then you can make strikes to the body much easier ... but why would you want to give up your guard. If he passes your guard then blows to the floating ribs are a must. If not wearing gloves ... and even lightling hitting the body ... a raised middle knuckle over and over to the same spot will really do damage. Even try this on their thigh ... can you say charlie horse.

With you on top in side mount you will have to rely on elbow strikes to the ribs and also use your weight to your advantage and lay it all on them. With them struggling to remove your weight this will give you other opportunities to take a better position or give you an advantage at an appendage becoming available for locking up.

Unforunately like some I don't have all of the answers or know enough but am learning as I go. I can see things in my head and visualize what I want to do ... but as we all know when actually grappling ... things don't always work out ... or you can see something but you just can't get it. Keep trying ... be creative ... see what happens.

I believe striking while in the guard is for making your opponent move from his current position so you can gain an advantage. When someone is struck, the natural reaction is to block or stop the hit. One can use hitting while in the guard to get thier opponent to move as well as to "hurt" them. you don't need to pull way back and try to land a "haymaker" for it to be affective, just use short straight jabs to the soft areas of your opponent, and KEEP hitting, they will move and when they do.USE THE OPPORTUNITY TO YOUR ADVANTAGE.(your opponent will be thinking about avoiding the strikes not advancing thier game.
I hope that made sense.(it's like a jab is to boxing).

If your in a fight and in the side control(cross mount), head strikes with elbows will mess somebody up. Or if not that, knee shots to the kidneys.

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Do any experienced MMA players ahve any suggestions for effective striking form these positions? Especially strikes to the body (head shots aren't allowed in my training yet, soon though I guess).

Thanks in advance,

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Grab your opponent's wrist on one side with your opposite hand (cross-grab). Use your opposite hand to hit. you should be wide open. Switch up when he blocks.

Use hitting only to force his guard open and work to pass when he ankles uncross.


-John