In my academy there are a lot of students getting close to attaining their blue belts. As I was ponding the meaning of the world, I realized a major difference with this group of blue belts and the group I was promoted with. Now, as I say this, keep in mind I am not saying one type of training is better or worse than another, it all has to do with goals and what reasons we train and study jiu-jitsu. My Academy is in the linage of Carlson Gracie, my instructor trained with him, and having that influenced his jiu-jitsu was geared towards fighting and non sport jiu-jitsu. As you may or may not know, Carlson Gracie was regarded as one of the best Vale Tudo trainers of all time, and rightfully so, he was a champion fighter and teacher. My instructor really took a lot of the vale tudo style with him, and although he is very good at sport jiu-jitsu his heart and really expertise is with no-gi and NBH fighting. Having an instructor like that has really helped develop my growth as a fighter, back when my academy was younger there used to be two locations. One specifically for fighters who were training a fully rounded curriculum and those who were just grappling. Where I trained we did gi and no-gi jiu jitsu we trained vale tudo drills at least three times a week, drills such as your opponent in your guard had boxing gloves and can punch and pass, establish position, and submit. The person holding guard, could only grapple, sweeps, turnovers and submissions. You learn a lot about your grappling when you are getting hit in the face. Even with boxing gloves not many people enjoy the feeling and because of that, your points of control change, your explosiveness changes, and your goals are more focused. It's a different world when you add striking into things. We did similar drills where one opponent was again in gloves and standing up, he could box and kick, the other had to shoot and take him down, and establish positional dominance. Again, traditional judo and jiu-jitsu stand up is a very different thing if you are trying to shoot under someones jabs and hooks, watching for uppercuts and executing a take down. This was the foundation of my training. My goals in training were self defense and being a well rounded fighter, some people are drawn to this kind of realism, others are not, some people love the grace of a jiu-jitsu competition, the flow, the smooth transitions, I have to admit I love that aspect of it also, but I want to have both side of the story so to speak. Back when I tested for blue belt, the test was two hours of GI jiu-jitsu, rolling, going over moves, demonstration proficiency in the curriculum my instructor had laid out for us. After that two hours we all went no gi and put on grappling gloves, the next hour was about vale tudo. My instructor and his assistant would single us out and attack us. Come at us with punches, take downs and kicks, we had to defend and counter attack. It was absolutely draining. We were promoted to blue belts in the well rounded curriculum of a fighters, we had the sport base but additionally we had our skills tested in another light of a full contact fight, I literally fought to earn my blue belt. The current group of upcoming blue belts have never had this type of training. They have a very good sport base, but they have almost never done no gi, they have never had to worry about striking while they are rolling. I am not saying they are bad at jiu-jitsu, not at all, in fact there are a few standouts that really will deserve their blue belt very soon and I would back them and have full confidence they would do just fine in the blue belt division of most tournaments. The difference is they just grapple for sport, and hopefully they understand this. This post is really meant to stop you, tell you to look at your training honestly, evaluate your style and reasons for training. Are you doing it for sport jiu-jitsu competitions? If so that's awesome, I I want to see you do well. Are you doing it for self defense? If you are are you really training realistically? When was the last time you put on the gloves against an experiences striker and rolled with them? How ever you train, and what ever reasons you train for, you need to do it properly. There is nothing wrong in my opinion with people who don't want to worry about striking, who just love rolling competitively and non competitively. The problem comes when people believe they are learning self defense and how to fight if they really need too in the street and have never dealt with a striking opponent. Jiujitsu is an amazing spring board for a fighter, in my opinion its the best place to start if you are looking for a realistic self defense training program, but grappling alone just is not enough. Again just be honest with yourself, what kind of training do you do, and what is it preparing you for? If you ask yourself that and you are training toward your goals, excellent if not, it is never too late to make some changes and approach things a bit different. Either way, get yourself out on the mat, and train hard. Thanks for reading,
The longer I grapple and study jiu-jitsu the more one thing becomes overwhelmingly apparent to me. There is absolutely no substitute for experience in this sport. Beyond just seeing all sorts of different fighters with different strengths and weaknesses, experiencing different types of games (ie. Good pressure, Open guard, or crazy half guard skills) things such as attention to detail, muscle memory, timing and thoughtfulness need to be developed. It's often the goal or ambition of white belts and new blue belts to fill their heads with as many moves as they can get their hands on. Buying new books every week, getting instructional DVD's, starting in the blackbelt section when they are reading submission books. They believe and I did as well when I just started that knowledge of submissions was the end goal, and if I could have hundreds of them memorized I would be ahead of the game. As I spent more time training, and soon learned that all those crazy submissions didn't work for me the way they did for Eddie Bravo, or Rodrigo Gracie, I was frustrated and felt cheated by the instruction in the books. As more time passed I realized that it was not because the instruction was bad, in fact normally it was excellent it was my own ability that was holding me back. Not my athletic ability, I've always been a athletic person but my grappling experience. There is no way someone with 6 or 7 months of training will be pulling off submissions on more experienced grappler's of a few years just because a world class black belt can do it and showed it to you in a book. I didn't have the timing, the knowledge of positioning, leverage and pinpoint detail in my movements yet, I didn't have the mat time. When I had been rolling for close to a year and about ready to get my blue belt, I noticed how my game had changed. I had a foundation in positioning, balance and timing, not perfect but a developing game. I was concentrating on only a few submissions, for me, that was the straight armlock from open guard, and a triangle. Those basic techniques were what I drilled, and was successful with in sparring, I was able to work on transitions and setting those moves up and letting my opponent put himself where I wanted him and and capitalize on it. Shortly after I received my blue belt my instructor had a friend of his in to do a seminar, Andrew Smith from Revolution BJJ down in Richmond Virginia was the visiting brown belt (his site is here RevolutionBjj.com). During his seminar Andrew did a section about finishing the triangle, I was thrilled, one of my favorite techniques and I was going to learn how to make it more effective. One of the details he mentioned was the position of your toes, "live Toes" as he called it in order to make the triangle tighter. At the time I took that for granted, and all but forgot about it, it was too detailed for me then. About a year later during a particularly intense roll, I had someone locked in a triangle but was just holding on, not finishing. I checked my legs, locked in, my hand position was in place, their arm was across, what was I missing? Then for some reason it jumped into my head, my toes were not the way Andrew showed us in the seminar a year ago, I put those toes in their upright and locked position and that was it, my opponent was tapping like mad. It was not that I had forgotten or not paid attention at the time when I was taught it, but I was not advanced enough to understand that detail until that moment, I needed more experience. The real honest answer here is that grappling can be extremely frustrating, and our desire to be good right away is just not realistic. You can't teach experience, you can't get years of mat time from a book or dvd, if you want to be a good serious grappler you need to put in your time, and be patient. Don't give up the drive or desire to learn, but just remember it's ok to take your time, it's ok to not be good at a technique the moment you learn it. You need experience, so get out there, hit the mat, give yourself a break and enjoy rolling, your day will come! Thanks for reading, and remember there is NO substitute for experience -Sean
When people see this question they will usually come up with the following:
-Attending class -Friends -DVD(s) -Book(s)
But the real question here is how your brain learns! At one time in my life I thought that I actually had a learning disorder. I remember sitting as early as grade school and just not comprehending information. This went all the way through college for me and my grades reflected that notion. I refused to believe I had a problem or needed medicine to solve it. Right around may of 2002, I found an article by Dr. Howard Gardner a professor from Harvard University, and he stated that we have a total of 8 different intelligences. From these 8 we will use 1 primary and several in combinations to figure something out. I won’t go into detail but you click on the link for more information (http://www.thomasarmstrong.com/multiple_intelligences.htm).
When I read this I thought I had found the “Rosetta Stone” to my problem. I got a hold of books, articles, and audio tapes on this topic because I wanted to utilize what I read to see how effective it would be. After a year of research I realized that my learning ability relies heavily on seeing the technique or moves (Visual), then trying to mimic what I learn (Kinesthetic intelligence), and then thinking/reasoning how this will work (Logical intelligence). My brain functions like this to get the best results in anything I do. So if you find yourself in class spacing out or bored, change your method of learning! You will be surprise how fast and fun it is to learn!
Let’s travel back to the mid 1990’s Brazilian Jiu Jitsu was still new to everyone and to most their introduction to it was UFC 1 with Royce Gracie, which in hindsight should have be an Infomercial on Gracie Jiu jitsu. My introduction to it was actually between 1987 to 1989. I was with my mother who took me to see Mel Gibson’s Lethal Weapon (not sure if it was 1 or 2) the last fight scene where Mel Gibson is fighting in the rain and the fight went to the ground and it was the most amazing thing I had ever seen, all the basic stuff. My mother and I were like what the hell was that we just saw! Five years later Brazilian Jiu jitsu would take the world by storm and everyone wanted to learn. Back then it was difficult to find instructors; you either had to move to southern Florida, or California. I was blessed with having Carlson Gracie Jr open a school in Chicago in the dead of winter!! Rather strange from the Brazilian’s who love warm weather, but ok. The classes were simple. You learn what they taught and you applied those principles in a sparring sessions with your fellow teammates. Pretty simple concept, you just did what you were told. Keep in mind no books or videos were available at the time. It was frustrating for me because when it came time to spar with your instructor, you would get the crap beaten out of you with techniques that you couldn’t explain. I remember a rumor at the time was that the Brazilian were holding out and just feeding us the basic’s. Maybe, Maybe not! But the reality is that the basic’s are all you need! So let’s travel to the present day and WOW you have an average of at least 10 schools teaching some form of grappling in the area. I can head to my local book store and see an entire section of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and let’s not forget the vast amounts of video’s out on YouTube. I sometimes feel that a person will get “BJJ ADD” because of the information overload. With that being said I realize that we have two types of practitioners. You have the one who is some what of a purist and learns by attending class and working things out. Then you have the practitioner that has learn ed the principles and gotten sucked into “BJJ ADD” . He/She is seeking out the latest techniques to gain the advantage but always failing in the end. I sometimes wish we didn’t have so many books, grappling websites, and videos because it can be overwhelming. A practitioner can end up confused, frustrated and questioning everything. My advice to someone if they run into this situation is to keep things simple. Remember if your house is strong no one can break it!!!
Self defense and a good perspective: The other day during my standard browsing of the web for martial arts insights and new ideas, I was reading articles from Roy Dean's Website. Roy Dean is a BJJ black belt teaching out of Oregon, trained under Roy Harris. Not only is Mr. Dean trained in BJJ, he has spend many years training in other disciplines both traditional and non and has what I find to be a very refreshing perspective on martial arts, training and self defense. In the particular article I was reading Mr. Dean makes a point about rank and black belt status as it can relate to self defense(which is found here) and I quote "So how can people receive a black belt and not able to defend themselves against an angry construction worker?" That got me thinking about training, effectiveness and mentality. As he goes on in his writing he breaks martial artists down into three categories: Fighters, Philosophers and Athletes. I am not going to go into that description because he has already done it very eloquently in his article and I highly recommend you reading it, but I want to talk about being honest in your training. Lots of martial arts focus of highly refined movements, forms, exciting and acrobatic kicks, leaps and extreme displays of athleticism. I know this not only because of what I watch and see, but because I have studied martial arts now for just about 18 years. I have done very traditional arts, showy arts, more dirty brutal arts, hard and soft forms, and now through that training gained perspective that I use to judge the effectiveness of my training. These days I focus my training on Krav Maga, Brazilian Jiu-jitsu and Muay Thai kickboxing. I have settled on these particular arts because I have been able to evaluate their effectiveness in live settings. Practicing on fully resisting opponents, both who know the art and those who don't, not confining my training partners to the rules I follow but rather have them act on their own accord not bound by honorable fighting codes. Additionally I have both seen friends and training partners of mine and even myself have to use what I learn and teach in a real self defense situation and come away from the situation with knowledge and a greater respect for the martial arts. This has in some cases been by people coming into my Dojo or gym and wanting challenge matches, sometimes this has been from being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and watching things go from bad to worse until I was forced to act, whatever the circumstance I believe in one very important idea that simplicity and instinct are critical. To further quote Mr. Dean from the aforementioned article "Thai kick, jab/cross punch combination, and a rear naked choke. I think if those basic techniques were diligently practiced under proper supervision, with real time drills, you’d be better prepared for a street conflict in a few months than most traditional practitioners after years of practice. The list of techniques is almost arbitrary, and could just as easily be a sidekick, straight blast, and an osoto-gari. What really matters is the practice, getting it to the point where intelligent, scientific movements are instinctive." That may be a little bit of an over simplification but not by much. I agree completely with the Thai kick, jab/cross punch combination but perhaps think that the guillotine choke and sprawl should be in the list also. I believe with perfecting of those few techniques in a very short time you could drastically improve your chance of surviving a street fight/self defense type of confrontation. All in all, I seriously encourage you to evaluate what you are training, why you are training it, and what you are really gaining from it, do you spar and drill with live opponents both trained and untrained often enough? Think about those things, the please take the time to read Mr Dean's Article I think you will gain a lot through it.
Results: Yesterday I talked a little about how I felt like I needed to branch out in my ground fighting especially as it related to leg locks and submissions not focusing on the upper body. After I posted I spent a lot of my time that was not filled with work pondering and thinking about leg locks and knee bars. It didn't stop there though, I had to think about my game when I was in someone's closed guard a bit differently also. Normally when I think about leg locks I think about setting them up when I am playing in someone's open guard, and their legs are easily accessible to me. After a couple hours of pondering I had an idea, a new approach to break guard, an explosive movement that relied on distance and technique and slightly different points of control than I would normally use to break and pass guard. I was lucky enough to have the chance to teach this to an advanced jiu-jitsu class and test it out against some of the best players in the school. This process helped me refine what I already knew as well as let me figure the best way to teach and describe the correct types of pressure technique to a variety of people with differing body types and grappling styles. Anyway, what the true point of this post was, to follow up from yesterday. I want you to be aware that in just taking a little time to explore a side of grappling I am not as proficient in, looking as sambo, I was able to not only learn some techniques they have, but I was also able to incorporate and gain a new perspective on techniques that I always use, and refine my main game all the way down to basic skills and basic positioning. So again, I encourage you to take a look around at different styles, don't let you grappling become stagnant, I am a great example of how just taking a little time can completely give you a new perspective and refine your current game and open you up to new and different submissions, and keep advancing your skill level and knowledge of grappling over all. Thanks again for reading, keep supporting Gorilla Gear! -Sean
Hello again Gorilla Gear fans and other people who randomly stumbled onto my site. Last night I was watching some combat sambo videos online just to see how they approached some grappling questions I have been toying with myself. I was very impressed by a number of specific techniques, the mentality and the intelligence of that martial art. As mainly a BJJ player, I know a lot of submissions on the upper body, arm and shoulder locks and cranks, neck cranks, wrist locks, chokes and so forth. I even know a decent variety of ankle locks, heel hooks, knee bars, but if I had to sum up in a percentage how often I look for upper body submissions verses lower body submissions it would be around 85%/15%. That's a pretty sad spread when you really take the time to think about it. I spent almost two hours just watching and re-watching some leg and ankle lock techniques from sambo instructional videos, mainly focusing on positions I find myself in often when I am grappling. Of course I have not had a chance to play with these in my game yet, but the approach is not overly complex, or fancy, quite the opposite. Most of the techniques are very simple and straight forward, and if you know anything about grappling you will know what I mean when I say it's really the simple techniques that work under pressure. Amway, I felt like I have expanded my ground game, and still have a lot more studying to do and am very eager to learn more of what sambo has to teach me. I just want to encourage you, if you are a grappler, and specifically an experienced grappler, don't get locked into just the grappling you know and are comfortable with. As grappler's we need to learn from everyone, we need to take BJJ, sambo, Judo, Greco Roman, and freestyle wrestling and all the other arts focus on ground work and be sure to give them consideration and have a good working knowledge of their strengths and weaknesses. Thanks for reading my Gorilla Gear post, and go look up a technique you are not comfortable with, that is not from your primary style and give it serious consideration, don't dismiss any style without first honestly evaluating it and trying to learn something from it.
Good Monday morning, I am Sean and one of the owners of Gorilla Gear. I just wanted to take a moment to welcome everyone to my blog and let you know we will be updating frequently from now on. We have new products in our products page, a tee shirt and hoodie are now for sale online. Check back frequently for product updates, event information and other random tidbits we feel are important for you to know. -Sean
