Defensive Mindset for BJJ

One thing I’ve noticed is that big white belts can get extremely competitive in rolling with blue belts.  Especially if they are 4 stripes.  My theory is they want to test themselves against the blue; beat the blue and prove that they deserve a blue belt.

This is one of the main reasons I don’t roll with large strong white belts close to their Blue Belt.  They muscle moves instead of finesse them;  each roll feels like an ADCC match.  The end result is an unhappy roll with injuries.   I’ve incurred 2 injuries in the same number of weeks due to this; bruised ribs and a hyper extended elbow. All caused by overly “eager” white belts with a point to prove. 

If you are a big white belt – then please don’t act like every roll with a blue belt is life or death.  Relax and treat your training partner as a training partner and not an opponent!

Ok, end of rant.

So to combat this I’m following a plan to improve my defences;  the plan helps me have focus and conserves my energy.  I allow the white belt to attack, get good positions and I work on my survival and escapes.  I’ve changed the focus of my rolls from wanting to tap someone, to trying to be efficiently unbeatable for that roll. 

I was quite surprised to see John Will blog on this very topic recently.  He made a point that having a defensive mindset for rolling is a very empowering experience.  In fact a lot of high level black belts always repeat this exact thing.

• Keith Owen on tapping 10000 times to blackbelt
• Saulo Ribeiro jiu-Jitsu University,  The first two chapters are all about about survival and escapes.

Personally, I enjoy the defensive aspect – the more you do it the more you become relaxed and still feel like you are in control..  I don’t feel I’m struggling and gassing out at all.  In fact I can keep this up for 8+ rounds – which is a record for me!

Initially I thought my focus would be on Side Control for just a week or two.  I’ve realised however that most people in my gym prefer side control to any other attacking position which means I need to spend more time working escapes.  It also means that if I want to practice mount and back defence I specifically have to ask my opponent to start from those positions.

So my average roll atm looks like this: Survive, Survive, Survive, Escape, Survive, Escape, Pass, Reversed, Survive, Escape Pass, Pass, Submit (optional).

Much better than: Stall, Stall, Pass, Attack, Attack, Attack, Stall, Stall, Attack, Exhaustion.

Dan

The Attack Triangle Trinity of BJJ

During my time studying these Rickson Gracie seminar’s I’ve been slowly coming to revelation on various attacking options.  I started with the micro, that is, I just pick one technique from one position and tried to understand how he applied it.

That attack for me was the Knee-In Armbar from Side control.  It was my worst submission, now it’s by far my number 1 submission.  Gone are the days of forcing on Kimura’s.  However  people have started to wise on to what I’m doing and to varying degrees can make things more difficult for me.  Now a few times I’ve chosen to grind through and get the arm bar, thus causing the roll to stall a bit.  Other times I’ve tried to attack the neck which has then re-opened the arms to attack.  Still something was missing – and yet again watching these Rickson Gracie seminars I stumble upon an almost throw away comment he makes.

He was stating that the person cannot defend all three (arm, neck or you getting better position), and that you always have these attack options as long as you move and keep fluid.   The comment was simple.  It was basic and easily understood.  This tells me it’s valuable.

If they defend the neck, then attack the arm.  If they turn into you from side control then take mount or attack the neck.  Rickson’s commentary on this sounded bigger than just an answer to a quick question – it sounded like a philosophy or core concept for attacking in BJJ.

I’ve fallen for the error of trying to attack a persons arms, then their neck and somehow they’ve managed to defend both and getting caught up in that.  The thing I’m forgetting in these circumstances is my opportunity to improve my position or change it.  Numerous times now people have attempted to get to turtle from under my side control rather than lose the arm to the inevitable armbar.  In these circumstances I generally control an underhook on an arm and stopped them turning.  I get frustrated as they were defending the arms and the neck.  What I should have done is take the back as they go to turtle.  I’m one step ahead of them anyway,  I know what they are about to do, but in these circumstances I choose not to flow with the go. 

This was an error on my behalf.  So intent was I on the control and submission of the arm or neck that I neglected the free opportunity to improve my position.  Many times after rolls I recall opportunities that I missed to get full back control or mount.  I failed at applying the Attack Triangle (neck, arm, position) concept correctly.   My opponent was giving me position, he didn’t want me to attack his arm or neck – yet I ignored this.

If you focus on position improvement and their arm then your opponent is going to stop you from getting those.  The defender can stop a person achieving these goals.  It’s so easy to get focused on two sides of the triangle that you ignore the third. Try to keep fluid between all three sides of this attack triangle.  Pick a side and legitimately go for it, then be on the lookout to switch to another side of the triangle attack and opportunities to finish or get better position will present themself.  Part of this is changing position yourself when you feel you aren’t making progress.  Knee-Ride, North-South and others are just variations of side control.  Use them all in side control and flow.

This Attack Triangle concept is just part of the BJJ building blocks – I believe most good BJJ players do this subconsciously and only a select handful can articulate this concept.  I come from a software development background,  in that you have a triangle for Cost, Quality and Time Constraints.  You can only ever achieve two of these constraints in a software development project.  If you have a set Cost and a set Time Frame then you have to sacrifice Quality to achieve those other constraints. I think the same applies for Jiu-jitsu defence -  it’s almost impossible to defend all 3 sides of the Attack Triangle unless you have a very good idea what the opponent is going to do next.

As an attacker I think you want to have good control, be fluid, use your hips and their levers correctly.  A sure sign you are not doing things correctly is if you find yourself grinding on the other person and trying to force a submission for say more than 5 seconds.  I’ve done this a ton in the past and it was such an effort to attack.  If you can’t get the neck after 5 seconds, then most likely you are NOT going to get it in without something changing – the only thing that can change in this circumstance is you.   Think about when someone attacks your arm and they are just belligerently trying to get it from the same position (say Kimura from Side Control).  You start to adjust and make it as difficult as possible to apply the position, and you start to work for escapes to use their strength against them.

For now I’m going to try to think about the Attack Triangle when I’m going for my attacks.  I’m going to see what other opportunities open up for me with this trinity of options.  I’m hoping Mount and Back Control.  They aren’t my strongest areas of control but I’m looking forward to see what I learn next.

Happy rolling.

Dan

Fluidity as a Basic Concept

Continuing on my theme from the last couple of posts I wanted to talk more about fluidity. This is another area I’ve studying from all BJJ video’s I could find on Rickson Gracie.  What does fluidity mean in BJJ.  Watch any video’s of most top BJJ practitioners– past and present.  Then watch two white belts or two blue belts at your gym.  Invariable one will have lots of movement…the other very little and lots of stalling.

I’m going to argue that the big difference isn’t in the amount of technique a blue vs high level belt knows but the core difference is in how they roll and create opportunities. A part of that is the use of triggers.  Beginners learn techniques but aren’t wired yet to instinctively know the triggers and what to do.  A beginner is all intent and zero opportunity.

Using this principle I’ve totally gone against  Cross Face from side control.  I can’t stand it any more as it doesn’t create opportunity.  The position anchors the top person onto the bottom person.  Making it hard for either person to move or work.  It’s this type of position that restricts fluidity.  As a person on top what option have I left the bottom person.  None.  So what is he going to do, keep tight and defend.

Everyone quickly learns the lesson of elbows in and protecting the neck.  So you aren’t going to get what you want, unless you give the other person what they want.  The other person wants the opportunity to escape.  To this extent, use less pressure (pressure for pressures sake)  when on side control and mount.  Become more mobile and use your hips to deflect their arms and stop their escapes thus creating opportunities for yourself. 

For myself I’m putting into practise triggers.  Depending what the person on bottom is trying to do, I’m trying to find very simple answers to that.  The end result is many opportunities for submissions arise and now I’m getting many submissions every roll if I get on top.

So I’m happy with my progress in this area.  Each training session I’m becoming more fluid  and more dangerous  with my attacks.  To do this I’ve eased up on the pressure, relaxed and concentrate on breathing and moving in reaction to whatever the opponent gives me.

Here are some tips I’ve been using myself when on top attacking:

• Never Cross face (shoulder of justice) from side control, it locks you to your opponent.  Good for points, bad for everything else.
• Never use excessive pressure – it locks your opponent so they can’t move and therefore can’t create opportunities for you.
• Don’t get into static escape fights– you engage in arm battles instead of redirection with hips and movement to stop your opponent escaping.
• Don’t try to force a particular submission – only go for it once the setup opportunity has arisen.
• Switch hips to redirect pressure from escapes.
• Keep moving at a nice easy RELAXED pace.  Use a 3 second rule so you don’t stall.  Stalling is just another word for a loss of opportunity, trying moving and switching your hips when you feel stalled.

Rickson Gracie Side Control Analysis

I was watching some Rickson Gracie Seminar’s over the last couple of weeks.  One aspect I’ve been really trying to hone and rethink is my side control all the way to mount or submission.  One thing I’ve noticed when Rickson rolls is just uses whatever the opponent gives him.  He has very fluid hip movement and doesn’t use any strength to hold a person down.

I’ve noticed at my school and many people I train with is they have one thing in common from side control.  They love the cross face (shoulder pushing into face).  While this keeps a person pinned it really doesn’t achieve much else.  It’s difficult to attack and you expend lots of energy.  To top it off the person will naturally want to be tight and not give you much because you haven’t give him much.

Instead what I’ve seen is that Rickson prefers to keep a short base side control with both arms on the other side of the opponent.  The difference is, he isn’t static.  If someone pushes his hip near their head he will switch base towards their head.  Likewise if they push his far hip or leg (the one near their leg) he will switch base and look to quickly take mount.

He will keep going around to the head and back to side control looking for any opening.  Always attacking, always moving.  However it’s the small details that make a big difference.  Switching hips, breathing, not using strength.  Lots of feints, letting the opponent trying to move a bit.  Going around to the head, he will keep his head pushing into the chest. That is, up until he has the reverse underhook locked up.  Then it’s game over with the arm bar.

I’ve been trying a similar strategy of keeping my hips moving, searching for the elbows, going to mount if the opportunity arises.  It’s proving quite effective.  I know a couple of posts ago I was bemoaning the fact that this was suppose to be the gentle art.  I’m starting to notice my top game is becoming that.  So far every time I’ve got top position (side control or mount) I’ll end up getting the arm bar!  Against blues, whites and against massive guys (120KG) full of muscles.

So much to learn. My next step is to take the side control flow and utilise a similar strategy for mount.  All the while looking for this arm bars.

Flow with the go!