It was the late 1990's, I was a purple belt, and my friend Allan had one of those gigantic $3,000 consumer cameras that recorded directly to a book-sized VHS cassette. He wanted to film some jiu-jitsu, and I wanted to show a few friends some material I'd been working on. So we went down to his condo's fitness room and shot a 12 minute "instructional" for some of my friends. The running joke at … [Read more...]
Turtle Position
The Step-by-Step Clock Choke
The Clock Choke Heard Round the World We're going to go through my favorite step-by-step method for how to do the clock choke, but first let's talk about a the first time I saw the clock choke and a match that changed jiujitsu... It was in 1998 when Royce Gracie squared off against the Carlson Gracie Wallid Ismael. At the time Royce was undefeated in 5 UFC events and, in my eyes at least, … [Read more...]
Top 10 Wrestling Moves for BJJ
by Jeff Meszaros In many ways, wrestling and Brazilian jiu jitsu are total opposites. The core concepts of the two sports run against each other, and what's a great idea in one art is often a terrible idea in the other. In wrestling, you do anything you can to avoid having your back put on the mat. But in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, people will often fall to their backs immediately to "pull guard" … [Read more...]
Taking the Back from the Ball and Chain Sweep in de la Riva Guard
Over the past few months on this blog I've been sharing a lot of de la Riva guard material. This series has been centered around the Ball and Chain Sweep which is one of the keystone de la Riva attacks that has been used by a lot of top BJJ competitors including Otavio Souza, Pe de Pano, and Brandon 'Wolverine' Mullins. In case you haven't seen it before here's a quick reminder of what the … [Read more...]
The Cheat Code for BJJ Turtle Escapes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmz1ID3VgGU The turtle is a terrible position! Being on all fours is an invitation for your opponent to apply the clock choke, take your back and choke you out, or attack you with other submissions. And if you're talking about an MMA or self defense situation it's even worse. Now your opponent can elbow, knee and hammerfist you into oblivion without even … [Read more...]
The BJJ Crucifix Position and Your Best Submission Options From There
The crucifix is a very important position in BJJ and No Gi grappling. Like the rearmount the crucifix puts you behind your opponent where all your weapons are pointed at him and he's essentially unable to launch any offense against you. Unlike the rearmount, however, the crucifix ties up both of his arms so that defending your choke and armlock attacks becomes even harder for him. So it’s … [Read more...]
Situational Sparring and Positional Drilling
Situational sparring and positional drilling is a training method used by virtually every single black belt and high level BJJ competitor. In this type of training you start out in a certain position or situation and define specific end points where you reset and start again. For example, if you were to start in the sitting guard then you might stop if the guy on the bottom gets the sweep or … [Read more...]
BJJ Rear Mount Master Class Q&A
When Rob Biernacki and I released the BJJ Back Attacks Formula instructional some of the readers of my email newsletter grabbed the app right away and asked some great questions related to the rear mount in BJJ. As it turns out, my partner in rear mount crime was coming back through town recently, so it seemed like a good idea to film videos answers to those questions. Here are the questions … [Read more...]
A Sneaky Rolling Judo Choke!
In BJJ it's often what you don't see coming that kills you. Which is why it's important to have a couple of surprise attacks in your arsenal. Today's video is from the Non-Stop Jiu-Jitsu instructional set that I did with BJJ world champion Brandon Mullins. It's a rolling entry from Judo that takes you directly into one of the most powerful chokes in the entire jiu-jitsu repertoire: the Bow and … [Read more...]
A Little-Known Move to Recover Guard from Turtle
When BJJ world champion Brandon Mullins and I started talking about doing a second instructional set, he was adamant about including a section focusing on the advanced applications of fundamental movements. I was initially dubious. I didn't think that most people would be interested in this. But the more we talked about it, and especially when he started showing me what he wanted to cover, I … [Read more...]
The Difference Between the Brabo Choke and the Anaconda Choke… Plus Tips for Both
I recently received the following question about the Brabo and Anaconda chokes from a reader of the Grapplearts Newsletter: Hi Stephan, I've been training in BJJ for about a year. In no gi training I really like chokes, but I still get confused sometimes: what is the difference between the Anaconda Choke and the Brabo Choke? I get my hand positioning all messed up every time I try either … [Read more...]
How to Stop Your Opponent from Turtling During Your Guard Pass
I was recently asked the following question: "Hi Stephan, My biggest problem on the mats right now is people turtling and going to their to knees when I'm about to pass their guard. Once they're in turtle they either roll back to guard or stand up and all the hard work I did to pass their guard is for nothing. What can I do to prevent this from happening?" This is a really common problem. … [Read more...]
Judo and BJJ Cross-training
Judo has a lot to offer to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu practitioners. And vice versa. Judo places more emphasis on throwing, of course, and BJJ is more ground-oriented, but Judo groundwork (known as 'newaza') isn't entirely dissimilar to BJJ groundwork. … [Read more...]
Technique 1: the Reverse Clock Choke
A demonstration of the Reverse Clock Choke against the Turtle Position by Denis Kang and Marcus Soares … [Read more...]
Sideride detail: attacking the turtle position
Thanks to Matt Kirtley for submitting this technique. For more information, or to contact Matt, please visit the Gracie Barra Tampa - Stephan Kesting. These details are rather simple and may appear obvious, but I have yet to see many people actually do it to get the crucifix and instead just complain about how hard it is to get the arm out with their knee alone. Here are two details to … [Read more...]
Step-by-step reverse omoplata
Thanks to Eduardo de Lima for demonstrating this technique, and to Matt Kirtley for taking the photos and writing the descriptions. For more information, or to contact either person, please visit Gracie Barra Clearwater - Stephan Kesting. If the crucifix choke is underused, then the reverse (or inverted) omoplata is almost unknown or at least considered an exotic novelty. Hopefully, this … [Read more...]
Cattle Catch Neck Crank
Thanks to Eduardo de Lima for demonstrating this technique, and to Matt Kirtley for taking the photos and writing the descriptions. For more information, or to contact either person, please visit the Gracie Barra Tampa - Stephan Kesting. The cattle catch is a neck crank (cervical lock) that’s illegal in almost all Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournaments, but still great for no-gi, submission wrestling … [Read more...]
A Confusion of Crucifixes
With the addition of the Crucifix Series, I felt I should address a common confusion people have when they try to discuss the crucifix. The root of the problem is that two different positions share the same name. One is legal at all levels of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and judo competition, while the other is a neck crank that is only legal in no-gi submission wrestling and mixed martial … [Read more...]
Dealing with Daddy Long Legs
A reader writes: Q: Do you have any advice for handling opponents who are tall, long-legged and very flexible? A: Yes! I have had several training partners who were built like daddy long leg spiders … [Read more...]
A Roadmap for Grappling
When an uninitiated person sees grappling in action for the first time it seems very chaotic and confusing. There are limbs and bodies all over the place and then, all of a sudden and for ‘no reason’ someone taps out. This can be a very intimidating activity for beginners to launch themselves into. … [Read more...]