Finding your feet – getting your base

Over the past few weeks we’ve been looking at the drivers of an effective game. Balance; Tight, economical structure; Good defence; Conditioning. Of these the root, quite literally, is balance. If you're working stand-up, clinch or ground it's the same, you are only as good as your base. Without this solid foundation you have no chance of working effectively in any of the other areas.

So what is balance?

'A state of equilibrium or parity characterized by cancellation of all forces by equal opposing forces.'

Physical balance and the control of it can be broken down into a number of themes. Subtle interplay between these is key to using your balance effectively.

1. Finding your balance
By far the most neglected of all aspects of balance. Most people never reach a state of equilibrium and blunder around constantly trying to recover something they never had in the first place. Take time to learn what your balance feels like. Learn to find that feeling and recognise it when you get there.

The easiest way to do this is to shut your eyes and ‘settle’, once you’ve done this open your eyes and carry on. Learning to quickly assess and find your balance is vital to performance.

2. Maintaining your balance
Small shifts, constantly made, is the key to maintaining your balance. The tricky part of doing this is that you are not the only person applying force, every time you get hit or someone pulls or pushs you your equilibrium is affected just as much as when you through a punch or a kick.

Added onto this is the ‘recoil’ of your techniques, the energy and reactionary force you need to absorb to apply force and power into someone or something else.

The most important part of your body for allowing you to control your balance under these myriad forces is your core. If your stomach and back are weak then you have little ability to stabilise yourself and you can't brace to deliver or absorb force. Imagine trying to push something heavy without locking your core stable, there would be no way to channel the power from your legs through to your arms and you'd just push the top half of your body away from the object. The same thing would happen when you delivered punches.

Centre of balance is often called centre of gravity. If it shifts too far outside of your bodyspace gravity takes over and you fall over. During standup this tends to happen when you over-punch or don't correctly counter-balance a kick – two results that are due to lack of adjustment of your balance, letting your centre of gravity get away from you. When you start to look at throws, sweeps and shoots then you see the power of controlling your centre of gravity.

The Fosbury Flop used in high jumping works by displacing the centre of gravity outside of the body. By arching over the bar the athlete passes over the bar but their centre of gravity passes under the bar. Strange but true.

Turn the Fosbury flop on it's side and you're not a million miles away from a sprawl. If you sprawl properly the arch in your back keeps your centre of gravity behind you, blocked by your hips, and makes it difficult for people to take you down. If you lean over the top of someone as the shoot on you, your centre of gravity moves forward, into the space that they control. You'll get dumped on your head if that happens.

Being able to play with your balance and maintain it even under the effects of external forces allows you to keep in the game regardless of position.

3. Resetting and catching your balance
Sometimes it goes wrong despite your best efforts. At this point good reflexes, light feet and an understanding of what your balance should feel like will save the day. The ability to get your feet or knees back underneath you will save you time and time again. On the feet it stops you getting driven off balance, allows you to recover if you trip or slip and makes you very difficult to throw. On the ground it is the thing that keeps you alive in a scramble.

Getting your base back under your centre of gravity and getting your head back over it is a key skill that needs to be drilled. Learn to reset your feet during combinations, dance around people's attempts to tie you up and pop back to your feet on the ground and you'll become all kinds of Chuck Lidell dangerous.

4. Sacrificing your balance
After spending time working on all of that there will be times when you just have to give it all up and take a flyer. Knowing when to sacrifice your balance allows you to bend like a reed in the wind, quickly reversing forces and taking people off their balance in an unexpected way. Unexpected being the key, you know it's coming, they don't, so you can immediately switch into your balance-finding game and come out on top. Often literally.

Learn to play with your balance but, most importantly, learn what and where it is. The best fighters should look like dancers, scary, mean-looking dancers but dancers none the less.

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