I’ve been wondering what people like and dislike about BJJ gis, so I put together a survey. If you include your email address, you’ll have a chance to win and have me record personalized instructional video on whatever you want.
Yearly Archives: 2008
BeginningBJJ.com by Stephan Kesting
Stephan Kesting of Grapple Arts just launched an awesome new BJJ resource, Beginning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (beginningbjj.com).
Signing up for the e-course gets you a free e-book, A Roadmap for Brazilian Jiu-jitsu. After reading it, my first thought was “I wish I’d had this when I started.” It’s a superb starting reference, presenting the right lessons and concepts for a beginner. The e-mails that come with the e-course are the same great quality all of Stephan’s work is.
If you run a gym, this would be a perfect to give to new students. I’m thinking of printing out a copy and bring it into the gym and telling the beginners to check it out. It presents the right mindset for learning and improving as a beginner.
Check out www.beginningbjj.com.
Rethinking Position
Rickson once said he admires Nino Schembri for “how he looks at positions in new ways”. (He also might not have said that. The quote is probably inaccurate since I read it years ago and can’t find the source any more.)
That idea stuck with me. As a beginner at the time it struck me, “How many ways can you think about a position? When is mount not just mount? When is guard not guard?” Those questions have become a kind of mind-clearing Zen koan. It opened me up to thinking about a lot of things in new ways and a lot of good has come from it.
What happens when I think of mount as “guard from the top?” I get omoplatas.
What happens if I think of leglocks as a part of open guard? I use them as sweeps and don’t sacrifice position to get them.
What if I look for the harness grip and not just rear mount and two hooks? I can attack the back from everywhere.
What if I see how long I can hold on to an armbar or triangle position without finishing the submission? I see how people will try to escape while learning how to control them and transition to other moves.
It is true about Nino, even if I got the Rickson quote wrong (or made it up in a fever dream). You see this in his DVD. Nino isn’t content to simply use the omoplata as a sweep or submission like the rest of us. He camps out there. He meets the locals and takes in the sights. He can maintain it and control them despite their efforts to escape. He’s got a array of alternative ways to finish them. Sometimes he treats it like the crucifix and attacks the neck. Other times he attacks the far arm, simply using omoplata as his basecamp to launch attacks. Hanging off them with his leg tangled around an arm is a desirable and perfectly normal spot for him.
Look at other innovators and you’ll see something similar. They found a position (or a few) that they liked. It could have been part of something we already know, something they invented, or something they stole from wrestling. It worked for them and so they kept at it and figured out the elements that made it tick. They reduced these down to concepts and principles (or at least absorbed an understanding of these into their head somewhere). They learned the control points, where to grip, how to adjust, the leverage, timing, momentum, etc. They found how to get to it from other positions and fit it into their game. And maybe this new positions leads them to more new ones and further innovation.
My personal pet project has been the reverse omoplata (seen here).
People complain that it’s too complicated and hard and has too many steps, that it only works no-gi (or gi, depending on who you ask), that you couldn’t get it on someone experienced, that it doesn’t work on someone bigger or stronger, that you have to rely on speed and surprise… Et cetera.
They’re all wrong.
But they are a little less wrong if they don’t really take the time to get good at it and learn how to deal with those potential issues, which is like saying the secret to success is success, but let me explain.
I learned the reverse omoplata on my first no-gi class ever. That was about 4 weeks into training. My instructor gave a little talk after people huffed and shook their heads while he was demonstrating it. “I know you’re all looking at this and thinking it’d never work,” he said. “But ask any of the brown belts and they’ll tell you I get this on them all the time.”
Being the naive and pure-hearted white belt I was, I took it on good faith and drilled it like any other technique. It wasn’t any more confusing than anything else at the time since I was still trying to wrap my head around the upa escape and scissors sweep. It was just another technique to learn and drill and try out.
While doing so, I ran into all of the complaints people had about it.
Is it really too hard? Well, each step makes sense by itself so it also makes sense that they stay good when you string them together.
It is complicated and has a lot of steps. How will I remember them all? If each step makes sense and I drill it enough to have them down smooth, it’s not an issue.
Does it work on a bigger, stronger guy? Yes, you just need to make sure you are doing everything right and know a few ways to deal with their attempts to power out.
Can they slip out no-gi? Yes, they’re always slippier no-gi, but there are ways to keep it tight.
Can they use the gi to defend it? Yes, but you can still deal with that.
Does it rely on speed? Can I do it slowly? Yes, I can break down each part of the technique, each moment in the roll, and pause there and know what to grip and how to control them. In fact, doing it slower is often the better way to do it, since you have more control and can force it on a big guy.
Can I keep getting someone with it even after they’ve seen it a few times and been taught how to avoid it? Yes, if my timing, position, strategy and technique are good.
Can I get it on experienced guys? After all that work, I’ve gotten it on people of every skill level that I’ve gone with. In fact, I often get it on experienced guys who know to defend the standard positions and submissions but don’t know how to deal with me somersaulting around one of their arms instead of taking their back.
What I did wasn’t any special process. I just drilled and trained and thought about it a lot. I went for it in sparring and experimented with good training partners who wanted to learn it too. I went to my instructor for advice and to ask questions when I had problems. I checked out how other people do it and tried to figure out why they changed parts. I looked for the concepts and principles that make it work. I simplified how I think and talk about it till I could teach it to a white belt and have him doing it in a minute or two.
And now it’s one of my best moves.
The morals here are nothing earth-shattering, but they’re good ones:
Look at old things in new ways. Look at novel things and see how they make sense.
Reverse Omoplata
This is a technique from Gracie Barra Clearwater’s website. My instructor Eduardo and I made this tutorial for the reverse omoplata. I’m putting it up here since I’m referencing it Rethinking Position.
If the crucifix is underused, then the reverse (or inverted) omoplata is almost unknown or at least considered an exotic novelty. Hopefully, this instruction will help change that.
A possible reason for this is that one of the hardest parts of the reverse omoplata is simply having faith in it. When most people are taught it, they blow it off as some impossible technique without even giving it a chance.
You have to be willing to take a “leap of faith” when you first start trying it. Once you get it a couple times, you’ll find that it’s not as wild as you thought, though it does require confidence in your movements, which will come with drilling.
While showing this move once, Eduard told the class, “You’re all looking at this and thinking ‘Oh, that’ll never work—that’s crazy.’ But ask any of the brown belts in the room, and they’ll tell you I get them with this all the time.”
So have faith and practice, and it’ll come to you!
You have side ride on a turtled opponent, similar to how you set up the clock choke. Your chest is across his back, and you’ve got a one-on-one (one hand grabbing one wrist) on his far arm. Your outside leg is posted away from him for base.
To take the crucifix, you need to expose his near arm. Do this by driving your knee under his armpit and pushing his arm out.
Step over his arm with your outside leg and drag it back, trapping it between your kness. If he is trying to hide his arm, you might have to dig some with your foot to get your heel to catch it.
All of the normal rules of the crucifix apply. Keep your knees pinched tight and your hips close to his shoulder so he doesn’t have room to pull his arm out. Your free hand posts on the mat in front of him to keep base if he starts trying to take you down.
At this point, you could roll to the traditional crucifix like we did before, but we’re going to take another route.
Pay special attention to the next two steps. They are tricky to get even with live instruction, and even harder to show in still photos. You’ll need to experiment with this part to get a feel for the footwork.
Cross your right knee over your left leg, bringing his arm back. Your goal is to pass his arm from one leg to the other. Your left heel will need to trap his arm so you can uncross your legs without his arm coming back.
When you uncross your legs, his arm should remain pointing back, stuck behind your left leg. Opponents will often hug this leg and try to take you down, not knowing what’s in store.
When people see this for the first time, they almost always ask “What’s stopping him from just uncrossing his arm?”, since it looks like it would be really easy to do.
Luckily, it’s not.
All you have to do is keep your left leg bent, and your heel will block his arm from returning to the other side. He can never straighten his arm (which is what he needs to do to free it) further than you can bend your leg to block it.
With his arm crossed back in the right trigger position1, let go of your one-on-one and bring your entire upper body to his right side. You’re going to dive your left hand underneath his near shoulder as you roll over your left shoulder.
As you start rolling, reach back with your left hand and grab his knee, and triangle your legs to secure his arm.
Contine rolling, still holding his knee and triangling your legs.
He’s probably already feeling the pressure on his shoulder, and if you do it fast enough, it’s possible to submit him from here. But because we don’t feel ballistically ripping your training partner’s shoulder off, we’ll continue the move with control.
Walk your shoulders towards his knee as you pull it to your head and hug it. This is to help you control three possible situations:
- He rolls to escape the pressure on his shoulder.
- You want to roll him to finish him on his back.
A mix of both.
It’s easier to finish him on his back if he’s too strong or flexible to finish upside down, or if he’s defending by holding his belt or grasping his hands together.
The easiest and most direct way is to keep rolling until you can sit up, lifting his knee and cranking his arm with your shoulder. He’ll often go right along with this to relieve the pressure and avoid the submission.
If you’re having trouble rolling a heavy guy, you can untriangle your legs and swing your right leg out like you’re doing a pendulum sweep, while rocking up and lifting his knee. This adds more momentum to the roll and can tip the balance.
If he resists rolling by posturing up, you can often take it the other way by sitting back into him and knocking him backwards instead of forwards.
He might also try stepping over you, in which case you can roll belly down and sweep him like a normal omoplata sweep.
Whatever happens, just get him on his back without losing control or letting his arm slip out.
While drilling, just stick to rolling him forward.
One way or another, you’ve now rolled him on to his back.
Keep holding his knee to maintain control and stop him from rolling out, and keep your hips tight to his body so he doesn’t get the space to pull his arm out.
Reach across his body and put your left hand in his far armpit. Lay across his upper body to pin and block him from sitting up. This position will feel natural if you’re familiar with reverse scarf hold.
Before you start trying to crank his arm, scoot your hips back to take the slack out of his shoulder—you won’t have the leverage to finish otherwise. This will also break any defensive grip he has such as holding his hands or belt.
Finish by posting with your outside leg and bringing your inside leg back like you’re doing a technical stand-up (your leg going under your hips).
1 A trigger position is when your opponent has some part of his body in a position that prompts you to do a particular move, such as someone pushing on your chest from under mount being a “trigger” for an armbar.
Training Hard, Training Smart and Having Fun
Check out the discussion of Three Rules for Good Jiu-Jitsu. This post stems from that discussion and others elsewhere on the internet.
The two main arguments are that “train smart” and “have fun” are more important than “train hard”. And there is truth to that, but it also depends on how you look at it.
If you don’t enjoy training, you’re not likely going to stick to it, but you have to be careful about how you define “fun” and how much priority you give “fun” things. When I see people who are too intent on “having fun”, they’re more prone to indulging in things like this:
- Going with white belts they can toy with.
- Not working on their weaknesses.
- Ducking people who will make them work or give them a hard time.
- Only doing enough reps to “get the idea”.
- Stopping training to discuss something that happened.
- Complaining about going with bigger or stronger guys.
- Quitting when they get tired.
On the other end, there are a lot of things that aren’t fun but are necessary. To name a few:
- High rep drilling.
- Pushing your conditioning and endurance.
- Sparring even when you’re exhausted.
- Having competitive matches with guys who give you a lot of trouble.
- Getting put in really bad positions and having to fight out.
- Learning to deal with being smothered and crushed.
- Dealing with that spazzy white belt or that tireless wrestler or heavier opponent.
Those aren’t “fun” to most people (congratulations if they are to you). I know people who purposely avoid some of those things. Now it’s perfectly within your rights to disdain things you don’t find fun or not do something that you think will get you injured. But I know my personality and know I’m prone to avoiding hard work, don’t like being competitive, don’t like discomfort (who does?) so unless I really keep my discipline in and train hard, I’ll do too much of the stuff in the first list and not enough in the second.
jandaim on The Grapplers Guide forum posted this:
I think what some people are missing is that you can still have fun, enjoy yourself, and train hard.
As an example – I train for and compete in marathons. Let me tell you, to get to the point where you can run 26 miles takes a ton of hard work. If I took every training mile like a “flow roll” there is no way I would ever reach my goal. Does that mean I don’t have any fun training? Of course not. Does that mean that every run is at 100%? Nope, I take days off and run some runs at a very easy pace just to get the blood flowing. But the majority of the time, I am working hard.
To be honest, it’s the hard work that I put in that makes it fun and the rewards are more than just a good time – there is so much more to be gained than just that.
Many people prefer “train smart” because they think “train hard” means “get injured” and I’ve got a story about that.
Recently I took about 2 months off. When I came back, I was a little out of shape and I didn’t want stress myself out or get injured. So I rolled light, played a relaxed game, let stuff happen, didn’t go with big guys, called it a night when I got exhausted, etc. Just tried to train smart and have fun.
Yet in two weeks of doing that, I sprained my ankle, hurt my knee, hurt my back, popped my elbow and injured my neck/shoulder. I never even knew how it happened. I thought I was going light and not pushing myself too hard and then I’d end the night with a new injury.
So much for training smart and having fun.
When I talked to Leo about it, he said something funny. “If you’re going to get injured, you might as well go hard and beat people while you’re at it.”
So I started rolling with a focus on imposing my game, really working, not resting, not “taking it easy”, doing matches even when I was beat, not turning down anyone. Grabbing the bigger guys and fighting them when I would have avoided them before.
Here’s the interesting part: I’m not getting injured any more. And I’ve found myself having more real fun based on real performance.
You’ll all have your own experiences and personalities and semantics to deal with on this issue, but for me training smart means to train hard. The fun is in the performance and seeing myself improve.
What takes the most importance to you–smart, hard or fun? Can you have them all? Leave a comment and let me know what you think.
Three Rules for Good Jiu-Jitsu
Eduardo has three rules for good jiu-jitsu:
- Train hard.
- Eat right.
- Sleep well.
That’s it.
Let’s assume you have quality instruction already. (If you don’t, you’ve got other issues). You can fuss over the details: what and how to study, gi or no-gi, drilling versus sparring, top game or bottom first, basic versus advanced and so on into infinity. But whatever combination of those you choose, you can’t get away from needing to put in serious, focused time on the mat and racking up training hours. That’s a no-brainer, yet people still miss it while searching for the secret easy path to success.
Diet is always important but especially when you’re an athlete (and that’s what you’ve become if you’re training hard). Nutrition is well researched and there’s a wealth of information out there. I’ll leave it to you to find what’s right for your body.
The importance of sleep is easy to overlook (which is why I asked if you’re getting enough). Your body needs time to rest and recover after working out. But there’s also a mental aspect that you may not be aware of but that scientists are learning more about. The superb radio program Radiolab (iTunes) did a show on sleep that you should listen to. It explains the topic better than I can. Scientific American Mind also has good articles and podcasts on sleep and its effects on learning:
- Sleep on It: How Snoozing Makes You Smarter
- Slumber Reruns: As We Sleep, Our Brains Rehash the Day
- Multiple Studies Confirm Importance of Good Sleep
- Rest Assured: The Brain Practices the Day’s Lessons as We Sleep
If you want to discuss the details of “the secret easy path to success”, or if you have any more good sources on nutrition and sleep, leave a comment or send me a message.