Neck clinch work is a big trend in Western “practical” karate these days. And that’s great- this fundamental position was virtually ignored by karate until recently (except for Kyokushin and combat focused offshoots like Kudo). In many of the videos demonstrating a karateka’s reverse engineered clinch techniques, two crucial technical aspects are missing:
-place the palms against the round part of the skull, *above* the neck. Not on the neck itself. Placing your hands on the neck allows the opponent to use their entire body to resist you. Placing the palms on the occiput area concentrates the force of their actions on the neck itself, significantly weakening their ability to resist. Placing the hands even a little bit lower than the skull results in a surprising loss of control.
-brace the tip of the elbows into the collarbone area, just above the pecs. Done correctly, this creates a strong frame that requires minimal effort to maintain. The opponent will have to overcome the strength of your humerus to get closer. When the elbows are flared out and disconnected, resisting the opponent’s movement becomes an effort using the weaker elbow joint and associated musculature, and invites them to “swim” their hands in to escape or counter.
Taken together, these two elements allow you to use minimal force to keep even a larger opponent controlled. Press the back of their skull downward as you press the tips of your elbows forward and into their collarbone area (their head doesn’t need to keep moving down, face downward is sufficient). Then squeeze forearms together like a nutcracker (just enough, don’t overdo it). They’ll have to move your entire body before they’ll be able to force their way past/out of your clinch, and of course that’s where using good footwork comes into play to off balance and maneuver them into strikes and trips.