The beauty of the long guard

[Jared Traveler]

I have been impressed with every aspect of Muay Thai. The single arm long guard is certainly one of the simple effective techniques I have learned.

There are many variations, but this video shows some good fundamentals.

What is harder to observe is how the long guard is built, as far as I can tell, into most offensive striking techniques. Defense baked into the offense. You can see it on a knee strike in step 6 of this video, as an example.

I'm very impressed with Muay Thai's simple but sophisticated defense.

 

[Jared Traveler]

Another great example, nearly identical to what I'm being taught. In BJJ you learn to control the distance to control the damage. Same for Muay Thai, it's just often done with the long guard.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

The jab-jab-cross is using the long guard strategy.

The main advantage of the long guard is to fight in your opponent's territory than to fight in your own territory. It's better to put your fists close to your opponent's face than to let your opponent's fists to move close to your face.

When you use long guard, you can interrupt your opponent's attack far away from your head before his punch can generate speed and power. When you put your arms into your opponent's striking path, your opponent's punches will have to meet your arms before reaching to your head.

Also long guard can be the nice bridge between the striking art and the wrestling art.

The best self-defense is to force your opponent to defend himself. When you use long guard, you force your opponent to use short guard to protect his head.