I am sure some of you are scratching your heads, trying to figure out why on earth I would be writing about how to beat a smaller opponent. Well smaller opponents tend to be fast, squirrelly, and sneaky – and they’re not about to take it easy on you just because you’re bigger – so I think it’s a valid topic to address.

In last week’s tip I talked about Godzilla and Japanese army jeeps; in this week’s scenario YOU are Godzilla and your opponent is the jeep. This leads to your obvious strategy: crush that smaller, faster, squirrelly, sneaky opponent! Make him bear your weight and you start to take away his mobility and tire him out. He’s not going to move slower because you happen to be bigger, so don’t you pretend to be lighter just because he’s smaller.

Making your opponent carry your weight is a fine art, which relies on several components. Weight placement is one factor: putting your weight over his chest and diaphragm area helps cut down on his ability to breathe. Anchoring your weight, typically by pulling on his gi, hooking his neck, etc., makes you even heavier. Sensitivity to your opponent’s movement and breathing patterns is another part of not allowing your opponent to recover lost ground.

Here is my one sentence summation of grappling with size differences: if you are larger than your opponent, crush him, but if you are smaller than your opponent, move around or he will crush you.