Fedor Emelianenko, the greatest heavyweight of all time. His run through the Pride Fighting Championships heavyweight division is legendary. Well known for his striking and dynamic ground-and-pound a less talked about area of his game is his takedowns. See he doesn’t shoot for singles or double legs, he’s a master of Sambo and a Judo black belt. This means all his takedowns have come from trips or throws in the clinch.
Clinch Entries
First, let’s take a look at his entries into the clinch. His most common clinch entry is a right-hand lead and step (The Fitzsimmons Shift) . This is where he throws a lead right-hand punch while at the same time taking a step forward with his right leg which enables him to fall into a clinch position. Now the right-hand punch is thrown as a legitimate shot and not as a fake. If it lands and his opponent starts backpedalling. He will follow up with further strikes.
The next entry used is hand trapping where Fedor will briefly block his opponent’s hand. Against Zulu his lead right slaps down Zulus left allowing him to jump in with a leaping hook, he used the same combination against Tim Sylvia. If we concede that the clinch starts as soon as your opponent’s hands and your own are touching then this offers a good entry into the clinch.
Fedor would use his lead right to block down his opponents front and rear hand and will even use his lead left to block his opponents lead left. For a brief moment, his opponent is unable to retaliate with strikes on their covered hand and Fedor uses this moment to close the distance.
Fedor could also initiate a clinch after catching a body kick. If he caught a kick he could either slide straight up the leg into an upper-body clinch and takedown or he would hold onto the leg to keep his opponent on one foot. Otherwise, he would return fire with a straight right that could knock his opponent down or even knock them out.
Outside Trip
Now that he has successfully entered the clinch one of his most common takedowns from there was the outside trip. This is where he steps his foot around behind his opponents with his knee resting on their thigh trapping their leg. He would then drive his weight over the top of that foot preventing those opponents from regaining their balance and forcing them to fall over. This move is ideally done while trapping your opponent’s under hook by clamping down with your over hook and driving them to the same side, but Fedor was skilled enough to pull this move off from any over hook or under book combination. Ideally, you’re using the smallest steps possible to get your foot around behind your opponents and Fedor will use his momentum from entering the clinch to help finish the takedown.
Inside Trip
The inside leg trip was another one of Fedors takedowns where if their hips and feet were close enough to him, he would step his foot in between their legs and then bring his heel on the back of their calf and sweep it out from underneath them. While he drives his upper body weight forward he makes sure to keep his head on the opposite side of the trapped foot enabling him to fall into their guard.
Knee Block
The knee block is where Fedor will reach down with primarily his left hand hooking behind his opponent’s knee and then driving forward. Using his under hook to lift his opponent’s upper body or a collar tie to push forward on their neck and shoulder. This is a good move when Fedors hips are away from his opponents and it’s closer for his hand to reach down rather than to step around with the trip It’s also a good move when it has a lot of
Foot Sweep
If the opponent starts leaning their weight forward over Fedors body he would look to execute an outside foot sweep. His right leg will step forward blocking his
If he rotates towards his
Scoop Slam
If Fedor secures double under hooks on his opponent his preferred
Hip Toss
If Fedor winds up with double over hooks, which is technically an inferior position he will look to go to a hip toss which is where he rotates his hips past the line of his opponents and throws them over his blocking leg or thigh and he will also sometimes bring one over hook up into a collar time to help assist with the throw. He will sometimes also go for the hip throw from an over-under position
Off Balancing (Kuzushi)
Now that we’ve gone through the techniques that Fedor used let’s look at the underlying concept of
This off-balancing training is vital to understanding the timing needed to throw an opponent and can simply be pushing or pulling them until they fall over, but when you attempt to do this in a fight that will likely push or pull back so once you have them reacting to your movements then you can blend your energy with theirs so you exaggerate their motion until you force them to be off-balance using maximum efficiency.
This is where the chaining together of throws becomes important as your first throw might attempt to get your opponent to place all their weight in one direction where you can then switch techniques to help take them further in the direction that they were bracing.
You will notice that Fedor is constantly engaged in this dynamic rocking movement from side to side and that it will chain the momentum and shifting of his striking entries down attempts together this effectively allows Fedors
Lessons from the Last Emperor
What lessons can we learn from the last emperor well certainly that? Constant dynamic movement as a means to off-balance your opponent and keep you always scrambling and moving towards a takedown is a very important element of his game and also that he relied on the clinch and upper-body takedowns without the use of single or double leg shots as by comparison the risk and going for an upper-body clinch is a lot less than the risk of being sprawled on from a double leg shot.
Lastly, making sure that you have drilled and practised your techniques so that you have a throw ready from any position or combination of over hooks and under hooks possible so that no matter how you end up clinching you always have a go-to plan of how to launch your opponent through the air and to the mat.
Now that concludes this study on Fedors clinch work!
