Today was interesting. We had our clinch drill for our combatives certification level 1. It is a technique that is used in order to try and minimize the damage from punches. The trick is to hook your arms under theirs and lift their arms so they have a bad angle to punch. It sounds simple but the clinch drill we did, we went against our own drill sgts and our combatives instructors. They can only punch at 50-60% strength but trust me, that is enough to hurt. Oh and we don’t do it once, we do it twice. So when they get done punching us in the face we get in line to get punched again. Two guys in my platoon got knocked out and they had to go to the hospital to get treated for concussions.
Today we also had our combatives tournament. I guess I was not feeling it though because I lost in the first match. I am not too disappointed though because the guy was 30 lbs heavier than I am. Also that is my only loss in combatives for the entire time I have been here at basic.