My Experience Using The Flopping Wing
Constantine Savvides
When I was doing the sparring test against Bobo (who is a bit shorter than me), the attack that was difficult for me to flopping wing was the low punch. Because I had my hands up guarding my face, I could never really lower them to the level of his punch fast enough to use the flopping wing against it. I realized also that the lower the punch, the more horizontal my flopping wing’s energy was and the higher the punch was the more diagonally upwards my energy was. I think that the difficulty in the low punch was that it was hard for me to get underneath it or even equal to it in time to block it because it was below the horizontal plain of my hands. For this reason, I believe that the flopping wing is easier to use of people who are of equal height or taller. The flopping wing When I wanted to really move my opponent I put a lot more pressure in the striking hand with a stronger switch. I found that one of the main differences between practicing in the air and using the move in application was how low my hands went before the strike. In the air my hands went as low as my abdominal region but in application I could not bring them that low for fear of leaving my face unguarded and also because of the amount of time it took. Also, when I attacked using inside flopping wing, unless I put a lot of power into the striking hand or I turned him to his dead side with the first flopping wing, I feared an attack from his other hand to which my outside parameter was exposed. The cross flopping wing (such as the one I trained on the speedbag) is impossible to make effective unless the proper stance is used. When my feet were in a straight line facing the target and I attempted this attack, I felt very off balance and was unable to put any power behind my strike. This is when I learned the importance of a good stance at all times in a fight. This led into my understanding of the importance of lateral movement.