03/04/2012 - Gracie Barra Bristol (Escaping Side Control)

Class #451
Gracie Barra Bristol, (BJJ), Luke Chamberlain, Bristol, UK - 03/04/2012

I received an email a little while ago asking if I'd answer a few short questions for a blog article. I'm always happy to talk about myself (I don't think it's possible to blog without at least a small strain of narcissism ;D), and here is the result, on Dan Faggella's blog, The Science of Skill. I'm one of twelve sites he contacted, including Georgette, Seymour from Meerkatsu, Julia from Jiu-Jiu and Dave from Jiu Jitsu Lab.

Dónal is unfortunately suffering from food poisoning at the moment, so as Geeza was also away, Luke was in charge tonight. He's a good teacher and obviously growing in confidence, so I hope that in future he'll become a regular part of the schedule. It's beneficial to have a range of perspectives, as well as a range of sizes and games. That was evident in the first technique he taught. It was the same basic technique I taught last week, escaping side control to your knee, but with a different spin due to a different teacher with a different training background.

Luke uses Geeza's terminology of 'cup and knife' for the framing arms (or was it seashell? Can't remember now), where the knife your forearm pressing into their neck, while the cup is your hand by their hip. In this variation, the elbow further along from that arm goes right to your opponent's opposite hip. It then proceeds as normal, bridging up and into them, making space to thread your neck-arm through to their far arm. Shrimp by straight-arming your 'cup' hand into their hip, then turn to your belly, reaching high with your arm over their back.

That's to stop them simply running around to turtle in that direction, which means you're ready for them to move the other way and recover guard if necessary. Alternatively if they just try to drop their weight, grab hold of their same side knee, then bring your own knees up to shift into turtle.

Next up was the other standard escaping, where you shrimp to guard. Again Luke's method was slightly different. As before, you frame your arms then bridge into them, making space to bring your knee through. The unusual part is that your other leg comes over their back. Underhook their arm with what was your hip arm, then adjust your legs into guard (you may need to shrimp a little more to make space to get your leg out). It is a little reminiscent of Roy Dean's methord, where he moves straight into an attack.

The last escape is one I don't generally use, where you escape to butterfly guard, so it was good to get a reminder. It is the same as the previous guard recovery, up until you bring your knee through. This time, you don't bring your knee all the way: instead, you just insert it far enough to block their knee. What happens after that depends on your flexibility. If you're able, put your other foot inside their thigh, establishing a butterfly hook. You could also hook it by their ribs.

If you aren't flexible enough for that, then again brace against their hip with a straight arm, using that to shrimp out until you have enough space that you can insert your butterfly hook. Once that's in, switch your hip hand to overhook their same side arm, reaching for the collar as you would with an overhook/overwrap guard. Secure both butterfly hooks, then readjust so you're sitting up, ready to attack.

Sparring started off specific from side control. I was pleased to be able to work with Vikki again, as she's a really good training partner (not far off my size, technical and gives helpful advice). I started off trying to shift to north-south and go for the kimura, but couldn't quite isolate the arm and properly stabilize my position. I then shifted to see if I could get that step-over triangle, but Vikki was wise to that so I wasn't able to lock my legs under her head.

Finally, I also tried getting a gift wrap, but I need to be careful of fingers: I don't think I was actually grabbing the fingers, but one of them started to get bent back. We stopped as soon as she let me know, but something for me to be aware of in future with that position.

That was followed by two rounds of free sparring, where I started with John. He has a fair bit of size on me, so I immediately looked to move to the top, but got stuck in his knee shield half guard. I was able to switch into an omoplata set-up when he tried to take the back, but I failed to flatten him out. I also totally messed up following that with sweep into side control: instead, I ended up underneath his side control, which definitely wasn't the idea! ;)

To finish I was with Vikki again. This time, I wanted to pull butterfly guard, but didn't close the distance well enough. Falling back into spider guard, I fiddled with Abmar Barbosa sweep where you put the leg across into their far armpit, but couldn't get the set-up. Towards the end I was just about to move into an overhook guard, which I probably wouldn't have secured, but the clock ran out at that point regardless.

It's a shame Vikki is leaving in a few weeks. As Kirsty isn't normally in the same class as me, tonight was a rare opportunity to train with my preferred kind of training partner (a woman about my size, due to the fact that in my experience, women are more mature, considerate and helpful to drill and roll with) since the old days at RGA where there were loads of good women about my size or bigger, like Christina, Indra and Joanna, along with skilled smaller partners too, like Dominique and Pippa.

03/01/2012 - Gracie Barra Bristol (Guard Pass)

Class #440
Gracie Barra Bristol, (BJJ), Luke Chamberlain, Bristol, UK - 02/01/2012

My first class of 2012 was, unusually, taken by Luke, one of the better blue belts at GB Bristol. I knew he had an interest in teaching from discussions we've had in the past, so I was intrigued as to what and how he would teach. Normally it would be Dónal, but I think he's skiing in Austria, and Geeza was also busy.

Luke more than lived up to expectations: he taught a very technical, carefully structured class, with loads of detail. That kicked off with a look at grip-breaking, which I'll definitely be keeping in mind for when I teach passing. Luke started with grip-breaking from the closed guard, from the perspective of the person on top looking to pass. If they grip your collar, the basic option is to place both your hands under their gripping wrist, then thrust upwards and away as you move your torso slightly backwards.

The second collar-grip break was a little more complex, which I hadn't seen before. IIRC, you start by bracing the elbow of your outside arm with your hip, cupping your hand underneath their arm, just before their elbow. Your other hand goes to the wrist again. Luke mentioned it was a bit like an armbar motion, as you're locking the arm out. As before, your then push up to break the grip (though I think I might be missing some details there).

Having dealt with the collar, Luke followed up with a grip break if they grab your sleeve. This was nice and simple, as you just circle your wrist in the direction of their thumb. If you try and go the other way, they can adjust and maintain the grip. Going against their thumb makes it much harder for them to retain their hold. Finally, if they grab your trousers near the knee, bring your hand underneath, then slide it up past their wrist to dislodge their grip.

Open guard grip breaks was next, focusing specifically on the spider guard. To escape my preferred lasso (where you wrap your leg around their arm), circle your hand behind their leg, then crawl your fingers around. I can't remember if the next one was also for a lasso or for the standard foot in bicep (I think it was the latter), but either way, you bring your arm down next to your knee, scraping their leg off, then circle your hand free of their grip as in the previous closed guard grip break.

If they are being sloppy with their feet in a foot-in-biceps spider guard, you may be able to simply circle your forearms under their legs, cupping the back of their ankle or leg with your hands, then push their legs off your biceps. That can then lead straight into a guard pass, as you take the opportunity to move round into knee on belly before they can recover their leg position.

The main technique of the night was the Margarida pass, named after Fernando 'Margarida' Pontes (read more about him here), a famous competitor from a few years back, who has beaten huge names like Saulo Ribeiro. Begin by grabbing their collars up high, near their chest, which is a common grip for when you want to stop them sitting up. Your other hand is going to grab low on their same side lapel, pulling it tight to take out any slack.

Use a swaying pendulum motion to stand up, then put the leg on the same side as your high collar gripping arm behind their bum. You want to get your knee into their tailbone: finding the right spot can be difficult, but if you just bounce your leg, that should be enough to jar their guard open. As soon as their legs open, drop down into a tight combat base: the knee on the tailbone break leg side will be raised. Your other knee will be on the floor, with the foot of that knee curled behind you, while your high collar grip is pressing into their shoulder.

It is important that you sink down quickly and tightly, as otherwise they may be able to sneak a leg behind to establish a de la Riva hook. I was finding that as I'm skinny, there was normally some space, but you can generally use your elbow to block what little bit of foot they manage to insert. Also, your weight should be mainly towards the leg you have on the floor rather than the raised knee. If your weight is leaning towards the raised knee, you're vulnerable to being swept.

Next, you want to slide your raised knee forward, up into their sternum, still pressing your high collar grip into their shoulder. The low grip you have on their lapel should help with this, as you can pull on that for additional leverage (a note of caution for drilling: you may end up squishing male training partners' tender areas if you're not careful). After that knee is into their sternum, you can shift your low lapel grip to the front of their same side trouser leg, about a fist's width below the knee.

Shove that leg down, coming up on your hips slightly if you need more force. Do a 'sumo step' over that leg once it is on the floor. Keep hold of that leg until you can slide your sternum knee to the mat, which will block that leg, meaning you can safely let go. Switch the leg gripping hand to instead grab their same side sleeve and pull it up high, across your chest.

If you can establish an underhook with your other arm, great, but most likely they'll be wise to that. In that likely event, drop the elbow of the high collar arm across to their other shoulder, so that your forearm is now pressing into their throat. Keep sliding through, until you can free your trapped foot, then move into side control. You also have the option to apply a collar choke, particularly if they're being very squirmy after you free your foot.

We didn't get a chance to practice that in specific sparring, moving straight into free sparring. I was paired up with three people not too far off my weight, which meant I was able to get into top half guard. I'm having a reasonable amount of success tightly underhooking their arm then bracing my other elbow against the back of their head, dropping my hips and sprawling back. From there, I found I could gradually put them flat on their back, then establish the usual cross-face and gable grip.

However, that was mainly because people weren't putting their knee up high towards my chest when they went to z-guard/knee shield. Instead, they were keeping it low by my hips, where I was able to sprawl on top of the knee and essentially negate it. That isn't a wholly reliable tactic on my part, as Callum used to knee-shield me all the time and I really struggled to get past: I think he must have had his knee a little bit higher.

I also failed to launch any real threat from top half guard. About the only attack I ever do is an americana, which is what people are expecting. I'm also often too hesitant about shifting from my secure grip to a position in which I can attack. I need to think of some options for offence based off that solid grip, with one arm under their head and the other under their armpit. Maybe some kind of choke?

Getting to mount a few times didn't help my attacks, as I'm limited there too. I'll either go for an ezequiel, but normally struggle to finish the choke (at least partially because I keep raising up, which gives them space to defend), or again an americana, but I'll often get stuck because my arm is still under their head. To complete the lock, I have to circle the arm over their head, at which point they can either block with their head, or take the opportunity to try and free their arm.