7 Dirty Fighting Tricks That Actually Work in a Real Fight

Fair fights are for the movies. If someone bigger and stronger corners you in a parking lot, outside a bar, or walking to your car, nobody is going to stop the action and check the rules.

Scott Sullivan, Ph.D., CEO of Bam Bam Martial Arts and founder of FightScience, has been in 13 real fights as an adult martial artist. He won all 13. Twelve of those wins came from chokes. His dirty fighting techniques aren't theory. They come from decades of real-world self-defense instruction, bouncing, and training law enforcement.

1. The Headbutt: When Distance Collapses

Someone grabs you and pulls you in close. Punching becomes almost impossible. But your forehead is the hardest bone in your body, and their nose is one of the weakest.

The headbutt works because nobody trains for it. As Scott teaches it: "You have to be lower than he is. You can't be taller than him and then pull his head into yours. You're going to eat the top of his head." The contact point is the front corner of your forehead, right at the hairline. Drive it into their nose or jaw.

Key detail: Drive through the target, don't just bump. As Scott puts it, "That will cut. That will knock people out. It is nasty. Is it dirty fighting? Yes. Does it work? Absolutely. And that's all we care about now. We just want to be able to go home to our family at night."

2. The Clinch Knee: The Fight Ender

There's a saying in martial arts that Scott repeats in every clinch lesson: "Where the head goes, the body will follow." Once you control someone's head with both hands behind their neck, you control the entire fight. The clinch knee borrows directly from kickboxing technique — it's one of the most devastating tools in Muay Thai, adapted for the street.

Pull their head down, drive your knee up. You can go straight in like a piston or swing it around like the low kick from technique #6 below. The targets: thighs, groin, body, and if they're bent over far enough, the face. Scott doesn't sugarcoat it: "I've seen guys drop. I've dropped from just one knee before. It hurts like hell."

3. The Groin Kick: Your First Move

Forget the fancy stuff. If someone is closing distance aggressively and you need to create space, a hard kick to the groin buys you time. It's not glamorous. It works.

Scott teaches two versions. The basic: point your toe down and snap your instep straight up between their legs "just like you were kicking a field goal." If you're closer, use your shin. The emphasis is on speed, not power. As Scott says, "With a groin shot, it doesn't take a whole lot of power." Snap it up fast and get back to your stance.

4. The Short Elbow: Close Range Devastation

Punching in a real fight breaks hands. Scott learned this firsthand: "I've broken my fist in a kickboxing match, hitting someone in the head. I was out for six months. A person's head is like a bowling ball with teeth." That's why the elbow exists as a weapon.

The elbow is a bigger, harder bone than your knuckles. It causes devastating cuts and you can throw it in spaces too tight for a punch. From the clinch (technique #2 above), you can load the elbow by pushing your forearm against their trap to tuck their head back, then pull their face into the strike. "Clinch, load, pop," as Scott drills it. The collision of their head coming forward into your elbow multiplies the impact.

5. The Shoulder Stop: Shutting Down the Sucker Punch

Most real confrontations don't start with a clean shot from distance. They start with a sucker punch, a wide, looping right hand thrown while the attacker is still talking. The shoulder stop neutralizes this.

Raise your lead shoulder and tuck your chin behind it. Let the punch land on the meatiest part of your shoulder. It absorbs the shot without damage. Then counter immediately while they're off balance from the swing. This pairs perfectly with the clinch knee (#2) or elbow (#4) as your follow-up.

6. The Low Kick: Destroy the Base

A hard low kick to the outside of the thigh does something punches can't. It takes away mobility. After two or three solid leg kicks, most untrained people can barely stand, let alone chase you.

Scott keeps all self-defense kicking "low line," meaning below the waist. No head kicks, no spin kicks. Aim for the outside of the thigh, just above the knee. Use your shin as the contact surface. Even one clean shot changes the dynamics of the entire encounter, and it sets up the groin kick (#3) because your opponent starts protecting the legs.

7. The Rear Naked Choke: End It Without Punching

This is the technique Scott considers the pinnacle of his entire self-defense system. "All striking should lead to the choke," he teaches. "My philosophy is: beat them up and choke them."

A properly applied rear naked choke cuts off blood supply to the brain in 3 to 10 seconds. The person loses consciousness regardless of size, pain tolerance, or what substances they're on. Scott has seen fighters shrug off broken bones and keep swinging. Nobody shrugs off a blood choke.

This is also the most humane option. A drunk friend. A family member having a crisis. Someone who needs to be controlled, not beaten. "When you choke him out, he doesn't have a choice in the matter," Scott explains. "He just passes out whether he wants to or not."