08/07/2014 - Artemis BJJ | de la Riva Guard | Removing the Hook & Passing

Class #579
Artemis BJJ (Impact Gym), Dónal Carmody, Bristol, UK - 08/07/2014

More de la Riva tonight, this time looking at passing. The first thing you want to do is get rid of that hook. Drive your leg into the back of theirs so that you can bring your heel back slightly, then flare your leg out to pop their hook off. Grab their other leg, pushing their knee towards their chest. That should make it easier to shove their leg across your body, going into a squat and pushing their leg over so you're right into a leg drag position.

The second passing option was essentially the one that Dónal showed me in a private last year. Again free your leg of their de la Riva hook, then shove their other foot down by pushing with your hand (specifically, with the v of your finger and thumb) into the part where their leg joins their instep. If they are pushing into your leg, turn it inwards to reduce the pressure. When you've pushed their leg down, swing your own leg up, pushing their leg across underneath your other leg, so you can sit on it.

In specific sparring, I was being too lazy with sparring, as I wasn't popping their hook off. Instead, I was shoving their other leg down and moving straight into the knee cut. That worked a few times, but the problem is that if it doesn't entirely work and they still have that hook, you might find yourself getting swept mid-pass. I need to make popping off that hook instinctive and natural, which at the moment it isn't. Getting into free sparring, I fit in a few sweeps, going off what Josh said in his comment recently (I think? Can't quite remember how I knocked them over). Useful principle to keep in mind.

After class finished, Dónal was showing Paul a nifty looking choke from top half guard. Reach your top hand to their opposite collar, getting a deep grip. Your top hand grips around their shoulder on the other side, dropping your elbow down and bringing your weight to bear for the choke. I think. Something to play with. :)

21/08/2008 - BJJ (Advanced)

Class #173



Roger Gracie Academy (BJJ), Jude Samuel, London, UK - 21/08/2008 - Advanced

I had a light roll with Oli M (I think his surname starts with an M: anyway, the Oli who isn't the recently promoted purple belt with a penchant for Eddie Bravo stuff), which was a good way to pass some time before the lesson started. As ever I got there early, so when Oli suggested a bit of rolling, seemed like another good opportunity to work on relaxing. Flowed around through various positions, until I bowed out. Ten minutes, maybe? I can never go very long, even when its not full-on. Also had a chance to try the foot-in-armpit escape from a mounted triangle, though as we were going light, doesn't really count.

Tonight was all about the half-guard. Jude started with a choke from half-guard (top). You begin with one arm around their head, the other by their back, linking your hands in a gable grip (palm-to-palm), while they have an underhook. First, bring your top arm back, grab their lapel and pull out as much gi as you can. Drag that over to their head, feeding the fabric to the hand you have by their neck. You'll need to stay tight throughout: using your chin by their shoulder is one way of adding some extra control.

Next, slide your top arm underneath their underhook, then get that hand right past their head: Jude advised that you'll be far enough when you can see your own fingers. If you're having trouble pushing your hand through, then you can use your other arm to pull their head back, and/or move your knee further out towards their head. Once you're there, switch the gi you're holding to the hand you've worked through.

Maintaining a firm grip with the gi hand (their gi should be up by their armpit due to having been wrapped round, to which they'll also have the discomfort of their arm trapped tightly against your body), hold the back of their gi with your other hand. To finish, bring the forearm by that hand around and into their neck, then squeeze for the choke.

From the same position, you can also execute a half guard pass. Though you've established your grips, they manage to defend. So instead of the choke, your going to transfer your lower hand to their same side sleeve and pull up, while the elbow of your other arm will press into their chest. Use that pressure to get your knee free of their legs, slide it forwards, then switch your hips to move into side control.

Last technique was a brabo choke. This one is a little simpler, as it doesn't involve any gi wrapping, and is therefore also applicable to nogi. As before, they have an underhook. Reach through with your top arm as before, but this time you're just trying to get your hand as far through as possible, rather than straining the grab a lapel.

Instead, you're going to grasp around the crook of your other arm, the hand of which will then grip them by the shoulder. Squeeze, trying to bring your lower arm upwards, simultaneously pressing forward with your chest to complete the submission. If you're having trouble finishing, use the pressure to get your knee through, then step over them, moving into a sort of mount position. That should enable you to apply greater leverage.

Specific sparring was, naturally, from half guard. My partner was Paxton, who is good at getting his knee through when underneath, so I had a hard time stopping him escaping. I tried using additional pressure, getting a tight grip and then wrapping his legs with my own, but that seemed merely to delay the inevitable: the only thing I accomplished through that approach was using up more energy.

Underneath, I found I couldn't get my knee through. Paxton was blocking it effectively with his knee: not sure if I could have somehow made more space in the other direction, but I think that was blocked off by his shoulder. I also tried using my legs more offensively, trying to stay tight but releasing the half guard and pushing, which was unsurprisingly a little risky. Sort of worked at one point, as I was able to recover guard, but not reliable just yet.

Free sparring kicked off with a purple belt, Javid. He took it easy on me, taking the opportunity to give out some useful advice rather than simply crushing me. As with yesterday, good reminder on keeping the arms tight under side control, particularly when they're trying to choke you from the top: Javid said that as soon as someone grabs your collar, get your elbows in position to block the choke attempt. I can't think of many people who try to choke me from side control, so was handy to be put in that situation. He also mention going to your knees from underneath, which is still something I don't do anything like as often as I should. Too reliant on either recovering guard or snatching half-guard.

Finally, rolled with Paxton, where we ended up back in half-guard. I did eventually manage to get a sweep, lifting him over my head, but I think that might have happened because we were getting near another pair sparring, so Paxton may well have eased off in readiness to move out of the way.

Something else sparring brought up was that I really need to make better use of all of my limbs, rather than just arms or legs in isolation. I've mentioned that before, so was trying to keep the principle in mind tonight. In particular I should be making more use of my legs, pushing against my partner to make space for escapes, as well as in open guard.

Forgot my towel, which was annoying, as I don't like to delay my shower: hygiene is super-important when there are risks like staph, after all. Can shower when I get back to my sisters, but not pleasant feeling skanky on the train. Bleh.

05/06/2008 - BJJ (Advanced)

Class #152



Roger Gracie Academy (BJJ), Marcio Gomes, London, UK - 05/06/2008 - Advanced

Really need to start getting more sleep: I'm averaging 6.5hrs or so, which isn't enough to give my body a proper chance to recover. Last night I got back a bit before 11pm as usual, but as my laptop battery has gone nuts, I wasn't able to type up on the train. That meant writing up at home, which took a little while, then the inevitable messing about on the internet. So, finally went to bed at midnight, which is a bit crap for getting up at 06:40. Need a more healthy routine!

Awesome lesson from Marcio tonight: best I can remember in a long time, from an instructional point of view. Even the warm-up was great, as it wasn't just star-jumps and press-ups etc, but directly applicable drills. That is without any doubt the best way to warm-up, and it serves both the purpose of getting the blood flowing and ingrains technique.

The first drill exemplified that. It starts with them attacking your turtle position (on your hands and knees, but tightly bunched, so elbows touching knees) from the front (i.e., facing you). You do a wrestler's sit out, by which I mean: hook one of their arms, then bring your far leg under your near leg, coming out the side and going round to the back. They then similarly hook an arm, also grabbing the gi material by your knee, then spin to their back, aiming to recover guard. You try to pass, they turn to defend, meaning that you are now facing their turtle and the drill can start again. That also means its continuous, so you're both working non-stop.

Second drill starts with you by their side. You push your head up into their armpit, the forehead pressing on the floor. Your far leg is up, the knee of your near leg shoved into their side. Drive your near shoulder into their chin. That means you now have a good base from which you can fling your body up and over to the other side, where you repeat the motion, going back and forth.

Finally, the third drill was from standing, Grab their knees, step to one side and push their knees in the other, then go straight to knee on belly. Posting your hands a bit beyond their head, fling yourself over to the other side and again go to knee on belly. To complete the drill, move back to their knees, then restart the process going to the opposite side from before.

Marcio then added even more awesome by going through an escape from side control, which is exactly the kind of thing I'd like to cover as much as possible. For this one, they have an arm under your head, with the other by your hip. First, you need to squeeze your near arm past their armpit, so you can push on the same side shoulder with both hands. Once you've pushed to make that space, you twist so that your bottom goes up and into them, using your legs to provide the power. It’s a slightly awkward position, but you're basically rolling over your shoulder to get your bum to shove against them. You also use your near arm to keep pushing. Finally, grab the gi material by their knee with your other hand and swivel back to guard.

Next technique was a choke from top half-guard. On the same side as your trapped leg, pull their gi out of their belt. Gripping the trailing material, pull it behind their head and feed to your other hand. Yanking tight, slide your other hand down their face, taking hold of the gi material with your palm facing away from their head. Position your elbow into their chest, and with your other hand grab their opposite sleeve and pull it across their face. Press the elbow down to get them to free your leg, then press your weight forward for the choke (I think: not sure if you have to grab your own arm or something to get the sub).

I found that extremely uncomfortable, which Christina said was made worse because I was tensing up my arm. I think that was because I was scared of accidentally getting wrist locked – the position meant I was ramming my hand into the mat in an awkward position, so had to adjust quickly to stop getting into a nasty position. However, I was being silly, as I could just relax the arm and put my hand around my head. I got wrist locked by Lubo's body weight once when squashed under his side control, so that's made me extra wary of getting my wrist twisted.

Marcio then showed the defence against the clock choke, where they have taken your back. With the opposite side arm to the one they're choking with, grab their sleeve and pull it in the direction their hand is pointing. This will reduce the pressure on your neck. At the same time, grab their gi pants by the knee with your other hand. Bring your knees close to their body, switching one underneath the other. Use that position to roll them over, whereupon you can go for your own clock choke.

As you roll over, you arm is in position to trap their arm, so wrap that up. Once you've got them on their back, reach your arm around to their collar, grabbing the back of it. Your other arm grabs a lapel and goes across their throat as you move your body around to north-south, squeezing for the clock choke.

Sparring was good again today, as like yesterday there were plenty of women who matched up well with my weight (as they're all strong and technical, but without any of the occasional spasms of machismo that men occasionally suffer from). I started with Christina, who was giving me an opportunity to try the side control escape from earlier, but I didn't seize the chance. Need to ingrain that as another option: I'm too used to passively waiting for the chance to snatch half-guard, which isn't working well for me at the moment.

I also kept on trying the Roy Harris open guard defence, but still getting used to it. Things are developing slowly, so if I keep at it I should hopefully be able to apply those principles instinctively rather than having to pause and ponder which side, which hand etc.

With Christy, I always get an interesting roll, as she has a different style from most of the people I spar with (probably due to her years at Roots in Australia). I kept trying to go for the kimura as always, and also pulling her down into a tight guard. She went for a few footlocks, which I'm not sure if I defended correctly. As she fell back to go for them, I aimed to get the sole of my foot to the floor, grab her gi and pull myself forwards. That got me into top half-guard at one point, and generally seemed a good place to pass from, but I get the impression it’s a sloppy defence that probably wouldn't work against someone really driving for the submission. Could be wrong though, as I'm generally pretty clueless about footlocks (while I've no intention of going for something that could potentially fuck someone up, I would like to work on the defences so I can prevent my knee getting blown out).

Finally, I had a long roll with Joanna, who is the perfect person to work the Harris open guard techniques. She goes for a loose pass against open guard, and invariably gets it, but it gives me the opportunity to at least try to push on her neck or arm. I'm getting better at sitting up as opposed to staying flat on my back, but I wasn't very good at reacting quickly to the side she was passing. That meant a few times I was trying to push the wrong side, which is very pointless, so spent a lot of time under Joanna's side control.

I also had a chance to use something Tran showed me a little while ago. When they swing their leg over to try and get mount from side control, if you time it right, you can simply bridge into them, rolling into their guard. Worked a few times, but as you're basically capitalising on a mistake (as from what I gather, its better to either slide the knee across for mount, or grab your foot and slam it down, leaving much less space), not something I'd want to rely on. However, useful to have up your sleeve.

Quite possibly my favourite lesson this year, so I was in a great mood leaving class tonight. This Saturday I'm hoping to get through lots of reviews I've been planning, especially the next DVD release from Roy Dean, who once again very kindly sent me a review copy. There's also a bunch of books I'd like to write up, but will see how it goes.