Midoriyama-jitsu

Wrestling practice today working on set-ups:

• Kiss the bicep / Steering wheel: From a neck and inside arm tie, drop your weight as you try to push your partners head to their arm.
• Snap to underhook: From neck tie, switch step out of the way to punch the opposite undertook in. Get a praying mantis grip on their head with your tie hand
• Kiss the bicep reaction: When your partner stands upright, use a penetration step to place your forehead on the center of the chest. This is an inelastic collision, your head is stuck. Now grabbing the near leg step laterally with you lead foot as you grab their other leg. Now pull there legs past your legs as you transition from head pressure to shoulder pressure into the side mount.

High crotch set-up requires you to "open the window”. Two options shown today were when with the kiss the bicep set-up or when they overreach your tie. Take a penetration step and roll to your knee, grabbing between their legs and clasping the back of their thigh. Step through with the rear leg and punch with your free hand to turn the corner, becoming perpendicular with your opponent hips. Overgrip your wrist and look toward their contralateral scapula.

• Use your overgrip hand to grip their anterior thigh and grab their opposite leg with your original high crotch hand. Step in front of them as you pull their legs laterally past your rear foot. Your shoulder will go to their abdomen and you will end up in a low side side control.
• If they block your anterior reach hand, pivot backwards about 90* as you “bow” dumping them front of you.

 

Next we worked on some ground-n-pound (GnP) principles:

• From the situation where they have fallen in front of you, use your rear hand to grab the ankle of the ipsilateral leg. Lift it at drive it laterally, kick the lateral and posterior side of their leg. Throw their legs across your body and away, insert your lead shin behind their thighs. Throw a solid rear shot. Step past their hip into knee on stomach, throw three punches.
• From the low side control, free your superior arm and obtain head control. Snack your arm under their head and grip the anterior side of their axilla. Throw three downward elbows to the flank. Then control their biceps with this hand and deliver three forearm smashes.
• From knee on stomach throw your lead hand, rear hand, lead hand, and rear hook. Jump to the other side and repeat for the round.

While the junior students worked on our fundamental self-defense techniques, senior students worked on the Kesa Gatame Kill System.

Fall 2019 Introduction to Wrestling and Notes on the Figure Four

In the Fall 2019 Goshin Jitsu Mixed-Martial Arts introduction to wrestling we started with the pummel. The pummel exchanges overunder positions with your partner, you switch sides by slapping your chest on the overhook side and swim through, under their arm pit. Your partner does the same      thing on the other side to switch the over under. Your lead foot is on the underhook side. One of  the keys in the pummel is to make your opponent carry your weight, pull on their underhook arm to disrupt their posture. We worked on repositioning our opponent with the pummel. The way to do this is to drop step a quarter turn with  your underhook side, pulling with the underhook as you push with your head. Their foot should make a loud thud demonstrating that you have shifted their weight to one of their legs. You can then easily pick up the other leg for a takedown.

Next we worked on using the head and arm tie to do the same thing. The head and arm tie means you have gripped their neck with one hand and are controlling the other arm inside their biceps Drop step away from the arm tie as you try to make them kiss their bicep by pushing their head toward their arm. They should pop up, as they do the head tie hand pushes their shoulder as you grab behind their knee of their lead leg.

The figure four is a solid submission grip. If they have a joint you can twist it enough for a submission with the increased leverage of the grip. Today we did pattern recognition for the Americana and kimura. We did the “surrendering gorilla” basically doing sit-ups in the closed guard and getting “batting practice” looking for figure four set-ups. We did the “figure four clock face” (or Every 60°) where from the side mount you look for Americana, straight arm lock, and kimura on one arm depending on the angle of their arm.

I often have trouble with opponents “pulling through” when I attack with the kimura. They simply pull their arm toward their opposite shoulder, trapping my  overhook and putting me in a reverse kimura. I have two tactics for mitigating this:

First, from the closed guard or half guard  I straight arm their wrist backward, behind the plane of their body. Then, I pivot my body to their arm, and secure the overhand grip. Now i force the bend in their arm and pull their elbow to my chin. To finish I attempt to place their hand behind their head.

The second way I attack from the closed guard is to create a shin shield on the inside of their elbow. I keep a solid grip on their wrist and then reach over their arm to secure the figure four grip. Only once I have a solid grip and have broken them down do I slide my knee out a finish the submission.

Fusion Cooking

Today I covered some mixed-martial arts style grappling from the closed guard. The first was a series I picked up from BJJ Mastermind II:

From closed guard clinch your opponents head like a muay thai plum and use the other hand to block punches. Catch their arm off the punches and place shin shield in their biceps, cupping their triceps with your hand. This should roll their arm, rotating their hand posteriorly, setting up the kimura.

If they defend the kimura by cupping their thigh, use the hand nearest their head to reach posteriorly and wrap their head grabbing their chin. Drop your arm on top of their head like you are gripping a football. Scoot your hips backwards to create space on the contralateral side from your grip, feed your hand in to secure the guillotine. Lift your hips and arc toward the ipsilateral side as their head.

If they defend the kimura by extending their arm, retain your grip on their wrist and cup their elbow with your other hand. Pull it over your head, trapping their triceps against your head. I pull with my legs to get the proximal insertion of their triceps against my head/neck. Wrap their neck in a deep figure four putting your free hand against your head.

You can also use this position to block punches, then swim underneath their punching arm with your contralateral arm to obtain a rear neck choke position.

We also discussed using the this set-up and setting up a shoulder clinch: block the strike and then roll your arm underneath it, Gable grip at their shoulder, pulling their torso down. Now slide out to this side on the contralateral hip, place your top foot in the near hip and place your knee on the shoulder. Essentially a vice grip with your legs on their torso. Pinch their wrist between your shoulder and head. Now slide down their arm with your Gable grip until you are just proximal to the elbow. Complete the arm bar.

If they bend their arm with their hand pointing inferiorly, hug their arm at the elbow with your top arm grabbing the biceps of the opposite arm. This hand grabs their wrist for the reverse kimura. If they bend the arm with their hand pointing superiorly, shuck it past you and take their back.

If they attempt to stack, keep pressure on their shoulder to force the contralateral leg to extend, raising their hips more on this side. Open your guard and inset the hook on this side. Use the forearm on this side to lift under their chin as you elevate your hook and sweep them.

Next Matt covered the Russian tie, starting with using a shrug to lift their tie off your neck. Reach across with your opposite side hand to grab their wrist. Use the same side hand to under hand and grip the anterior deltoid, placing  pressure on their arm at the shoulder joint. If they are carrying your weight, release the wrist grip, undertook and grip the posterior deltoid. Free your other hand and grab their contralateral hip. Now step forward and guide them to the floor, pull slightly with your hip grip to pull their back toward you (placing them in a less defendable ground position).

If you can not break them down, fold their forearm toward them and figure four, lifting with your hips. Their reaction should be to push their arm downwards, again allowing you to guide them to the floor.

From the wrist grip and posterior axillary undertook, you can place your near foot behind their foot and as you push with the near forearm lift their foot to your opposite hand. Set up the single leg of your choice. If they step back to avoid the sweep, step forward and pull them to the mat. Alternatively sweep their opposite foot.

Lastly Adam ran through a trapping sequence off the jab cross. For the jab he did a split entry, that is catch and move the head to the outside while jabbing/eye poke/neck shot. Then cover the cross on the inside with a similar shot using your other hand. Roll the cover hand over their forearm and pass it across your body to your opposite hand, freeing your near hand for the uppercut to the jaw. Now fold their hand down with their elbow up to pull them close to allow your near hand tie their neck in a half Nelson. Knee, elbow, or throw as desired. 

Wrestling Practice Notes

Double leg

Use your rear hand as a distance gauge by placing it on their forehead. Use the other hand to wrap the neck, pull toward. They should reach to your shoulder. Use your tie hand to lift their triceps and shuffle in, placing your head on the lateral side of their ribs. Grab their thigh with your ipsilateral arm and step through with your opposite leg as you grab the thigh on this side. Drive laterally as you pull on the legs.

Russian Tie to Reverse Double Leg

If your opponent collar ties use a two handed baseball grip and rotate your shoulder as you pull this across your body. Leverage their arm by driving your elbow into their triceps. Retain the grip on the wrist and with your near hand grab a grip at the biceps. Squat, putting your weight on their arm. Now hook their near foot and lift to your far hand. Pull with this hand and reach behind their leg to tap the far knee.

Pummel Arm Drag Pull Down

From the pummel use the under hook to pull as the overhook pushes and drop step making them plant. Now shove their underhook arm down and reach across with your underhook to pull their triceps across. Grab their far hip with your free hand and drive with your head into their scapula, pulling them to the mat in 4 points.

Russian Tie to Pull Down

From the Russian tie, reach up with your wrist control hand to their biceps and transfer your top control to the far hip. Pull them laterally to 4-points.

High single to knee tap

Notes on the high single:

• Head up listening to the chest, legs square - think dead lift or squat with a slight lean.
• The initial grip on the leg: lateral arm goes underneath the leg and is palm down, the medial hand is palm up.
• To bring the leg up, drop your far leg back and the medial hand grabs the heel. Bring the leg up and guillotine it. To make him light on his base leg you want to guillotine at the ankle where the sock line would be, and lift. You can also punch up at the cubital fossa.
• Pass to the side mount by putting them in a fetal position.

If they whizzer you by overlooking and grabbing the inside of their thigh, bringing their leg to the outside, switch to the knee tap. Underhook and punch up as you step around the near leg, loading them on their far leg. As you pressure forward tap the lateral side of the far leg with your free hand. The punch literally acts a wedge to tilt them onto one leg which you briefly block to let them fall.

Leg day! Singles and kicks

Wrestling

Figure 1: If you want to do a single leg and you are in opposite leads, you will need to do a drop pivot step for them to switch leads so that they are mirror with you.

From your wrestling stance, lead hand protecting your lead leg (the most likely one to be attacked) and rear hand to make contact with your opponent (feel their movement). Use the “wristwatch grip”: grab the medial side of the ipsilateral wrist just proximal to the hand. If their lead foot is a mirror image to you, proceed directly to the single (Figure 2). If your leads are opposite, use your rear hand to pull them in a 90° pivot by dropping your rear leg back and keeping your same lead (Figure 1) then proceed to the single as above (Figure 2). Use your wristwatch grip to twist it anteriorly so their thumb is pointed to the rear. This opens the “door" for you to fit your shoulder inside as you step with your lead leg behind their lead leg (creating  shelf behind their lead thigh), with your head on their chest listening to their heart, eyes up. Push with your head and pick their leg up, slide your arms in a guillotine grip at the ankle. Lift up to bend their knee, drawing them closer. Use your far leg to hook their base leg with the bottom of your foot.

Figure 2: From mirrored stances, set up the single leg by stepping behind their lead leg.

Once they are on the ground, you can clear the leg and pass to the side mount. Alternatively you can knee or kick their leg, followed by punching to the head with your far hand.

Striking

See the Fall 2017 Mokuroku pg 39.

Regardless of the "Rules of Engagement", The Human Body Can Only Move In So Many Ways

Warm-Up:

Well at least some of them.

Hands - head - forearms - hips are the layers of defense in takedowns. Thus protect the lead leg with your lead hand, elbow at knee height, hand in front of the knee. Keep your head at or below your opponent’s. Use your rear hand to check and range find their head or shoulder. If they do not clear your lead hand it, your arm blocks the takedown with the help of the hip, checking into them perpendicularly.

To do the snap down your rear hand cups the head and the lead hand their elbow pull them down and lateral to your lead leg, using your legs not just your arms. Then double leg them laterally.

If they grab your wrist with their ipsilateral hand pull them across your body and grab their wrist with your free hand while freeing your hand. Pull to the single leg.

Remember that you must be eye-to-eye to engage your opponent, when you are ear-to-ear your are in a stalemated defense. To break this pull them forward, then push their ipsilateral elbow medially to break their clinch.

90° muay thai pivot drills.

Lead pivot: Rear kick, your opponent with step toward you, while you step 45° anterior laterally with the lead foot, check hand with your head hand (which will remain lead), pivot to the same stance, cross, lead hook, rear kick. Repeat. The lead pivot is easier but unless your are opposite leads will mean you are pivoting into their power side.

Rear pivot, version #1: Rear kick, your opponent with step toward you, while you step 45° anterior laterally with the rear foot, check hand with your rear hand (which will become your new lead hand), pivot to the opposite stance, cross, lead hook, rear kick. Repeat. This allows you to pivot to their weak side but is more complicated because of the lead switch.

Rear pivot, version #2: Rear kick, lead hook, cross, your opponent with step toward you, while you step 45° anterior laterally with the rear foot, check hand with your rear hand (which will become your new lead hand), pivot to the opposite stance, rear kick, lead hook, cross, pivot step. Repeat.

 

Wristwatch Grip

Grab the medial side of the ipsilateral hand palm to the posterior side of their hand, twist it anteriorly so their thumb is pointed to the rear. From here step in next to them shooting the underhook and “popping” their near chest with your shoulder, options:

1. Reach down with your free hand and then your underhook hand to secure their near leg. Take a step back to “drop them in the hole”.
2. If they step the foot back to avoid the single leg, drive your underhook up, as you step past them and knee tap the far leg
3. If they try to whizzer with their overhook, control their head with your free hand, elbow pointed to the mat with your forearm along the neck, a drop step first your near foot (the underhook side) then your rear foot to spin them to the mat.

Later we took this same set-up of striking, using the catch and parry to underhook and do the same takedowns.

My First Wrestling Class*

*This title should be taken with a grain of salt. My BJJ coach, Jack McVicker, has made wrestling a part of his game and passed what he considers the highest yield on to his students. I had numerous wrestlers teach when I was chief instructor of Goshin Jitsu.

At the young age of 40, I participated in my first wrestling class. That is, a class that only did wrestling, not as part of another grappling art or mixed-martial arts training. I think I know now why wrestlers start a “little” bit younger than 40.

Penetration Step: Step forward on the heel, roll to your toes, then to your same knee. Bring your trail leg up so that the toes land parallel with your knee line. This allows for greater variability when turning the corner. Hands grasp behind the knees. Face welds to their hip.

Sprawl: Toes back, hips forward, cross face. We practiced off our partner’s penetration step, sprawling on top of them. Rotate the hip opposite their face weld into your opponent, this gives space for you to cross face from their ear to their nose to their opposite ear. Underhook on the opposite side. Remember that if their takedown folds you, it is better to reestablish the cross face then try to hold their hips.

Go Behind: From the front headlock, sprawled on your toes, cupping their chin with one hand while placing your shoulder at their proximal thoracic spine. Cup their opposite elbow, rotate away from this side, pull/lift their elbow, so that their head goes toward the mat and their arm comes away from it. Now, release their chin and place your forearm on the back of their head and the back of your hand on their triceps. Step a little forward with the foot on this side and then pivot step bringing your other leg around so that you are parallel in the same direction as your opponent. Secure grips under each arm pit.

Snap Down: Tie up behind their head and controlling their opposite biceps, push into them and then violently snap their head forward. Secure the front headlock grip on their chin. Then sprawl to pull them to the mat.

Peek Out: More optimal, less intuitive, go in the direction away from the headlock. Place the hand that is on the same side as their headlock between their legs, touching the opposite knee if possible. Bring this leg through so that it is outside and perpendicular to where it started. Your head should trace under his body, with your neck being attached to his lats. Your other arm swims, almost as if you are trying to elbow/backhand your opponent. Reverse direction to spin behind/next to your opponent and be able to take their back.

Half Sit-Out: Less optimal, go in the direction of the front headlock. Post up on the foot on the same side as the headlock, sit on the opposite thigh. With the outside hand secure your opponents elbow, with the inside secure his wrist. Now bring your head toward his centerline, essentially unwrapping the front head lock. Secure the 2-on-1 grip on their arm.