How to Perform a Back Fist Strike

Hey guys! Welcome to martialskill.com, I am Sean Daily. I have with me today Patt Brown and we are going to be talking to you about one of my favorite moves, one of my favorite techniques in all Martial Arts which is the Backfist. Backfist, we call it Bung, or Bung Da, or Bung Choi depending on what exact system you are in or what Chinese you are using or not using. But, the bottomline is it's a Backfist. It's a very, very effective technique. It's very fast, it's almost like a jab in its speed and this should be, and we are going to help you to figure out how to make it that way if it's not right. So basics of the Backfist. Really, a Backfist is, I am going to do it straight on to the camera so you can see this. A Backfist starting from my favorite position is simply coming out from here. Okay, so this could be that hand, when you go, punch, punch, and then this as you go -- it's not here, it's just like a jab because you will do it all the way out, and all the way back. You don't want to pull it. So I don't want to go with this and I want to make it that thing, though it can be, and we will talk about that later. Now this should go all the way up, so this should be extended fully at the end. Now some people are worried that they are going to hyper-extend their elbow when you do this. I guess that's possible, but you need to learn the sensitivity of how to pull that back, just like you do to fully extend your jab. It's a bit different. So when we are punching, we are going to go, we are going to bring, and we are going to need this elbow because it's going to come straight towards our target, and we are going to lead out. So you want to think about like this, leading with the elbow and flipping it. But, it all becomes one motion coming out to the end point. So we'll go punch, punch, punch, basic Backfist. Okay? Almost like a jab. You can use this to set your opponent back to stroke; you can stroke down. You've probably noticed, why would we strike there? When we break somebody's nose, it causes inflammation; it causes tearing, makes it hard to see. You can also strike to pat him on over here. Other targets for -- but there are many targets for a Bung, so we could actually strike to the top of the head, we strike to the bridge of the nose, we can strike to the jaw-line. This is a great one out here. We can strike behind here; we can strike to the temple. All these are targets. So your Backfist, the basic Backfist, I am going to move back a little bit here. Your basic Backfist is going to be just right here. It's just like a jab Backfist. Now, when you are practicing with a partner, you should be able to have the control to be able to land that without stroking that. So I just put this on Patt's cheek, you will be able to do fist. And notice that the hand should come back so quickly that he cannot even stop the technique. So he is just reacting as my hands are already back. So hands, pick about this way. The hands have to come back quicker than they went out. That's what you would be thinking. By thinking that way, you are actually going to create a faster technique. So most people, we talked about this in the jab video. If you haven't seen that, go back and watch it, because people get tensed when they're told about that motion, right? So I am going to Backfist you, and he is pretty sure I am going to Backfist him right about now, because I am looking like I am going to do that. But, if I am in a normal fighting position, here if he doesn't know I am going to do that, I don't want to do anything away. So right here, hook, okay, so go ahead and walk to him now. So you see his hand is moving after, passing fast further, now back because you need it so quick. It comes back even before he can stop it. I am going to go closer a bit. So that's a basic Backfist. Another Backfist is gravity, and punching over the top. Because one of the things is, if he is starting to move hand up like this, and on Backfist, so you can just simply raise that hand to go up, little bit easier to block. There we go. So what I am going to do is punch over to the top of that. So I am going to grab here. I could also, I could jam, jam in. So I can jam and punch over the top,. By the way this is very similar to the reverse one. The only difference is having a fist, okay? Very similar technique and in fact if you Bung, your Backfist is slow, turn it into a reverse palm for a while. Relax yourself. Okay? Because most people are more relaxed when they do reverse palm and bung, because that fist again, as soon as you start making the fist, then those people get off tensed. As I've talked about in the jab video, it shouldn't be a fist until it gets out there. So if I am doing Bung, I am going to do what we call simple Bung. I am not going to go here. I am going to go here at the same time. So this happens altogether, boom, together. So you are going to go one, two, gives him way too much time to figure out what I am doing. You are also going to go like this, okay? But, it's get up if you are a drummer, it's a plan right there like that. So back, back. So nice, still and hold back and see how his hand is right about that, that's what it should be. So, you are not slapping it, you are grabbing the control, and punching it. That goes to the tension of this hand. This would be like someone who care is like, well my hand isn't grabbed, that's drawing the tension, it's moving his guard right, it's also drawing his tension and there is a lot of that, and frame of that just come through. So that's simple one. So when you are practicing with your partner, you probably want to work maybe an inch, up and down. If they have each one on the blocking, I mean somebody who is very good, so Patt is going to go ahead and form it in that, yeah, it's fine. So I am going to make sure that if you want to try such thing and drop, you want to practice some of the tension. There it is, good. It's very difficult to lock this and it has not been made up. Nice, okay. So same thing, back. So if your partner is a little bit slower in that starting, then it's up to you now to control it, okay? And then to stop. You don't want to be punching your partner in the jaw over and over again, that is probably not going to let you practice with him much. So this one for those of you who are - as soon as you start putting this in your practice, is rolling bung and in rolling bung you will see a nice switch here. So this rolling bung, you will see that this is the end of the first row in bung form. Here we have elbow strike when you go grab, grab, bung. There is going to be a difference really here. This is just climbing over to the top one in essence over what's happening. So I might go to one, two, three, if I am doing with two hands. So just to explain that what I did, it seems that - the form is like covering a lot of it. Really what I am doing is covering both hands, either grabbing or jamming and punching over the top. So at the end of it, it's a bungo. Okay so one thing that's really important to remember about the striking surface if you are going to do Backfist or bungo, and not everybody realizes this, your hand is made up of many, many small bones and you do not want to be striking here, the back of your hand, unless you've got some seriously tough hands. It's right behind this line of the knuckles right here, that's your striking surface. So you shouldn't be leading like this. You shouldn't be like this. This should be a straight line, so it's just like a straight fist, you know turned over. So all bones in your arm should line up, this is completely straight, I could set a plate on this, okay? It should be completely flat, and I am going to go straight right along the edge. So if I am striking somebody in the jaw, or wherever it is, that's my striking surface.