Today I went to class at Minnesota Martial Arts Academy for the first time in months. Actually I’ve been to Minnesota twice since January but the first time I had a hamstring tear that caused a big scary lump to grow on my thigh. The second time I had the flu. I’m still rehabbing my MCL problem that has been plaguing me for the last few weeks, but I went to class anyway because I wanted to see what’s going on at MMAA.

When I walked into the gym I saw Sean Sherk there working his ass off on the mat as per usual. That guy has the most inspirational work ethic. Nick Thompson was there too, as well as a bunch of other professional fighters. Minnesota Martial Arts Academy is home to lots of pro MMA fighters. A lot of people come from other states to train with Greg Nelson and scrap with some of the best fighters in the game.

Anyway, today Andy Grahn taught the no-gi class. He started with two 5 minute rounds of calisthenics with medicine balls and other instruments of torture. Andy always starts class with lots of conditioning. Today he said that the reason is so our muscles will be tired and we’ll have to use technique instead of brute strength. I thought he was just being sadistic. Hee hee. Andy’s classes are awesome. I use his combos all the time when I roll.

We started with a half-guard pass to a form of side control I’ve never seen before. Basically you make a tripod with your head, knee and foot. The key is to plant your head on the mat on the opposite side of your trapped leg.

1. If your right leg is in your opponent’s figure-four, then you plant your head on the mat to your left next to his head.
2. Then you get up on your feet and drive your trapped knee to the ground so that your opponent’s hips are torqued over.
3. Pull your foot out and plant your tail-side knee on the ground right next to your opponent’s hip.
4. Balance yourself by getting up on your other foot.
5. Control your opponent’s near arm by grabbing under the tricep.

When we drilled this, Andy had us try to escape from tripod side control and it was really hard. None of the side-control escapes I know worked because my head was immobilized by my opponent’s head and I couldn’t shrimp away. It sucked. The only thing that kind of worked was to put my heels out far away from my butt and drag myself out from under my opponent with my hamstrings.
Transition to Mount
If you can’t get your foot out then you can transition to mount:

1. Switch your knee to your opponent’s other side and drive it to the ground.
2. Pummel for two underhooks.
3. Inch your hands up so that both of your opponent’s arms are isolated above his head.
4. Pull your foot out
5. Establish mount

We didn’t go any further with this technique but I think you could finish with an armbar or an arm triangle because your opponent’s arms are totally stranded. I also noticed that you’ve shut down his mount escapes because

• he can’t do a hip escape without making a frame with his arms
• he can’t do an uppa because he can’t push up on your hips
• he can’t block your transition to S-mount because he can’t push down on your hips.

Finally we worked on a counter to a kimura from half-guard. This is a rad counter because you end up with your own kimura except you’re in a dominant position postured up over your opponent. Basically the context is that your opponent has you in half-guard and he swims under you and locks a kimura on. The counter is hard to describe but it goes something like this:

1. Posture up on your head-side foot.
2. Grab under your own thigh with the arm being attacked.
3. Hip drive forward to break your opponent’s grips.
4. Making sure that his elbow is in the center of your chest grip his wrist with your free hand.
5. Lock in the kimura by passing your other hand underneath your opponent’s arm.

It’s snowing, raining, and sleeting simultaneously in Minnesota and I had about seven near-death experiences on the icey roads driving to the Minnesota Martial Arts Academy. By the time I got there my nerves were frazzled and I was grinding my teeth so hard I gave myself a head ache. But I’m glad I made it because today Tom Schmitz taught us all manner of sweep and my head is spinning from all the stuff we learned. This class went by in the blink of an eye and I’m not sure I grok the techniques well so I preface this blog with my usual admonition that the following should not be considered even remotely instructional.

Butterfly Sweep

1. Posture up
2. Hip back so your head is in front of your butt - this way your opponent can’t just push you down onto your back
3. Grab your opponent’s near wrist while rotating your body so your arm is over your opponent’s arm
4. Reach down and scoop under your opponent’s far thigh
5. Hip in so your head is behind your butt and you can easily pull your opponent on top of you
6. Sweep your opponent over your shoulder without releasing control of his arm
7. Land in side control and mind your tail-side leg or your opponent will hook it and get half-guard

Half Guard Sweep
This is a cool move when you can’t get to your opponent’s back from half guard. The context is that you have an underhook and your opponent counters your transition by getting a whizzer on your underhook.

1. Break down the whizzer by surrendering the underhook and drawing your elbow into your torso. By doing this you maintain control of your opponent’s arm
2. Exert pressure on your opponent by hip-driving into his side. Your opponent will resist your hip drive which sets him up for the sweep
3. Quickly drop and scoop your opponent’s far thigh
4. Roll back and use your opponent’s momentum to sweep him over
5. Land in side control

Turtle Sweep
The context here is that your opponent is turtled up and you don’t have a good place to get a hook in. Tom explained that if you cross your opponent’s center line you are vulnerable to a sweep so it’s very important to maintain a strong position at his side, rather than directly over his back.

1. Reach across your opponent’s back and grab his kimono or armpit
2. Block your opponent’s ankle with your near knee
3. Pull his knee out from his side with your free hand
4. Put your head into the space you just created
5. Reach under and scoop your opponent’s far thigh
6. Roll back and sweep your opponent onto his side so you are behind him
7. Put your mat-side shin high on your opponent’s back
8. Pull your opponent onto his back
9. Establish heel hooks

Arm-Bar to Back
This sweep occurs in the context of a battle for arm-bar. You’re postured over your opponent trying to extend his arm for an armbar. However, he has his arm bent and you’re not able to isolate the arm. In this case, you can transition to back control and work for another submission.

1. With your head-side hand reach under your opponent’s head and grab his far armpit. It will look like you’re cradling his head. You now have very good control over his torso and it will be easy to lift him into your hooks.
2. Slide your head-side shin high on his shoulder
3. Pull him into back-control

Today while we were drilling I had two moments when I recalled things that Shawn Williams taught me. Sometimes I learn better from flashbacks.

First we were drilling arm bars. I was letting my tail side leg hang low on my partner’s back and Willy, a blue belt and MMA fighter told me to keep my leg high and reminded me that it’s more important than the head-side leg. This caused me to flashback to a class at Hollywood BJJ where Shawn Williams said to drive your shin high up into your opponent’s armpit before shifting your hips and planting the head-side leg. This was the exact same bio-mechanic that Willy was reminding me of. I watched Willy do his armbar drills and I realized another thing i was doing wrong. He was thrusting his hips up the same way you do with a triangle. So his hips were elevated way higher than his shoulders and his entire body was engaged in the arm bar.

Second we drilled standing guard passes and there was a sequence where you scoop your hands between your opponent’s thighs to get him stacked. In Shawn’s class we studied a sequence where you’re stacked but your thighs are very low on your opponent’s arms. From this position you can get an arm crank or a collar guillotine or even a belt sweep. But Greg taught us a counter that will neutralize these moves by keeping your opponent’s legs high on your shoulders. Basically after you scoop you pull your opponent’s thighs forcefully towards your chest so he can’t wiggle back and weigh down on your arms with his thighs.

Today’s drills depend on the following bio-mechanics

• Keep your elbows in and low at all times. Do NOT let your opponent inside your elbows.
• Keep your knees close
• Forcefully push down on opponent’s torso as you stand to pass

Standing Guard Pass

1. Pin opponent’s biceps
2. Posture up
3. Grab both lapels at solar plexus
4. With other hand, pummel to capture sleeve
5. Pull your elbow in tight to your belt line with sleeve wrapped in your fist
6. Pushing down on opponent’s stomach and solar-plexus, step up
7. Keep your knees and elbows close together and wedge between opponent’s knees

Thigh Pin Pass Variation

1. Opponent will try to pull you to one side to sweep
2. Use opponent’s momentum to pin his leg under your shin
3. Scoop under his head maintaining heavy pressure on his chest and maintaining sleeve control
4. With chest-on-chest pressure flop your other leg back behind you
5. Grab under the thigh of the opponent’s near leg to counter a sweep
6. Forcefully throw it over the other leg while pulling your resting leg under and through
7. You are now in side control with the tail side hand pinning opponent’s near leg to the mat and his head scooped in your arm

Stack Pass Variation

1. Dip your hands between opponent’s legs
2. Forcefully pull his thighs towards your chest
3. Reach across and grab the top of your opponent’s far pant leg
4. Reach under and grab opponent’s lower back
5. Drive and stack
6. Lift your head so opponent’s legs flop past your face
7. You are now in side control with head side hand pinning your opponent’s leg to the mat.

Leg Lock Variation
If you have your opponent stacked, sometimes you can whip their thighs to the side. One leg will be crossed over the other. If you reach under the bottom leg and grab the top leg your opponent will be hog tied.

I am learning that part of my game has to be figuring out and adjusting to my opponent’s game. Today I rolled with Nick who is a big heavy guy who overpowers people with leg drive. Even though I want to practice technical moves, I need to adjust my game to the person I’m rolling with. If someone is relying on brute strength to drive through you, it’s not the right time to be thinking about fancy set ups.

I am also learning that it’s probably better to roll with blue belts because they are all so much more technical and tend to not rely on strength. I can learn much more from them, though I have no hope of submitting any of these guys.

Finally, I am observing how much one’s mental attitude affects training. Today I had a terrible day at work and it carried over into training. I wasn’t able to compartmentalize the misery of my job and when I hit the mat I had all of that mental baggage with me. As a result, I wasn’t able to focus and gave a half-hearted effort at best. I need to get better at getting my head in the game.

All of these techniques depend on securing side control. Greg pointed out a nuance that had escaped me other times we studied side control. Basically you drive your shoulder into your opponent’s chin and crank their head away from you. This prevents a bridge sweep and causes him to push your body away to relieve the pressure on his neck. This is when you scissor your legs under his arm. Unless you do the neck crank, it will be very difficult to establish control over your opponent’s arm. Anyway, when your opponent pushes you away, you shift your weight from his chin to his chest while you scissor. It’s okay to pull him toward you so his near shoulder is basically on top of your thigh.

Side control to triangle
This is a slick move that is extremely painful to drill.

1. From side control put knee on belly
2. When opp counters by pushing on thigh, control his hand by keeping it close to his side
3. Step OVER opponent’s countering arm and put calf under opponent’s head
4. Grab shin with opposite hand; at this point you control head and one arm
5. Post free hand to avoid being bridged OR
6. Roll into triangle when opp tries to bridge

Triangle to elbow guillotine

1. Try to drag opponent’s sleeve across your body
2. Opp will try to counter by jerking arm
3. In the space thus created, slide your hands under opponent’s elbow into guillotine position
4. While securing opponent’s body with your guard, lean into the guillotine

Triangle to kimura

1. Try to drag opponent’s sleeve across your body
2. Opp will try to counter by jerking arm
3. Keep opponent’s wrist close to his body
4. If his elbow bends reach over and secur the kimura

Side control to kimura

1. From side control, opponent will often try to cross-face to relieve pressure on his head
2. With hand closest to opponent’s feet, pull down on his bicep so his elbow is close to his side
3. With hand closest to opponent’s head make a knife and slide it across opponent’s face to secure opponent’s wrist
4. Do a wrist curl to tighten the lock
5. Secure the kimura and pull opponent’s elbow downwards while doing a wrist curl