front fist roll reversal

[swfl]

Good evening. Trying to reverse my wrist roll on the front fist roll. What is the contact area on your hand? Is it an upward strike? I can kind of get it while going very slowly. Unable to find this in the bible. Thank you

[Marlon]

Here ya go

http://www.speedbagforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4939

Hi,
Click on that link & it will bring you to a thread where I asked for help on this & Alan went above & beyond with a detailed explanation AND a great illustration that shows exactly what you are looking for. It's #25 on there.

I'm STILL stuck on this stuff too (anything in reverse gives me problems) but I have a much better understanding of it so at least I now know WHY I suck. Good luck!

[swfl]

I thought this might be a little difficult to understand from my words. What I am looking to do is hit the bag on the front side. On videos I have seen people start with a standard front fist roll and then reverse the direction of the roll while still hitting the front of the bag. Hopefully this is easier to understand.

[Zaza]

This might help, there's SloMo at 2:15.
(practice before last years speed bag gathering)

[swfl]

There it is!.. Thanks Zaza. It looks like the contact point is the same in either direction. Just more practice.

[Zaza]

It is, but notice I move in more of an oval pattern (you see me move my face back a bit...because I was punching myself in the mouth!) and you do kind of use a little more wrist flick in an upward direction.

I always use a bigger bag and go slow to learn anything new....like Alan says, it's a "Control Bag".

[Speedbag]

Good evening. Trying to reverse my wrist roll on the front fist roll. What is the contact area on your hand? Is it an upward strike? I can kind of get it while going very slowly. Unable to find this in the bible. Thank you

Yes, it is an upward strike on the bag. Normally in fist rolling your "next punch" comes from over the top of the last one. Notice the rolling motion in the Normal F-Roll, your fist contacts the bag, and the "normal" rolling motion drops it down, below the bag and out of the way of the next rebound, which hits the other fist coming from over the top of it. You do not have to consciously worry about that fist that just hit the bag, it's out of the way.

but when you "reverse" this rolling motion, things change. First, the fist hitting the bag connects in an "upward motion". As the fist hits and clears the bag, you must consider two things. first, that fist is now moving upward, (1) into the bag arc of the next rebound and (2) towards the board overhead. If your fist contacts either one of them, you have "messed up". To avoid this, particularly getting caught by the bag rebound, you have to think about moving the fist "back" a bit and out of the way of the rebound. Now, your "next fist" in this reverse direction fist roll is coming from "underneath" the last fist. Honestly I had never seen any punching technique or combination where the NEXT punch came from underneath the other fist, or punched upwards on the bag until members demonstrated it here. It is NOT in the Speed Bag Bible, (along with a lot of other stuff I've learned since then...) because I never did it myself. Had I known about or considered it, I would have added a paragraph or so about it as a variation of the Front Fist Roll.

You will quickly find that punching "upwards" has a tendency to push the bag in an upward direction, possibly kinking the swivel or lifting the ball a bit in the housing. A normally directed punch in the Front Roll angling slightly downward pulls the bag and swivel down, tightening the connections. Punching upwards does the opposite, so my attempts at this "upward" fist roll found the swivel clanking a bit, and is a bit more unforgiving to a missed punch. If you miss hit slightly when you are rolling upwards, it will be on the "low side" towards the bottom of the bag driving the bag and swivel upwards. And, your upward moving fist is still moving into the rebound arc of the bag, so you have to pull it back out of the way.

There a few things to consider when learning Front Fist Rolling in an upward direction. First. How to start the upward motion. Mostly I see people doing a "normal" front roll (next fist hits from "over" the last). Let's use the right fist. The Right Fist moves "over the left", hits the bag, and then has to reverse direction to get out of the way of the next punch in the roll, which is the left fist coming up from underneath. For me this is easier if I have the rolling motion more of an "egg shape" oval towards my face. OK, so the right fists hits the bag, goes back upwards or toward your face out of the way of the next (left) fist moving upwards, and as the left fist hits your right is dropping downward slightly to come UP for the next punch, from "under the left fist".

I must admit, my mind to this point just rejects this "reverse" direction in front of the bag. I try to do this logically, in patterns of four, then five, then six punch rolls, reversing direction on fourth, fifth or sixth punch of the "new" direction.

OK, so you can do this reverse direction, upward punching roll. NOW WHAT.

As usual, things are always more than they appear on the speed bag. Once you can reverse direction with control, if you really want to master that move you should consider (1) other ways to get into it as well as (2) other ways to get out of it. First, consider the fist two punches of a Fist Roll, any fist roll, could be seen as a "double Punch" (two fists hit the bag with one rebound inbetween)

This always creates a "normal" and a variation of an "upward" angling Front Double Punch (FDP). Again, never thought of this until I saw MsDeville do it remarkably well in one of her punch drumming videos. she did a normal front double punch, the reversed direction with a Front Double Punch moving upwards. What?? did I just see that..... yep. she did it several times. busted. I never did that before, or even considered it.

Back to the Reverse Direction, or upward angling Front Fist Roll (F-Roll)
OK, When you are rolling your fists in the Upward direction, consider option 1, other ways to get into it. You do not have to start this upward motion from a "normal" front roll. Consider starting it directly from any Reverse Technique. Start with the Reverse Double Punch (RDP). Do a RDP, pass thru the bag and immediately start the upward moving F-Roll. So your fists are rolling in that upward direction, NOW for option 2, getting out of the Roll. Try passing the fists back thru the bag to the RDP. To make this a bit trickier, Try doing the upward moving F-Roll and split the fists from it, allowing one fist to hit "upward" on the bag, and pass thru. this fist is now behind the bag, the front fist hits in the roll and just continue punching in the split fist position. Now, let the fist from behind the bag, doing a Reverse Single Punch (RSP), pass thru to the front, and start the upward angling F-Roll.

To really confuse your brain, Try going from the upward angling F-Roll to a normal Reverse Fist Roll (R-Roll) and back to the upward angling fist roll. Think about this.... Do it without the bag, sitting there reading this. Do an upward angling fist roll, see the bag, pass through to a normal R-Roll for a few punches, then pass both fists thru to the front of the bag, into the upward angling fist roll. notice anything peculiar? (* it's a trick question )

Now, I notice several people are very good at using inward and outward elbow moves within a normal Front Fist Roll, particularly the outward elbows, say the left fist hits in the "normal" roll, and they pull the other arm over to follow with an outward double elbow strike
(O-DES) or whatever, but they use the outward elbow within the Roll. For those that do it, try using an outward elbow while your fists are rolling upwards. This will be tricky because your pulling your "next arm" over across the body, sort of into your upward moving fist. But if you can use outward elbows within a F-Roll, couldn't you do this regardless of the directional movements of the fists?

Anyway, that's just a bit to consider about Reversing the motion of your F-Roll.

(* answer to trick question: Your fists will be rolling in the same direction on both sides of the bag. When you reverse the direction of a Front Fist Roll, hitting upwards in front of the bag, this is the very same motion that creates a "normal" Reverse Fist Roll. This is most obvious if you start from the Reverse Roll. sitting there reading, imagine doing the Reverse Roll. notice the motion of your fists, with the next punch coming from over the top of the last, now imagine passing thru the bag, and if you keep that same motion, you will be doing an upward angling F-Roll. The motions of the fist never changes, but the direction of "the next punch" does in the front of the bag. )

[swfl]

Nice. Thank you All. Just gave it a shot for a bit and there is light at the of the tunnel. The flick term helped very much and Alan always has a great reply.