保定摔跤

For when you are thrown straight backward. Three things happen at once. Bring your hands up to frame your head like a pillow — fingers apart, never laced — so an incoming knee or elbow meets your arms, not your face. Tuck your chin hard to your chest and round your spine so you rock through the fall like a rocking chair instead of slapping down flat. And draw your feet together, soles near the centre line, so your knees cannot knock together or drive up into your own face.

For when you fall to one side. Never catch yourself on an outstretched wrist — that is how arms break. Instead roll the shoulder forward and land on the thick muscle of the upper back and shoulder blade. Keep the bottom leg slightly bent with the side of the foot flat to the ground to spread your weight, and keep the top leg up, ready to absorb the landing or to kick and re-engage.

For when you fall forward onto your face. Turn your head sharply to one side so your nose and jaw never meet the floor. Hold your arms in a loose 45° in front of your chest and slap down with the flat of both forearms and palms at the same instant — that arrests your upper body so your hips and groin do not crash down. This is the standard sports version, palms down; for the self-defense variant, see the palms-up front breakfall.

A self-defense version of the forward fall, taught by the coach for landing on ground you cannot trust — broken glass, nails, jagged rock. Everything matches the standard front breakfall (the sharp head-turn, the momentum-arresting slap) except that you turn your palms UP, so the BACK of your forearms and hands strike the ground. That keeps the hazards away from the soft underside of the wrist, where the arteries and veins run, so a bad landing cannot puncture them.

For when you are thrown with forward spin — roll rather than resist. Stay loose (松) and let yourself crumple softly into the ground. Tuck one shoulder fully beneath your chest and look UNDER the opposite shoulder, keeping your head behind the leading shoulder with the chin tucked. (Looking up and over the shoulder lifts the head into the floor — avoid this.) Roll diagonally from one shoulder blade across to the opposite hip, then immediately snap back up onto your feet.

One leg steps forward with the knee bent, the back leg straight and locked at the heel, weight about 60% front and 40% back. It is the stance for driving power forward — the locked back leg braces and sends force from the ground straight through the hips into the opponent's jacket, behind framing actions like diagonal striking (斜打) and crunching (掰).

A higher 'empty' stance with the feet closer together, about 60–70% of your weight on the back leg and the front foot resting light on its ball. This is the neutral fighting stance. The light front leg keeps it safe from sudden sweeps and leg picks, and lets you snatch the front foot up instantly for a kick (踢) or a fast entry.

A wide, even stance, both knees bent and weight split evenly — but kept fairly high to stay mobile, not the deep static horse stance of some styles. It is almost purely a defensive counter-root: when an opponent goes for a heavy hip throw, drop your hips into it to lower your centre, widen your base, and jam their rotation.

The feet form the character 丁, a 'T' — one foot points forward, the back foot turns out at 90°, the front heel lined up with the arch of the back foot. It is an entry stance you pass through mid-throw: as you pivot into a hip lift or back-load like the hip-throw (揣), the perpendicular back foot gives you sideways stability so you do not topple while hoisting the opponent's weight.

The short, heavy gripping jacket — the garment that makes jacket-wrestling possible. Every hold in the art seizes it somewhere: lapel, sleeve, cuff, collar, belt, underarm, or back. Without the jacket there is no shuai jiao. Also called 褂 (guà).

Stone or clay bricks for the conditioning drill 推砖子 (brick pushing). You hold each brick in a pinch grip — flat against the palm, clamped between thumb and fingers, with no handle to wrap — and drive it forward through the base of the palm, the same push you would use to shove an opponent's frame or land a heavy strike like 斜打. It builds pinch strength in the fingers, a stable forearm, and connected power from the core out to the hand. The rough surface toughens the skin into calluses that will not tear in a jacket battle, and the heavy block teaches the wrist, elbow, and shoulder to stack into one aligned column so the arm does not collapse under a smash.

A heavy belt or sash for power-generation drills. Its name carries 抖 (dǒu, 'to shake') — one of the thirty poem-primitives — and that is exactly what it trains: the sudden shaking, whipping force that drives so many throws.

A small stick for wrist and grip conditioning — twisting and squeezing drills that build the crushing grip strength that jacket-wrestling demands.

A large stick or pole for whole-body power. Shaking and swinging it trains the connected, structural strength that runs from the feet through the hips and into the hands.

A padlock-shaped stone weight, swung, pressed, and caught to build 整勁 — the whole-body power that runs from a rooted base through the waist into the hands. Its awkward, shifting load forces the whole kinetic chain to work as one connected unit rather than isolating the arms.

A small clay pot, gripped by the rim and often filled to vary its weight, used to condition grip and whole-body integrated force. Like the stone lock, its live, shifting contents train the feet-waist-hands chain to move as a single connected structure.

A cross-lapel grip with the hand deliberately turned upside-down, thumb pointing down. Inverted this way the forearm becomes a brutal lever — roll the wrist into the opponent's chest to break their posture or snap them downward.

The natural same-side lapel grab — your right hand takes their left lapel. This is the baseline of the 'gates' system, giving balanced push-and-pull power. Switching from here to a cross grip changes your angle of attack and closes the distance.

Grip the middle of the opponent's short sleeve. A primary control point for jamming their forward progress or steering their upper body.

Seize the very rim of the short sleeve. In Baoding this is a skill of its own, because the heavy fabric is stiff and cropped close to the arm. Bunch and twist it to lock the wrist and it becomes the angled or wrapping cuff grips.

More than just holding the cuff — you bunch and turn it, inward or outward, until every bit of slack is gone and the fabric bites bone-tight against the forearm. This is the grip that gives diagonal pulling (调锣) its total command of the lower arm.

A continuous circling motion of the hand that coils the sleeve, trapping the wrist and overextending the elbow so the opponent cannot draw their arm back at all.

Grab the thick seam running down the centre of the chest. Used to drive the opponent's weight down, or to push-pull and collapse their spine.

Reach deep over the shoulder and grip the back of the collar. This loads the opponent's weight onto their own back and shoulder, setting up fast hip tosses.

Drive the fingers deep into the armpit seam of the jacket. A Baoding favourite for clamping the shoulder, killing the opponent's posture, and stopping them from reaching down for your legs.

Reach across the body or over the arm and bunch the dense fabric along the spine. It does two jobs at once: it anchors the opponent's torso to your chest by locking onto their central line, and it is the main setup for the heavy rotating back-load throws like the hip-throw (揣) — stopping them from spinning out or breaking away from your centre. This is what makes the style's touch-and-throw speed possible.

The general belt grab. The woven belt cinches the heavy jacket down around the waist, so gripping it gives direct, unyielding control of the opponent's hips and centre of gravity — unlike a fabric grip, a belt grab completely freezes their pelvis. The deepest belt grips earn the name 大拿, 'the big lock.' Three zones follow: front, side, and back.

Grab the front of the belt near the knot. Pull the opponent's belly into your hips while pushing their upper body up with the other hand. It stops leg attacks and anchors them just before a foot trip (踢), jamming their ability to drop or step away.

Grab the side of the belt over the hip bone — a lateral handle. Pull sideways and rotate your waist to twist the opponent's hips out of line with their feet. A foundation for hip throws: it pulls their hip flush to yours so they cannot slide off your back on the lift.

Reach over the shoulder or under the armpit to grab the belt at the small of the opponent's back. A deep grip and part of the 'big lock' — it bypasses all the jacket's slack and secures the spine directly, for high hoisting and suplex-style throws: arch your back to lift the opponent off the floor and load them for a heavy drop like the hip-throw (揣).

The central cross-lapel grip of the 'gates' system. Reach across the opponent's centreline to grab the far lapel. A Baoding favourite in rapid exchanges — it limits their rotation and shuts down their leg shots. Where the straight-gate grip (直门) takes the same-side lapel, switching to this cross grip instantly shifts your angle, closes the distance, and loads the opponent onto your hip.