Training The Dream: Crossover From Wrestling To Bjj

This week I am going to talk a bit about how my wrestling has helped and molded my BJJ game. Having wrestled for 13+ years, it would be impossible to say that my wrestling has not helped or shaped my style of jiu-jitsu. I started Bjj two days after my last collegiate wrestling match and as time has progressed I have tried to build my game in a way that will use my wrestling strengths to aid me. Before I get into how wrestling has helped me in jiu-jitsu, I want to review the week in training.

WEEK IN TRAINING
With the holidays over, training has definitely ramped up down here in Rio! The mats have filled with even more avid BJJ practitioners ready to role. Monday morning I busted out a tough cross fit body weight workout, and at night Weber (one of the instructors at Gordo’s) taught some excellent standing guard passes. They fit nicely into my game and I have hit them a couple of times throughout the week. As always the rolling was great. One memorable roll from the night is when I was rolling against Thiago, one of the many black belts at Gordo’s. He is a great guy super nice and a great technician. While we were rolling he got me in some kind of crazy gi choke (not even sure what) I was defending (barely) and next thing I knew Gordo and several others were yelling for him to stop; apparently from the angle they had it looked like I went out. After assuring everyone I was fine we continued to roll. Tuesday was Dennis’ Connection Rio class, which is always fast paced and filled with great technique and drill work. This week my girlfriend Nicole started her TEFL course in Centro, so I have been getting up earlier with her. On Wednesday I managed to drag myself out of bed for the morning class at Gordo’s. I am sure glad I did! I walk in and class was huge, 14 black belts, 6 browns, another 5 or 6 purples, 5 blues, and 3 white belts. Gordo taught some excellent guard passes from our opponents butterfly guard. When it came to live sparring I rolled with two purple belts and the rest of the time was with brown or black belts, trust me this is every blue belts dream (or at least should be). When class was done I quickly hopped into the pool grabbed an apple and toast, and prepared for the next training. Normally on Wednesdays the CR crew goes on an academy visit to one of the many fantastic training camps here in Rio. This week, however, we had a special treat. Two time world champion Felipe Costa came in to teach a class at the Connection Rio Premier House. We laid mats on the main balcony of the house and practiced under the hot Brazilian sun. Felipe is a smaller guy, so his game was an excellent fit with mine. He taught on attacking the back. The series of technique was great, but what made such it an awesome experience was the concepts he enlightened us to. Being able to pick a world champions brain and having him to discuss the little ideas and details is nothing short of amazing. We had some great rolling after and Felipe made sure to have at least one five minute sparring session with everyone who trained. The game he plays is super relaxed and it felt, even as he is sweeping or submitting you, like he was putting no strength or effort into it at all. William from BJJpix.com was there to take photos, some of which are at the bottom of the this blog. After the class Felipe hung with us and the pool and discussed more BJJ and just about where we were all from.

This last fact is what makes staying at Connection Rio and training here so much fun. Over the course of the last month we have seen around 30 people from all over the world come stay and train here. It makes for great discussions, both BJJ related and not. Added to the discussion is that not everyone here trains at the academy, so a lot of talk is about the different training styles, etiquette, and people we see and meet. Currently there are guys training at Gordo’s, Checkmat, Escola De Jiu-Jitsu, and X-gym. In the last two weeks alone some of the big names that have been training or around include Jacare, Anderson Silva, Erick Silva, Antonio Braga Neto, and Big Nog.

Thursday was kind of a lighter day to help me get over a nasty cold. I have a bad habit of getting sick, still training hard and then getting sicker so I erred on the side of caution. I did some tabata hill sprints (8 rounds of 20 second goes with 10 second rest), shadow boxed and wrestled. Later some of the guys and I drilled a few techniques from the seminar. Most of the day I spent working on a wrestling curriculum for coaching; setting up series of techniques to flow from one to the other.

To round out the week I finished with another 2- BJJ training sessions. First the a.m. session: I got up and headed to Gordo’s, when I got there found out there was no power (storm hit the night before). That did not stop us however and in early morning light we trained. On Fridays the classes typically consist of extensive warm up and live rolling. Sometimes there is just a bunch of king of the mat and free training and sometimes there are “marathon” rolls. We had a 20, 15, and 10 minute sparring matches. You first start out with the 20 minute as a warm up, starting slow/flowing then gradually picking up the intensity. The other rolls are your typical speed and intensity just for longer than normal. The last roll of the morning was against a very solid purple belt, who in addition to good technique, was fast and strong. Our spar was filled with scramble after scramble, one guy getting the advantage and the other countering to the advantage. In the middle of the roll I was in an awkward top half guard type position trying to keep from getting swept and better control when I hear Antonio Braga Neto shout some pointers on where to set my grips and what to do to secure. It’s an awesome feeling knowing that a multi-time world champion was watching you roll and wanted to lend some pointers to you. Sparring finished and we lined up and bowed out and everyone shook hand and left the still dim gym chatting and smiling. In the afternoon we had Dennis’ class. We reviewed one of the sweeps he taught earlier, which was nice because it really helped it “click” for me. Then we worked on several techniques that lead into a submission and sweep series. The various series that Dennis has created are a great way to not only master technique, but to develop a sense of chain jiu-jitsu allowing for you to transition effortlessly from on technique to another until something works. Learning and Drilling these moves are a great way to send your game to the next level. We finished out the session with our normal sparring which is a great way to finish out the day/week of training.

WRESTLING AND BJJ

Having wrestled for the past 13 years or so, one of the biggest questions I get from guys in the BJJ world is, ‘How do you feel your wrestling has carried over to your jiu-jitsu?’ It’s a pretty broad question which, at the time, is hard to fully go into. Here I am going to try to go more in-depth at answering it.

I feel that wrestling is a great accompaniment with jiu-jitsu. One of the biggest positives is that coming into the sport of BJJ from my wrestling background I already had a knowledge of body pressure, leverage, and distribution of weigh. The intense push-pull of wrestling, along with the need to either keep an opponent on the mat or pin him gives a wrestler a leg up on those just starting BJJ from no other grappling background. This is because while a BJJ newbie may spend weeks or months learning how to distribute getting a feel for pressures, the wrestler already has that down and can focus on other aspects of the game. To illustrate my point one of the biggest comments I hear is people saying, “man wrestlers have the best base, and they are hard to knock of their base”. Wrestling also gives a new BJJ practitioner a leg up by allowing them to already be familiar with one aspect of BJJ, top control. In wrestling the overall goal is to pin your opponents shoulders to the mat and keep them there in a variety of positions and moves. So while the wrestler may not yet now any submissions, controlling from side control, half guard, the back, and the mount positions are all familiar to the wrestler. I have found that since having a wide variety of wrestling breakdowns it has allowed me to at least get one hook in when my opponent is in turtle. An added benefit I have found is carrying over wrestling moves to aid in my BJJ. For instance I have found great success using the ¾ Nelson from a sprawled position to bypass my opponents back and guard and go straight from a sprawl into side control. One of the biggest benefits is the advantage in takedowns. While most BJJ sparring starts from the knees, most wrestling sparring starts from the feet. To go along with that drilling takedowns from start to finish at great length everyday hones the technique and knowledge of angle of attack far faster than in BJJ. I think if you are seriously looking into competing in BJJ working with a wrestler is a must to help hone and perfect your game on your feet. Don’t just take my word for it, an example far greater than my advice can be seen if you were to look back at Rolls Gracie Sr. was regarded as one of the great innovators of BJJ, he actively trained and competed in wrestling tournaments believing that it was only going to strengthen and add new dimensions to his game.

The biggest contribution that wrestling has made to my jiu-jitsu game in on the mental side. After years of being a wrestler I have gained the knowledge of how to learn technique. I know it sounds weird, but having to learn how to learn is one of the hardest things to do. Over time your mind learns how to absorb info then transferring it into motor skills through repetition. The mental toughness also comes into play. In wrestling you are pushed to your physical and mental limits, this builds a toughness creating the ‘never say die, I can do this’ that comes in handy when things get tough.

For all the positives of wrestling for BJJ, there are a few areas where wrestling can hinder your jiu-jitsu game. First one of the man things wrestlers are taught to do when they feel off balance and need to secure a position is to post an arm out on the mat. In BJJ this can leave you open for armbars and kimuras (trust me when I first started training in the gi it was armbar city for people on me). While the grinding, pressuring, offensive nature of wrestling can help you. It will leave you open for other submissions as well. A wrestler trying to power in a double and leaving a neck exposed will quickly feel a guillotine choke get slapped on. (on a side note, my last trip to Rio Mario Sperry taught an mma class on beating American wrestlers filled with guillotine variations) The number one submission wrestlers fall into, in my opinion, are triangle chokes. Because wrestlers are taught to smother and cover there opponent, when in guard they tend to keep there head down and weight heavy, this coupled with the posting on the mat essentially give away the choke. (see Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen 1, or Royce Gracie vs. Dan Severn). In the beginning for wrestlers learning to get comfortable and developing your guard game is difficult. For wrestlers being on your back is the ultimate sin. I was always taught to matter what you do get off your back, AT ALL COSTS. This mentality still at times can be difficult to advance my guard game. While it is my guard is getting better flow, it is by no means as natural or as fluid as my top game.

Lastly I want to say that BJJ has improved areas of my wrestling as well. Because of no fear to the pin its made me a lot more comfortable to engage in scrambles on the mat. In wrestling this was never my strong point. But because of the constant ebb and flow of BJJ on the mat, I feel much more relaxed and calm in precarious situations and flowing out of them. My leg riding in wrestling has become much better, because of the high emphasis on taking the back as a dominate BJJ position.