What A Fighter Should Do When Knock Down

What A Fighter Should Do When Knock Down
By: Aaron Snowell
      (Trainer Of Champions)

There are four basic approaches:
1. Get to one knee, beat the count of 10, The first is to flee, to stay as far away from your opponent's fists as the 24-foot-square ring will allow, buying time to clear your head and make it to the bell.
(This strategy is often referred to as "getting on one's bicycle).

2. Keep your gloves up beside your head.
3. Tie Up, Place your arms around your opponent's elbows from the outside, pinning them against his ribs or side of the body.
4. Do not attempt to trade punches with your opponent. Went you do punch, use quick punches, avoid leaving yourself open for a counter punch. Do not get hit with the same punch again.

The most important thing is to buy time. Once wobbled by a punch, you are far more vulnerable to attack and far less able to withstand subsequent blows. For many fighters the immediate instinct when hurt is to punch back but this is not the time for offense. You need to clear your head, get your legs back, and avoid being  hit with additional punches that will damage the process. Remember, live to fight another round in the fight.

Clearly, this is a place no fighter wants to go. Yet, every fighter, even the greatest of all time will attest getting tagged now and then. It is how a fighter reacts in that moment of the knock down crisis or when his head is ringing and legs have gone wobbly, that makes the difference between surviving the round and being counted out.

The punch you do not see, get you!

Finally, Listen to your corner, they can see things you do not, use the one-minute rest period between the rounds to completely recovery. Let your corner know how you are filling. Know that you can still win the fight. It just a knock down.