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A story reported here, about an 18 year-old-girl walking home at 1:30AM was grabbed from behind! Talk about a scary situation! Reportably the girl felt a knife at her side as the guy threatened her. She defended herself with a kick! The story does not go into a lot of details but I will focus on why kicking is an ideal defense for a girl and some strategy along with application tips. Here is a picture of High Kick Girl in one scene of the movie trailer.
High Kick Girl
The girl that escaped bought some time with her kick! Why did she do that? I think girls and women have to decide based on the circumstances what they should do. This girl took a chance with the knife and kicked the attacker. My guess is she kicked the nuts – that would have the affect of temporarily incapacitating the attacker so she could get away!
Something else going for the girl is the attacker probably intended on molesting or robbing her. Now why might that be an advantage? It buys her some time and if the guy was out to beat her up or murder her – he would have done that straight away!
I would argue that self defense is the better option in most cases because once someone is threatening you with a weapon – he has very little regard for your life. So lets assume that a girl or woman has decided to defend herself. What will work against a large male attacker? Kicks are one good logical choice! Take a look of this male/female bodybuilder video to see the differences in muscle mass.
On a quick aside I almost had to fight a body builder one time and do you know what? I would have been like a woman fighting against a man. At the time I was 165 pounds of lean body mass (conditioned by fighting) but the body builder looked to be about 280 pounds of pure muscle! All of my normal moves would have had no effect! I’ll tell you my probable strategy later but lets explore how women can defend against a male attacker.
My first comment would be that even though this female body builder is stronger than most women – she does not stand a chance in any test of strength against this male body builder! What are her advantages? Here is what I see:
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she is lighter
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she is more flexible
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she is probably quicker
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her legs are stronger than the males arms
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she is not overconfident
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she might have some martial arts/self-defense training
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she can use tools
When a woman is defending herself against a large male, all of the normal striking points I and many other self-defense instructors have taught are all open. For instance the eyes, ears, throat, and groin are all great strikes for women. A girl can kick the groin effectively in most instances (raised heel from behind or snap kick/knee to the front).
What are some non-standard strikes (meaning not really practices in sport karate)? Keeping with the message in this post – kicks to the knees, shins, and stomps to the inside of the knee and top of the foot. Remember that a woman’s legs are stronger than a mans arm. She can easily inflict pain to a man! I am a huge proponent of the snap kick to the knee or groin. Here is a quick video.
The snap kick to the groin or knee can be thrown with the front or rear leg because the targets do not require a lot of force to be injured! I would not throw high kicks in a real self-defense situation. Girls and women should take a self-defense course at a minimum to learn these basic strikes.
Snap, side and rear kicks are taught at the very basic level in Kenpo Karate and I would assume in most styles of karate. These basic kicks to the legs are often overlooked because the low leg targets are illegal strikes in point, full-contact, and MMA matches. They are simply too dangerous because dislocating knee cap or breaking a leg would stop the fight and permanently injure the contestants.
Low leg kicks are perfectly suited to self-defense situations. Now if I had to fight the bodybuilder I mentioned, I would have taken his legs out with snap or side kicks to the knees. I would not have gotten close to him where he might have grabbed me… it that had happened – I would have had to transition to eye gouges, throat punches and groin kicks/knees!
Now I did not address defenses against weapons specificly here but rather why I thought what this teenaged girl did (kick and get away), was a good stratigy for her. If you have enjoyed this post, please consider subscribing to my RSS Feed.
March 23rd, 2009 at 10:12 pm
She may have also done a strong down thrusting kick to the shin. The groin kick may have been difficult for her because the attacker was from behind and pulling her in close.
Either way, she showed good instinct and got out of a potentially lethal situation.
March 24th, 2009 at 6:27 am
Excellent post. My strategy in a self-defense situation would be the same… knees, throat, eyes and groin. In women’s self-defense classes, we teach a thrust/stomp kick to the knee, four-knuckle fist to the throat, gouge to the eyes and knee to the groin. Elbows are good too!
In regard to groin strikes for self-defense, do you think that men anticipate that target?
March 24th, 2009 at 8:16 am
I am all for acting like you’re weak and going along with the perpetrator. Then when the moment allows, cause as much damage as humanly possible and run like hell, hahahaha…
I have been there and know from experience that you have to fight, use your body parts as weapons, and find a way out.
I am glad to hear the girl got away. I like happy endings. Great post.
March 25th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
To start with she should have stomped down as hard as she could with her heal into the middle of his foot, which would have temporarily incapacitated him, and buy her time to assess, or to flee.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
the mos effective self-defence method: ”groin kick and 200m dash”
March 26th, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Hey Ikigai – you might be right… another good kick might be to scrape the shin on the way down to a stomp on top of the foot. Lots of stuff to try.
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Hi Michelle! Yes there are great inside strikes that are very effective. It is kind of funny you ask but it is my feeling (after have being kicked so many times there) that men are open for groin kicks… especially if they believe that have a woman scared. I have often feigned apprehension in an altercation – right before I exploded.
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Hi Sly – I have wrote about your adventures and mishaps… you are a survivor! And yes – use all of the tools at your disposal.
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Hey Bob! Great advice about the foot stomps – I think there are so many good targets and ways to set up the strike and escape for women.
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Archie! A man after my own heart! I only wish I could run the 200 fast nowadays!
August 24th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
You over-rated groin kicks in this article. I mean, Bear hug or any attacks performed from behind isn´t suspectible to groin kick in any way, unless performed incorrectly, which I will not post here (=) if you are interested post me a mail on karel_novak@yahoo.com ), 99% from forward arent (except maybe front choke) and from side again, anything except side choke.
August 24th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Hi Scipion121212,
True one will need a few more tricks than just the groin kick but I don’t agree that groin kicks are over-rated.
One can kick the groin from almost any angle (i.e. snap, heel hook, wheel kick) so unless someone is wearing a cup – the groin can be kicked. Now one can argue if it is the best defense in a given scenario.
If you would like to explain your point, I’d be glad to debate, failing that – thanks for your opinion.