19/04/2014 - Dave Jacobs Seminar in Virginia

Seminar #015
Tidewater BJJ, David 'Rock' Jacobs, Chesapeake, VA, USA - 19/04/2014

If you've been around on BJJ forums for any length of time, especially NHBGear (now defunct, it would appear), then you know who Dave Jacobs is. I've also come across him due to Seymour's posts about seminars Jacobs' has done at Mill Hill, plus there was an interview with him in JJS a while ago, IIRC. My host here in Virginia, Adrienne, is an old student of Jacobs. She therefore was keen to support his seminar at Tidewater BJJ: that fit well with my plans, as not only did it mean I would get to train with a top black belt and internet personality, I'd also be able to rest my neck (rather than getting in lots of sparring, the other option today).

After a cool opening speech about his ethos for BJJ (all of which I agreed with, so his school sounds like a great place to train), Jacobs ran us through a couple of warm-up drills. The first was similar to the open guard drills I learned from Kev, specifically the third one where you do a hip swing to recover guard. Jacobs call it a 'reverse shrimp' and does the same motion of popping up onto your toes with your bum in the air, but from the same starting position as a shrimp. We then did that with a partner, when it became almost exactly like I'm used to, except that your partner stays up rather than shifting into knee on belly. The final drill was doing the motion of a butterfly sweep (i.e., rolling to your side and kicking a leg up high, basing on your shoulder, head and hand), then swivelling through into scarf hold (the same leg you lifted into the air now goes underneath, so you end up facing the opposite way to when you started).

Getting into the techniques, Jacobs started off with a concept he called the supine twist, or rather that's what it is called in yoga. As he put it, great position in yoga, but terrible if somebody puts you there in jiu jitsu. Essentially, you're shoving their legs one way, knees pinned to the mat, while aiming to shove their head the other way. To illustrate that concept, Jacobs taught a variation on the transition from side control to mount.

That begins in the normal way, driving your knee across the belt line. The finish is where it's a little different. Keep driving your leg across until the knee pokes out a little past their leg. You're then going to slide it backwards into that leg, scraping it into their outer thigh. Your aim is to push their legs together, then slip your leg to the ground. They should find it difficult to step over and pull your leg into half guard, because you've pushed it backwards. Jacobs also briefly showed how the 'supine twist' could apply to passing quarter guard, bringing your knee across their body, shoving their legs one way and shoving your head next to theirs, pressing into their skull to turn it in the opposite direction.

After a short break, we moved on to a more extensive session. Jacobs is a big fan of butterfly guard, especially the armbar from there. He mentioned that he has a lot of trouble landing the standard armbar against anybody with experience. His preference is to instead use a pressing armbar from butterfly. Personally I've always found those difficult, but then I rarely use armbars of any type, because it requires more space than I would like (at least when you compare it to my favourite attacks, which are chokes and bent armlocks).

I last saw this taught by Nathan Leverton at one of his Leverage Submission Grappling seminars. Jacobs has a comparable set up, though this is from butterfly rather than closed guard. With both your butterfly hooks in, grab both their collars and drop back. It's important to stay as 'one unit', by which Jacobs means there isn't any separation between your bodies. They will normally post out their hands if you knock them forward like that.

Get an over-under grip, wrapping one arm around their head, the other under their arm. Trap the wrist of their outstretched arm between your head and shoulder. You then want to get your head arm over towards their shoulder. To do that, use your shins to push them backwards, hopefully providing the necessary space to bring your arm over the head and establish a lock by the shoulder.

Next your want to get your feet onto their hips so they can't stack you, turning your body to also clamp your knees on either side of their shoulder: Leslie calls this the 'shoulder sandwich', a helpful way of remembering the positioning. Put your hands in a gable grip and slide them down their arm until you are just above the elbow (finding that spot is one of the parts of this technique I struggle with). Once there, press down with your hands for the submission.

If they manage to circle their trapped arm off your head, you can still attack. Slide the top hand of your gable grip up, ready to catch their wrist before they circle their arm over. Establish a figure-four grip on their arm, then twist that arm away from you. This might get the submission, but more likely is that you steer them over, reversing the position to mount. As you transition, put your elbow by their head and move right into an americana from mount.

You can also finish the pressing armbar from mount too, by sweeping them as you have the grip. Just put in your hook and lift the leg up and over as you normally would with a butterfly sweep. The same principle then applies, sliding your arms up their arm until you get to that point above the elbow, exerting pressure for the tap. Alternatively you can switch to whatever submission you like.

Going to an armbar from s-mount works too. Kick your far leg under their armpit, bringing up their other arm and staying tight the whole way. Turn your torso towards their legs. Your near knee goes into their ear, or if you're like Leslie and are working on being mean, put the knee over their head. It is possible to do this in a controlled way, but as I still have major hang-ups about aggression and the whole idea of being mean, it probably isn't something I'm likely to use. ;)

Leslie has been working on her aggression for some time, though that is a complicated term for both of us: she has had similar hang-ups in the past. Leslie gets into a very interesting discussion of the topic over on her blog (extending into the comments here). As we were doing that technique, she said she'd be updating it to reflect her current perspective. I'm looking forward to reading the additions: Leslie's writing is always thought-provoking.

Next up was a more unorthodox position, the crucifix, although it is becoming more common. There have been a few instructionals on the topic, including an upcoming release by the Godfather of BJJ Blogging, Aesopian. If you're not familiar with the term, it is basically a back position where instead of putting your legs around their waist, you swivel and put them around their arm instead, while controlling the other arm with at least one of yours.

Jacobs entered the position by attacking the turtle. Reach inside their arm and grab a sleeve. Jacobs prefers this to the wrist, because it gives you enough slack to escape should they reach back and grab your elbow. They're intending to roll you over and take side control, but they can't easily lock that elbow if you are able to pull your elbow back due to the looser sleeve grip.

Shove your knee by the elbow of that sleeve grip. If there isn't space, walk around to the other side (maintaining pressure as you do), grab the sleeve there and attempt to insert the knee. You can even grab both sleeves and keep switching side to side until you work your knee in. Once you do, try to hook their arm with your other leg and drag it back. This puts you in a downwards facing crucifix. You can get an armbar from there, using your legs (you can do a sort of lockdown too to hold it in place), though as ever I found it hard to get the right leverage point for the elbow.

Alternatively, you can attack for a shoulder lock from turtle. Put the knee nearest their head slightly forward, making sure it is still controlling their arm. Turn to face their legs, grabbing their ankle to anchor yourself. Twist and swing the leg furthest from their head backwards, still hooking the arm. Do this movement gradually, as that shoulder lock can come on quickly, depending on their flexibility.

Most of the time, people will somersault from the turtle crucifix to get into a position where they are now facing upwards. To maintain the crucifix, shrimp out a little so they can't drive their weight on top of you. Be careful not to shrimp too far, or they may be able to scoot down. If they can do that, their next step is to roll backwards, putting them straight into side control. Make sure to have an arm around the head grabbing their opposite collar (like a bow and arrow choke) to stop that escape route.

If they manage to sit up, then adjust your legs into a sort of reverse omoplata position to get upright yourself, then walk backwards (still crucifixing their arm with the legs) to recover that upwards facing crucifix. Even if they stick out a knee for base, if you keep shimmying back, you'll eventually get them onto a weak angle where you can roll them back over. Alternatively, when they first sit up, that makes them vulnerable to that shoulder lock from earlier.

Assuming they don't sit up and you manage to hold that upwards facing position, you have numerous chokes available to you. Snake an arm around the neck and grab the opposite collar for a bow and arrow type attack. You can also grab the other collar for a sliding choke, then there is always the rear naked choke. If your arms are long enough, driving an arm past their armpit and behind their head while you also have that bow and arrow type grip works too.

Again, Jacobs prefers to armbar. He does the main one with his legs on their crucifixed arm. Keep adjusting your feet and slipping them up to the wrist, wriggling their arm in position. Don't ever step both feet off the arm, only one at a time to maintain control.

Swing your leg back past the knee line of the other each time. Eventually you find it gets tighter and tighter, until you can press on their wrist with your feet for the submission. Switching to a standard armbar is possible too, though there is a risk of losing position (as always with mounted armbars, it seems).

The final part of the seminar was dedicated to wristlocks. This isn't something I have used much myself, but I'd like to add it in, given it's a great equaliser for smaller guys like me. The principle is very simple: any time you can isolate their arm so that their hand is pressing into you and their elbow is blocked, the wristlock is available. Their elbow might be blocked by the mat, or it might be you knee, or you might grab behind it with both hands.

I was especially intrigued by a side control option, as I have had that exact grip numerous times but not known what to do with it. To get this side control wristlock, the situation is that they have tried to get an underhook, but you whizzered their arm. Trap their wrist in your armpit and grab their elbow with an arm to block its movement. Adjust with your armpit until you can use it to bend their hand back towards their wrist, then apply pressure for the sub.

The other one that caught my interest was a wristlock from guard. Hold their sleeve and elbow, pulling the arm across like an arm drag: Jacobs calls this the 'short arm drag'. Wedge your knee next to their elbow, the other leg up into their armpit. That should immobilise the arm. Bring your sleeve grip elbow around the back of their hand, pressing in for the submission.

You can also wristlock them if they try passing your half guard and grip a collar: same thing as before, isolate the arm and pull behind the elbow. Hence why Jacobs recommends grabbing the bicep when passing half guard like that, as that is far less vulnerable to wristlocks.

26/01/2009 - BJJ (Intermediate) - Last Class at RGA!

Class #210



Roger Gracie Academy (BJJ), Gustavo Dos Santos Pires, London, UK - 26/01/2009 - Intermediate

As you can probably gather from the lack of posts, I decided to concentrate on interview preparation since my last class on the 12th. As I’ll be busy Wednesday, that means tonight is going to be my last class at RGA, at least for the moment (might well return to London to work some time in the future).

Bullshido has had an interesting new addition, in the form of Mark Tripp. While he registered back in 2005, Tripp only just starting posting this month, and has already shared a bunch of great stories from his many years of experience:

Mark Tripp’s Background
Tokyo Police Aikido
The ‘KI’ Master
Choked Out by Gene LeBell
Gene LeBell’s Advice On Respecting the Tap
The Seagal Incident
Chuck Norris ‘Kills’ Gene LeBell
The Silat Challenge
Practical Joke

Well worth checking out the threads those posts came from, particularly if you’re keen on grappling.

Getting back to tonight’s final class at RGA, which was also the first time I’ve been taught by Gustavo for a while. As usual, he showed us some open guard sweeps, from a sort of spider guard position. One foot is pressed into their same side bicep, while that side hand is gripping their opposite collar. Your other hand is holding their same side sleeve, while the foot on that side goes against their hip.

Starting with them standing up in this position, Gustavo demonstrated how you can pull them into two basic submissions. First, you can drag them into a triangle, by yanking on the sleeve, raising your hips and flinging your legs into the triangle. Alternately, if they twist, you can shift the foot on the bicep to slide under their armpit, pull on their sleeve and bring your other leg over their head for the armbar.

Gustavo then showed us two sweeps, for when they have their knee raised up to block armbars and triangles. For the first sweep, take the foot you have on their hip and instead weave it under their thigh and hook with your instep (so, sort of De La Riva position). Pull on their sleeve, this time bringing their arm out, then back under their own leg (Paxton described it as a ‘looping punch’ motion). You can now use that momentum to shove them over, ending up in side control.

Finally, you could instead switch your grips, so that instead of holding their lapel, grab their sleeve with both hands. Then straighten out the leg by their raised knee, so that its lying alongside them. Switch the hand nearest that leg from their sleeve to their same side heel.

Now swing your other leg all the way over past their head, so that you are facing away from them on all fours, but still maintaining a grip on both their sleeve and their heel. Again straighten out the leg nearest theirs, then pulling on their heel, continue your roll, knocking them over your own leg and shifting around to side control (you could also try and go straight through into mount, but their knee may be in the way. If that’s the case, follow your momentum to go through to side control).

I had trouble stripping Paxton’s grips in specific sparring from the closed guard, as his hands were glued to my hips. I only managed to do anything much when he made a mistake, and the same was true on top. At one point he tried to switch from a triangle to an armbar and I squeezed past, and on another occasion I think he was going for some sort of sweep, but there was enough force that I could bounce right over into side control.

In free sparring, I began with Melissa, who was stopping over in London on her way to the European Championships in Portugal at the weekend. She wanted to start from standing, presumably to prepare for that competition. After a bit of wibbling round, I eventually pulled guard, then spent most of my time squirming to get into half guard. Melissa loves going for chokes, so I also found myself constantly defending against that too. I’m still being too complacent, shoving an arm in between when she went for the cross choke. That did give me enough leverage to shift my hips over and get into a position where I could push back against the choke with my legs and get breathing room, but its a bad tactic. I should instead be trying to prevent the choke altogether, rather than just delay it: anyone stronger than me is liable to still get the choke despite my weedy arm-wedge.

For my last ever spar at RGA, I didn’t want to pick just anybody, and therefore waited for Paxton. He’s been a great training partner ever since he started at RGA, a few months after me, so it was satisfying way to finish my time at the academy.

I managed to roll him over from side control to come out on top, but with the important caveat that whereas I’d just sat out two rounds, Paxton had been rolling. Had we both been equally knackered, I doubt I could have reversed him like that. Similarly, I escaped from several choke attempts from mount, knee-on-chest and the back through repeated bridging, but that is much easier when you’re fresh.

I had a go at the ‘running man’ escape from side control Saulo demonstrates, but did it wrong so basically just gave up my back. I’d earlier also tried Damian Maia’s side control escape, where instead of pressing a forearm into the neck, he wraps his arm over their head. I’d be wary of getting submitted that way, but had some success with Melissa using Maia’s technique.

Not entirely sure where I’ll be training next week, but should hopefully be able to sort something out. I’d like to return to RGA some day, if I ever find myself working in London again, but we shall see. Would be very cool to head back and see all my old training partners flying up the belts. :D

28/02/2008 - BJJ (Advanced)

Class #123



Roger Gracie Academy (BJJ), Jude Samuel, London, UK - 28/02/2008 – Advanced

My thumb is still giving me a bit of irritation, but equally its not affecting my training in a noticeable fashion. Hopefully any niggles will be gone by next week. My gf didn't go along to her pilates class last week (she's not quite settled into a routine), so instead she took the cheaper option of running through a class with me at home. I'm thrilled she was willing to do some BJJ with me, but if this becomes a long term plan for her fitness (and I very much hope it will be), I'm going to need some proper mats. Even if her interest drops off, I could do with mats for doing drills etc at home, though that’s another point in favour of the cheaper eBay option.

I've thought about this before, but now I've got motivation: last time, I was thinking of either the swish looking Swain mats, or some cheap Jigsaw mats off eBay. The Swain looks good, and also stores away easily, with dimensions of 1.5m x 3m x 38mm (if I understood the Imperial measurements on the Swain site correctly). Before shipping, its about $250. Unfortunately, looks like they don't ship to the UK anyway, although I think Dollamur sell the same mat and ship internationally (doesn't mention the cost, though).

The eBay jigsaw mats are a lot thinner at 20mm, with each one 1m square, and they only cost £10 each (though I think the shipping is around £7 per mat). I'm presuming for two people I'd need about four, which would mean £40 before shipping, then another £30 or so. Much cheaper than the Swain option (particularly as I'm not sure on shipping from the US to here for something that big), but the downside is the thickness. I wasn't planning on doing much, if anything, in the way of throws, so I'm assuming 20mm is enough for the lesser impact of things like scissor sweeps. Could be wrong though.

Checking on forums, I see there are also cheapish ($150 for 4x8 foot) mats from Mancino, but they don't mention how much international shipping is (so I'm guessing that means it’s a lot). They don't seem all that highly regarded, but meh: I wouldn't exactly be judoing my way through lots of throws or anything, just a bit of light rolling.

Before class started and everyone was chatting, a guy I haven't spoken to before popped over and introduced himself as Greg. He mentioned he'd seen the technique summary on my blog, but that some of the videos weren't working. I've noticed that the embedded Google Video ones were a bit temperamental, but hoped it was just my browser or something: perhaps not. If people notice videos aren't working, due to broken links, browser, something with the HTML or whatever, then let me know – stick up a comment on the technique page itself, or drop me an email (my username on here at gmail).

Instead of Felipe and Jude alternating, it now appears to be Gustavo and Jude: I've not had a class with Felipe since October last year, so presumably he's going to be doing that Open University degree (IIRC) until at least the same time this year. At least, I'm counting this class as taught by Jude, seeing how he took the warm-up, helped out during drilling and presided over the sparring. I suppose nominally this would be Gustavo teaching again, but in the interests of pedantic categorisation, its going down in my spreadsheet as a Jude lesson. :p

The warm-up was again hefty, even more so than yesterday, with the pain of repeated tuck jumps and sprawls. We then moved on to technique, where initially Gustavo was going to show an armbar off the open guard, but instead decided to show the same sweep as yesterday. That was fine by me, as it was a complicated move: I was happy to grab the opportunity to see it demonstrated again.

With that open guard sweep (I still don't know the proper name, but its apparently nothing to do with De la Riva, as I randomly thought it might), there were a couple of points I hadn't noted yesterday. First, when you push that leg through, use the grips on their leg and arm to help drive the motion: seemed less likely to get caught up in the gi fabric of the armpit that way, which was happening to me yesterday. Secondly, when you're doing that, you should also shift in closer, so as not to leave too much space and therefore mess up the sweep.

I was finding it a little hard to maintain my grip on their sleeve after swivelling round, but the tip on readjusting the distance was useful in landing the technique. I also noticed that when Gustavo demonstrated, he moved into a sort of scarf hold by shifting his legs rather than rolling under himself and going to side control. That’s what I was attempting yesterday, so perhaps instead I should try to scarf hold thing then switch my base for side control.

Gustavo followed this up with an armbar. This is for when you're in position, with your leg wrapped round their arm, but they've grabbed the fabric around your other knee. Hold the outside of the elbow and kick the leg they're holding straight, pushing their elbow across your body at the same time. This should break their grip, whereupon you can push the arm down towards your opposite armpit, locking the arm up there. You can now bring your leg over their head and raise your hips for the armbar.

Class then became a series of specific spars, with the same partner. Starting with guard passage, I found myself playing around with open guard against Christina. This is because I kept trying to pull her elbows apart in order to sit up guard, but that merely resulting in her standing, until I couldn't keep my legs locked and went to open guard. I vaguely tried wrapping up her arm as per the earlier technique, but that didn't go anywhere: generally I was flailing around low on her legs trying to get some kind of hold.

What I should have been doing was paying more attention to my foot position. I could have put one on her hip and one in her bicep, or both on her hip – instead, I just kept failing to get one behind her leg and the other pressing her knee. I should also try using grips on her trousers more too, in order to limit her mobility.

Under side-control, knee-on-belly was a big problem for me, with Christina regularly moving to that and steadily shifting to mount. I was attempting to remember the escape Gustavo showed us, which involved pushing the belt, but I couldn't get it. Will have to have another look at my notes. I'm also continuing to forget about going to my knees – I'm going to have to start chanting an inner monologue on that during side control, as I keep ignoring the option.

On top of side control, I felt more secure than I have for a long time. This is entirely thanks to Tran's tips a few lessons ago. I locked up the head and arm with an gable grip, as he advised, also pulling Christina in towards my knees, trying to crush down and stay as tight as possible. However, I found that I had trouble working a knee into her armpit to make space for the mount. I'm going to have to work out how to be more proactive from that position, as while I felt I had more control than normal, I wasn't really doing anything, which is kinda pointless (though better than just getting repeatedly swept, which is what tends to happen).

In mount I wasn't able to move up to Christina's armpits at all, as she get her elbows in tight. I attempted pushing on the point like Zaf recommended yesterday, but couldn't work my way in to get at them. That meant repeated sweeps, including one where Christina managed to slip right through into guard.

Underneath, I was defending ok, but not getting anywhere with sweeps. I was occasionally able to isolate a leg, but couldn't get enough purchase on the same side arm to make the sweep happen. I also managed to shrimp more than I've been able to in the past, pushing on the knee to help, but not enough to work through before Christina readjusted.

In her guard, I was again mostly just defending, working to a position with my elbows close to my knees, aiming to slowly free my upper body and posture up. After a long period of doing that, Christina opened her guard slightly, and with my hands pressing on her hips, I had a go at that sprawl pass Brian showed me last weekend. I don't quite understand it yet, but the motion sort of worked, enabling me to work to half-guard. I didn't have a chance to see if it would lead anywhere, as time ran out, but definitely something I want to try more often. Better than sitting and doing nothing but defend all the time in somebody's guard. ;)

After a break, where Jude chatted to me about the UK BJJ map and development of the BJJ scene (always cool to hear the perspective of someone so centrally involved in UK BJJ as Jude), I rolled with Joanna. Either because she's going easy, or she just has a relaxed game, it felt looser than with Christina, as I span around underneath in open guard, working back to either closed guard or butterfly guard. However, I couldn't do anything with the position, trying to pull Joanna down close to then attack her arms, but got stuck. An arm was sitting there staring at me, offering up a kimura attempt, but Joanna also had a firm grip on my gi – I wasn't able to break that hold to go for the sub, or try shifting to a sweep. Something I want to work on, as the kimura from guard is easily my favourite submission (seeing as it’s pretty much the only one I ever get, on the very rare occasion I sub my partner).

I need to make my butterfly hooks (by which I mean hooking the instep underneath their leg) more effective, as I was in position for a sweep, but couldn't finish. I need to bring their weight towards me, also isolating one side so they can't post out to stop the attempt. Joanna had no problems keeping her balance, so I was clearly doing neither.

All of today I've felt like I had shin splints, as if I'd been running. That could be from all the open guard work we've been doing recently, but felt weird: I've never had that without running before (I hate running, so I'm sure my technique is awful and highly shin splint inducing). I get a rest now until next Wednesday, though hopefully I'll get in another lesson with my gf on either Monday or Tuesday.