Article - US Grappling and the Beginnings of Submission Only

Article #22, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy

A few years ago, US Grappling decided to run a true Submission Only Brazilian Jiu Jitsu tournament. We talked about everything that might go wrong. We talked about how to handle the people who would tell us it couldn’t be done. We talked about a hundred reasons not to do it, and at the end of the day, we all decided that we wanted to bring pure jiu jitsu tournaments back. So, we set out to solve the problems on paper before holding our first event.

First, how were we going to ensure that the event didn’t last forever? Should we have some time limit on matches? Should we have a mercy rule, with points to fall back on? Once we determined we didn’t want a time limit or any points at all, we had to discuss stalling. Finally, we weren’t going to have any stalling penalties, since there was really no advantage to stalling for either competitor. We handled this by limiting the number of competitors at the event. We wanted to be sure that our referees and our staff could handle the demand of focusing on one match that could potentially last for an hour, or more.

Second, how were we going to schedule the divisions? Without knowing how long matches would last, it’s really hard to have an accurate schedule for the day; something we have always tried to do for our competitors. We started with a liberal use of ‘tentative’ and did a lot of analysis of the preregistered competitors.

Next, we knew that in order to combat the naysayers, we’d need a lot of data after the event so that we’d know how long matches really lasted, on average. We modified the brackets so that there would be a spot for the length and submission for each match, and trained the referees and table workers on how to complete these extra fields.

Finally, we were ready to go. We made our brackets, took a deep breath, and kicked off the day. One of the very first matches of the day lasted nearly ninety minutes. We realized the two grapplers in this match were both in several other divisions. We started to worry about holding things up. Then, other divisions started to finish. Fast. Matches were ending in two minutes. Entire divisions were finishing in fifteen minutes of total match time. This was working!

At the end of the day (which wrapped up before 5 PM), we had collected data on nearly 200 matches, and our average match length was just over six minutes. We were well within the normal tournament timelines, even with that first match lasting so long. It turns out that for every outlier like that one, there are a few dozen matches that end in less than two minutes, and it all averages out quite nicely. Oh, and the two grapplers that competed for ninety minutes both went on to compete in some (but not all) of the other divisions that they entered.

The thing that we hear over and over again from competitors that try the submission only format is how the event just feels different. There’s no pressure to score points in the next 30 seconds. No one is yelling at the referees for points or advantages. Everyone is there to see whose jiu jitsu will prevail.

US Grappling plans to run around 10 Submission Only events in 2011. You can see where they'll be at www.submissiononly.com.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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Article - A Women's BJJ Class (4)

One woman's journey into creating a women's jiu jitsu program
Article #19, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy [FAQ Entry]
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I’m now five months into teaching the women’s BJJ classes at my academy. It’s been an interesting journey, for sure. I’m still learning the methods that work for teaching smaller classes, and how I should handle skill disparity between students. I’m getting the rhythm of the classes down, which was one of my concerns when I started teaching.

One of my least favorite things about drilling techniques in jiu jitsu is that they often require one person to do something wrong, over and over again. For example, when drilling a kimura from guard, we’re often asked to start by putting our hands on the mat so that our partner can begin right at the kimura setup. That’s great for the muscle memory of the person on the bottom, but it’s teaching the person on top that sometimes when you’re in the guard, you feel the mat under your palms. It’s teaching you to have bad posture. This is one of the easier ones to fix, just by requiring the guard player to break the posture and move the hands to the mat before setting up the kimura.

A big part of the drills that I’m using are drills that will help both people improve. My current favorite drill is switching between a triangle and an armbar from guard. The person caught in the submission alternatively postures up or stacks the bottom player as the bottom player alternates between the two submissions. The top person works to actually finish the escape and the bottom person works to actually finish one of the two submissions. The women work to tighten the triangle or the armbar with each switch between the two submissions. I believe that I’ll add the omoplata into the mix after a few more weeks of this drill, and after the women have learned the omoplata on its own.

I believe that these drills are working because I’m seeing the women look for these transitions during sparring. When I spar with them, I set them up from both the offensive and defensive sides of the drills, and they’re starting to react automatically now that they’ve worked these drills for a few weeks. I think as an instructor, that has to be one of the most gratifying things that can ever happen.

I’m always looking for other drills that benefit both training partners, so if you have any that you use in your academy, please post them in the comments!

Now that September is over, I’m happy to report one of the women who was a bit reluctant to train with men has started attending the co-ed classes. She came on a night that she knew I would be attending for the first one, so she could drill with me, but she also sparred a round or two with some of our nicer fellows. She left class soaked in sweat and smiling from ear to ear. She’s been back for a few more since then, and has even come in a few times when I wasn’t there. That was really a big accomplishment for her, when you consider that she was pretty sure that she never wanted to try a co-ed class just two months ago. I’m glad to see her branching out, and I hope some of the other women follow in her footsteps soon.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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Article - The Importance of Training Partners

Article #18, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy

Last month, I attended another amazing women’s grappling camp in Toronto, Ontario. This was my second week long camp, and it proved to me yet again the importance of seeking out different training partners. Even if you have three or four other people your size to train with on a regular basis, it’s really important to get out there and meet other grapplers to find the holes in your game before you find them at Mundials.

This doesn’t just apply to women, though. There are always outliers. Think about the people that train in your gym. Do you have a man training there that’s under 130 lbs? What about a man over 300 lbs? Are they always paired up with the closest person to their size, but still training with a size disparity? Sure, maybe the big guy is on the winning end in the gym but what do you think will happen the first time he has to compete against someone who is actually his size, or even bigger? He is probably going to find that his technique might not be as solid as he thought because he’s been relying on his size advantage for the last year.

Maybe you do have partners that are your size and skill. It’s the perfect scenario for great training, right? Maybe, but think about the last five or ten rounds with those partners. Did they all go about the same way? You pulled guard. Your partner passed your guard. You recomposed guard and tried to sweep with your favorite sweep (that your partner knows is your favorite sweep, so she defends it). If this (or some variation) is what every roll looks like, you just might benefit from finding some new training partners once in a while.

I know that I tend to fall back on what is comfortable, or on techniques that I have had success with in the past. For me, a great example of this is spider guard. That doesn’t work so well if I’m at a no gi class, or if I drop in to train at a school where everyone works low passes instead of standing to pass the guard. By forcing myself out of my comfort zone and training with a different style of jiu jitsu, I’m ultimately opening myself up to learn more and to improve. Sure, that learning curve is probably going to start with me playing a different guard that gets passed, but it’s all part of the journey.

The moral of the story is to seek out new and different training partners, especially ones that will push you to try new things or play a different game. As much as I love my teammates, I make it a point to train with other people at least once a month, just so that I can experience a different style of jiu jitsu, and to make sure I’m not developing any bad habits. I think women’s open mats are a great way to do this, especially if a week-long camp isn’t in your budget (or on your continent). Where I live, there are also open mats where men that are over 250 lbs (I think that’s their cutoff, anyway) get together to train. I know that sometimes it’s hard to get beyond the politics of an area to set these sorts of things up, but in the end, it will only make everyone better.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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Article - A Women's BJJ Class (3)

One woman's journey into creating a women's jiu jitsu program
Article #17, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy [FAQ Entry]
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Post-Tournament Wrap-Up

Thanks to injuries and cold feet, we ended up with one woman competing at US Grappling’s Dominion Grappling Championships on August 7, 2010. Rachel Prestipino took 2nd place in her white belt division, losing to a woman who was promoted to blue belt the following day. Rachel trained very hard for the tournament, and I’m really proud of her. I think this is her first time competing with women instead of teens (she just turned 16 this summer), and the first time she’s competed in about a year. I can’t wait to see how she does in her next event.

Class Progress

July brought several new women to class, which meant retooling lesson plans nearly every week. This is a great problem to have, and I’ve structured the August classes so that new women can jump right in. This month, we’re working from the closed guard. I’ll be introducing the women to passing, sweeping, and submitting from there so that they get a taste of both top and bottom games. I’m trying to incorporate both sides into the drills, but sometimes it means that we work the same basic position for two classes in a row. I actually like doing that, since it means that the students get more reps from a position and they spend less time practicing bad technique (like putting their hands on the mat so that their opponent can practice a kimura, for example).

Curious Problem

I think it’s fairly common practice for the instructor to (kindly) submit students when they first start jiu jitsu. The problem comes in when I’m training with the teenagers. I don’t want to train so hard with them that they are too discouraged to return. I also don’t want to train so light with them that they think that jiu jitsu is easy or ineffective. I’m also a bit worried about the perception of the parents on the sidelines that don’t train, who are watching their children get beaten repeatedly by an adult. Being a teenage girl is hard enough without this sort of extra pressure, and I’m trying to find the right balance.

So far, my solution has been to reward good grappling choices and to “punish” bad ones, much like I would do if I were training a puppy. If the teenagers flail around under side control, the pressure slowly increases. If the teenagers attempt proper escapes, the escapes will work. I’m still working out if this is the best way to work with them or not, and I’d love some feedback from anyone that has trained teenage girls in the past. I don’t want to treat them like delicate flowers, but I also don’t think that treating them like a full-grown adult is the answer.

Coming Up

After August, I will start trying to get some of the newer women over into the co-ed classes. I think they’ll have enough of the basics to start trying things on a larger variety of opponents at that point. I also don’t want them to become too spoiled by always having sparring partners at their size and skill level. Plus, they need to find ways to adjust techniques for shorter and longer limbs and so on. If they’re always training with the same body types, they’ll never learn to make these small adjustments that will make their jiu jitsu more effective.

I’ll be spending a week at a women’s grappling camp in Toronto for the last week of August, and I hope to come back with some more ideas about developing the women’s program.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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Article - A Women's BJJ Class (2)

One woman's journey into creating a women's jiu jitsu program
Article #16, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy [FAQ Entry]
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The Classes

The day of the first class, I couldn’t really think about anything else. What if no one showed up? What if I forgot everything I wanted to show? What if jiu jitsu techniques magically stopped working?

None of these things happened, of course. I had two students for the first class, and have had at least two students for nearly every class since then. I have designed the classes so that the warmup, the self defense move of the week and the two BJJ techniques all tie together somehow so that there are common motions being repeated.

At the end of each class, we do some positional sparring and then review the techniques from the class. During the first class, I covered details of mount escapes and then my “rules” for maintaining mount. The positional sparring was solely to maintain mount, without working for any submissions. I wanted to make sure that the women become comfortable with making adjustments in their posture and base automatically, before thinking about submissions.

Since most of the women that have been attending classes are fairly new to jiu jitsu, I’ve been spending a lot of time on the basics. I want these women to feel confident in the co-ed classes, and to have a lot of repetitions of the fundamentals. I also spend a good bit of time on the principles behind the movements so that the women understand other places that these movements will be effective.

Nearly every jiu jitsu academy talks about posture while you’re in someone’s guard, but I try to point out what good posture is from every position so that they’re always thinking about how to be safe, even if they don’t quite know what to do next. This is where I think that the positional sparring is the most helpful. Now that I have 3 months or so under my (blue) belt, I’m going to start making a few changes. I’m going to drop the second BJJ technique and add in more sparring. A lot of my students are teenagers, which means parents are very prompt about picking them up. This means that they expect class to end right at 9 PM, so the teenagers are missing out on the open mat time after class ends.

The Future

Right now, I have a few students who are planning to compete at US Grappling’s Dominion Grappling Championships, so we’re spending July and the beginning of August working on tournament strategies and on what to do if the plan goes awry. We’ll have some women coming from other academies to visit for classes between now and August 7 to help prepare for the tournament. In addition, I know I’m going to be getting a few new students in the next week or two, and I’m excited about seeing the program grow. Planning the lesson is one of my favorite parts of the week, especially when I work out the alternate ways to explain things, or to accomplish a particular technique with a different body type. I feel like it makes me a better instructor and a better grappler.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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Article - A Women's BJJ Class (1)

One woman's journey into creating a women's jiu jitsu program
Article #15, by guest writer Chrissy Linzy [FAQ Entry]
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The Setup

About 3 months ago, using what must have been some sort of black belt trickery, Klint Radwani (my instructor) convinced me to teach a women’s class at our academy. I hesitantly agreed once I was absolutely sure that there was no way our purple belt woman could do it. Of course, when I agreed, I was sort of banking on this class starting sometime in the future. The distant future. Instead, it would start on the first Tuesday of May. I had two weeks. Crap.

So, I did what any panic-stricken gal would do – I dashed off an email to friends of mine who teach women’s classes and begged for help. Adrienne Adams (Yamasaki), Jen Flannery (Fifty/50), and Alaina Hardie (MECCA MMA) all started teaching women’s classes back when they were blue belts, and were kind enough to talk me off of the proverbial ledge and back onto the mats where I belong.

With some excellent advice from them, I got my head back into the game and got to work on my game plan. Common themes from all of the women – develop consistent patterns, show movements that the women can build on from class to class, and reinforce what they already know. With these things in mind, I developed lesson plans for May and June, starting with the positions that I always wished I had spent more time working when I first started jiu jitsu.

The Requirements

Klint wanted to ensure that any women who were only attending this class would be getting self-defense techniques, so each class would need to include at least one of those. I have eight self-defense techniques that relate directly to jiu jitsu that cycle through the classes, and I tie them to the lesson for each week. Other than that, I could teach whatever I thought would be most beneficial. Knowing that I would have a mix of experience levels (including women that outrank me on occasion), I started working on a curriculum that would be scalable enough for beginners to jump in, but would also offer a challenging session for the more experienced women as well.

After I had the first nine sessions outlined, I asked for feedback from everyone I’ve already mentioned, plus Valerie Worthington (Carlson Gracie/New Breed). Val has a background in both BJJ and education, and among other things, she recommended being prepared to handle the “But What Ifs” (aka Mission Creep) in each class. I tried to do this by teaching both sides of each technique. For example, if I teach a submission, I will also teach the defense. I’ve used this format since the first night. This way, the students all know that they don’t need to ask how to defend that cross choke because I’m going to show them in the next section. Then, they’re going to start sparring from that position so that they can work on the submission and the defense. I like to make sure the women are getting some sparring time in during each class, and to see that there is a practical application for these techniques.

In the next installment, you’ll hear about the first week of classes, and what I hope the future will bring for the Yamasaki Jiu Jitsu women’s classes.

Chrissy Linzy has been training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for 5 years, and is one of the owners of US Grappling, a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and submission grappling tournament circuit that travels across most of the United States for events. She (rarely) blogs at www.clinzy.com.

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