Today's tip comes was inspired from some training I did with a smaller grappler, let's call him 'Stu.' Stu wanted to learn some sweeps from the Spider Guard (an open guard position where you control both of your opponent's sleeves and have one or both feet on his biceps). Anyway we worked on what I call the Baiting Sweep.' (Those of you who have purchased the Spider Guard Masterclass … [Read more...]
Positions
4 Mistakes That’ll KILL Your Half Guard…
Whether you want to or not, you ARE going to end up in the half guard! Some people simply use the half guard as a last resort when their guard is being passed. Their opponent is blasting around their guard, so without even thinking about it they lash out with their legs and trap one of his legs between their own. … [Read more...]
The X guard position
The 'X guard is a position that I've been using a lot recently. It is either a form of the open guard or the half guard, depending on your point of view. You end up here a lot when you use the butterfly guard, especially when your opponent posts his foot to stop your sweeps. … [Read more...]
North-South to Mount Transition, by Perry Hauck
Here's a great way to transition into the Mount, one of the most dominant positions in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. This technique is by Perry Hauck, who was a brown belt under Rey Diogo at the time of this photo shoot. … [Read more...]
BJJ Self Defense: After the Takedown, Now What?
An Article by Brad Parker Brad Parker runs Defend University (www.defendu.com), a research and development group dedicated to the exploration of leading edge techniques and strategies for self-defense, security and defensive tactics. … [Read more...]
A Glossary of Guards Part 3: The Half Guard
By Stephan Kesting and Elliott Bayev Principal Photography by Keith Haist Originally Published in Ultimate Grappling Magazine This is the third and final article in a series introducing a wide variety of guard positions. … [Read more...]
A Glossary of Guards Part 2: The Open Guard
By Stephan Kesting and Elliott Bayev Principal Photography by Keith Haist Originally Published in Ultimate Grappling Magazine This is the second of three articles discussing variations of the Brazilian Jiu-jitsu guard position. In this article we are going to focus on the Open Guard, where your legs are NOT locked around your opponent’s torso (the other articles cover the Closed Guard and the … [Read more...]
A Glossary of Guards Part 1: The Closed Guard
By Stephan Kesting and Elliott Bayev Principal Photography by Keith Haist Originally Published in Ultimate Grappling Magazine … [Read more...]
Double Threat Attacks from the Bottom Position
In grappling, sometimes a submission can be more than just a submission. Let me explain… There is no shortage of different submission attacks from the bottom position. Most typically you'd attack from the closed guard, open guard or half guard position, but you can also use submissions if you're turtled under your opponent, or even pinned in side mount. Of course if you finish a … [Read more...]
Advanced Submission Attacks
Let's talk about an advanced concept that top submission artists use all the time. But first, let's set the stage by talking about the limited number of common positions in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu. … [Read more...]
This impressed the hell out of me!
In my early days of martial arts training I ran into quite a few teachers who were so full of themselves that students asking questions was almost unheard of. At first I thought that this was normal. I thought that maybe things would change after I'd paid my dues for 10 or 20 years... … [Read more...]
When the Closed Guard Fails…
A reader writes: Q: Hi Stephan, I recently received and read your email with the video link about the closed guard in the Beginning BJJ newsletter. However my instructor is quite thick and muscular, … [Read more...]
The Deep Half Guard (video)
Nowadays you often see the Deep Half Guard at the highest levels of BJJ and submission grappling competition. But there are a lot of important details to the Deep Half Guard that you need to know before it becomes a powerful sweeping weapon. Because I saw this position working again and again, several years ago I decided to add it to my repertoire. It's a bit like regular half guard except you … [Read more...]
BJJ Wrist Injuries and My Guilty Conscience
Today's tip comes from my heart, because I learned this lesson first hand when I injured my first BJJ teacher (and friend) Pshemek Drabchinsky. Once upon a time we were grappling. I was on top and things seemed to be going well (this was unusual at the time because he was way more skilled than I). However on this day I almost had him pinned! Pshemek is one of those Daddy Long Legs kind of … [Read more...]
A Great Half Guard Resource!
If you haven't seen this video yet then you're in for a treat! Here Indrek Reiland and Jorgen Matsi take you through the Half Guard Position, covering the basics of both the top and the bottom position. … [Read more...]
Free Book About the Guard for Grapplearts Readers
Heres's a really cool resource for you, something that I've received a TON of positive feedback on. It's a free, downloadable book that breaks down the many different variations of the Guard position with detailed descriptions and lots of pretty pictures! And you can grab it super easily, for free... … [Read more...]
The Reverse Mount; Another Unorthodox BJJ Position
The first time I saw the Reverse Mount I was at an Erik Paulson seminar. My reaction was something like "yeah, right...." I honestly thought that Erik had run out of high percentage things to teach and was now just making stuff up. … [Read more...]
Offside Kesa Gatame has an Judo Name
OK, it's official. The collective intelligence of the Grapplearts readership is awesome. Thousands of people people receive my newsletters, and many more read my articles on the website, via RSS feeds, etc. If we all got together and combined our knowledge we'd make Rickson Gracie look like a three-stripe white belt. … [Read more...]
‘Offside’ Kesa Gatame: Another Unorthodox BJJ Position
Today I want to look at another unorthodox position. It's so unique that - to the best of my knowledge - there aren't any formal names for it. For now I'm calling it the "Offside Kesa Gatame" … [Read more...]
Stirring Up a Hornet’s Nest
Boy, was there a lot of feedback after my last post! When I wrote about Kesa Gatame being both a valid and an unorthodox attack position, long heated discussions broke out on several grappling forums and quite a few people even contacted me with quite a diverse set of responses: … [Read more...]