22rd April, 2010

Concepts

Survival

Escapes

Technique

Side Control Escape

Broken Scarf Hold Escape

So last night was a busy class, Thursday's are normally quiet so it was great to see a good number of people.  The focus of the class was to consolidate and refine the concepts and techniques drilled in Monday's session:

1. Top position

Maintaining 100 kilos - not just in side control but as you transition from Mune Gatame to any other pin.

2. Bottom position

Achieving the survival posture is the priority, not achieving it impedes your ability to escape.

3. Bridging into your opponent, not just up.

Bridging into your opponent in both escapes practised last night gives you that extra room to escape the hips and replace the guard.

We also practised a new escape - from Kuzure Kesa Gatame.  Having observed and practised with the group, applying the principles from side control made this escape relatively easy to digest.

1. Survive by bringing the hands and arms inside.  Elbows remain close to you ribs.

2. Bridge into your opponent to achieve this, remember you may not get this the first time around so keep bridging and inching your arm out from your opponent's control.

3. The arms relieve the pressure your opponent is applying to you, stopping the bicep of the collar grip arm stops him/her from returning to Mune Gatame.

4. Bridge again into your opponent and punch your elbow into the floor, this helps to give you a base to escape your hips but also stops your opponent's hips, hindering his movement.

5. Escape the hips and replace the guard.

We then drilled these concepts and techniques through countless rounds of positional sparring. We ended the session with two six minute rounds of sparring.

15th and 19th April, 2010

Concepts

Survival

Escape

Technique

Side Control Escape

In the last two classes we have focussed on survival and escaping from side control.  If you think back to previous lessons it will become apparent that we have implemented both concepts and techniques in Jiu Jitsu in the following manner:

Survive

Escape

Position

Submission

So for example if we look at the closed guard position you'll see that everything we have practised correlates with the above:

Closed Guard

Survive - maintain posture

Escape - break guard

Position - pass to side control - mount

Submission - from side control or mount

(We have yet to cover the mount position, but this will follow various 'top' positions we are currently training)

So before looking at actually escaping side control we looked at surviving.  The easiest way to survive side control is to deny the position in the first place.  Here we practised 'stopping' one of your opponent's four tools to pin you, his arms and legs.  We paid particular attention to the arm which would eventually take collar control by placing your hand on his/her bicep and attempting to roll back onto your side, this would allow you to replace your guard.  This denying the side control can also be executed by grabbing one of your opponent's legs and performing the same technique.  We also looked at the worse case scenario where the side control has more or less been established and the final denial coming from pinning your head to the floor and your ear to your shoulder to again stop collar control.

If the above does not work and side control has been established, we looked at two basic escapes.

1.  Shrimp escape to guard replacement
2. Shrimp escape to single leg, double leg or back take

In both escapes there are several very important principles, which are key to surviving:

1. T-Rex - arms should be close to your chest, relieving the 100 kilo pressure and allowing you some control over your opponents head and hips.

2. Legs close to your butt - allows you to utilise your hips to shrimp and denies the mount.

3. Hips active - they must be live, see number 2.

4. Relax - side control can be a suffocating position, try to relax and remain calm, struggling unnecessarily here can be a real drain on your energy.

The following is a clip from Demian Maia's 'Science of Jiu Jitsu' - sums the above up perfectly:



We then attempted to put the above into practise, with numerous rounds of position sparring from side control.  The person on top trying to maintain side control whilst the person on the bottom attempts to escape.

We ended both sessions with two six minute rounds of sparring.

8th April, 2010

Technique

Knee on belly

This was the first class after the Easter break and I'm pleased to say we had a decent turnout.  We have been working hard on getting the group up to speed with the closed guard submission combinations so it only made sense to warm up utilising a series of flow drills.

Arm bar - arm bar defence - to pass and side control

Arm bar- arm bar defence  - omoplata counter - roll counter - side control

Ending in side control in both flow drills provided a useful re-introduction of the various top pinning positions we trained last month.

Side control - Mune Gatame

Broken scarf hold - Kuzure Kesa Gatame

Reverse scarf hold - Ushiro Kesa Gatame

North south  - Kami Shiho Gatame

We then looked at the knee on belly position in more detail.  We have previously arrived at this positon from a standing guard pass, but today we looked at establishing this from side control.



We then utilised this in another flow drill



Drilling is incredibly important to develop your BJJ, but flow drilling allows you to not only drill but gain, establish and then move to another position as you would when sparring.

We ended the session with four six minute rounds of sparring, well done guys.