Continue reading]]> Julius Park is the owner of Crazy 88 in Maryland, and he has built an extraordinary program. The proof of that lies in his students. Too many to count have become forces to be reckoned with and among their ranks are several World Champions.

I’ve also personally spent many hours training at his gym, and I have a lot of respect for the focus and vision he brings to Jiu-jitsu instruction. That’s why this interview is focused on gym leadership.

How do you inspire excellence with your gym? This interview approaches that question from a captain’s point of view but philosophy isn’t something that always must come from the top. That’s why this is an important topic. What we tell ourselves and what we tell others matters, and it can affect the culture and the growth of a gym.

When one of your students loses a match, what’s the most important thing that must be communicated to them and what must never be said?

There should be an honest assessment of the match. Sometimes this occurs right after the match and other times when the athlete is in a better state of mind and more receptive. The athlete can only get better with feedback and its up to the coach to provide feedback beyond WIN = GOOD and LOSS = BAD.

I think its very dangerous for coaches to put the locus of control outside of the athlete or allow excuses. Sometimes the excuses are real, like the referee really could have made a bad call. But because you don’t have any control over that, you want your athletes focusing on what they can control, rather than what they can’t.

The one thing you never do and that is NEVER put the opponent on a pedestal. I often hear athletes say stuff like “Oh, he’s been a Blue Belt for a long time” or “He won the World Championship” or even worse “He trains at XYZ”. You should never put the opponent on some sort of fundamentally superior position to your athlete. After all, you’ll eventually have to fight them again and hopefully win!

What ideas and philosophies should be reinforced over and over again to build an environment that inspires excellence within a gym?

World class effort. Give recognition to individuals who are working hard towards their goals.

Actions > Words. Self-explanatory.

Be a person others can depend on and look up to. Character of the student base will play a larger role in the long term development of the school than technique or skill.

Pick a lofty goal and hold people accountable to it. I’ve noticed this a lot recently where schools will purposely choose goals that are easily attainable or not quantifiable. Once this goal has been set, its important to make sure people are all working towards it. For example, if you say you want to have a competitive school, but everyone is only training 2x a week – there is obviously a disconnect between reality and the goal.

What do you consider the best methodologies for drilling and practice?

This is a very broad question so I’m not sure how to answer it.

I would say that the purpose of practice is to make people better. Sometimes, the student needs to work on technique. Other times, strategy. Maybe the students need more conditioning. And sometimes the students even need to work on their mental toughness. A practice emphasizing mental toughness is much different than one focusing on technique. So the best methodology is always changing based on what the student base needs. This requires the instructor to always keep an eye on whats occurring on the mats.

I think there should be emphasis on particular systems and these systems should be developed in the right order. For example, I have a White Belt student right now who is focusing on Worm Guard. It actually works pretty well on the other White Belts who are dumbfounded by this. But as soon as he faces non-White Belts, he gets passed easily because his De La Riva and Spider Guard aren’t there.

There should always be an emphasis on Fundamentals (Fundamentals meaning Fundamentals… not Fundamentals meaning everything that was taught before 1996).

I know that you’ve often recommended that your students read specific books, so what are your five best books for inspiring excellence?

Talent Is Overrated, Outliers (I personally found this boring but other people really like it and its a great introduction to the idea of dedicated practice), Mindset, Turning Pro, and The Inner Game of Tennis

I’d also recommend the first 2 chapters of The First 20 Hours

Have you noticed any specific benefits when your students have read those books and others that you’ve recommended?

The benefit of the books for the people who have read them is that it helps students realize that a lot of the patterns and frustrations that they face are commonplace across different fields. It also helps that put their goals and training into context. For example, if you read Outliers, you should understand that you won’t be UFC champion or a BJJ Black Belt in 4 years if you’re training 2x a week.

From a coaching perspective its good too b/c it allows the coach to identify students who are willing to listen to the coach’s advice.

Is there anything that you would like to add on the topic?

I think that everyone should try to pursue excellence. Of course, not everyone is going to become a world champion but everyone can reach the next level of their own development – whether its becoming more fit, more technical, more perceptive, etc. Its the active pursuit of self-improvement that is the most important. It will keep you motivated even though it will take time and be uncomfortable. Its worth it.

Continue reading]]> Earlier today, I taught a seminar at Randori on how to improve your finish rate with triangles, and this post is about what was covered.

Overview

The seed of innovation lies in the deep understanding of fundamentals. That’s why we looked at the triangle from a variety of angles in order to create that seed.

It started off with a review of the push pull entry to the triangle because it emphasizes how the hips should be used to attack. I’ve always likened it to how a crocodile treads the water right before it shoots out of the depths, clamps onto its prey, and then drags it down to its demise.

Then we switched gears and went over posturing up to neutralize the effectiveness of the triangle. It was important because posture is the first thing that must be addressed whenever the triangle threatened.  If you’re on top, posturing up is an easy way to kill the threat, and if you’re on bottom, killing posture is an easy way to keep the threat alive. So after going over it from the perspective of the top person, we went over methods of controlling posture once the triangle is threatened.

That format of teaching a counter and then teaching the counter to the counter was the focus of the first portion of the seminar. Also in those recounters, there was a recurring theme in a few of them because the creation of frames against the hip in order to suspend movement occurred more than once.

After that, we concluded with  triangle entries from various positions and the micro adjustments that can make the submission more lethal.

Triangle Elements

(This is something I wrote awhile ago on the topic of triangles to focus my mind on the essentials.)

Concepts

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In a few weeks, I’m going to be teaching a seminar at Ground Control on passing half guard, so I am in the process of planning and organizing the class structure. My ideal process is always to start with the concepts and then teach techniques that demonstrate how those concepts can be exploited.

As I continue to work on that though, here are a few of the concepts I plan to focus on.

1) Flatten your Opponent.

Most attacks from the half guard depend on your opponent being on their side. There are, of course, exceptions to the rule but if you can significantly limit their offense by keeping both of their shoulders on the mat.

To give you an idea how that can be done and to reinforce the concept, here’s a video from Xande Ribeiro:

The most important takeaway from that video is the reason behind the technique because you can accomplish the same objective with different methods. Some examples are crossfacing, stiff arming the chin away, grabbing at the collar and stiff arming the far shoulder, pulling the near elbow to the sky, and the underhooking the far arm with head pressure.

The goal is to shrink your opponent’s options to the point where they cannot throw anything unexpected at you, and if you make a conscious effort to keep them flat, it will increase the probability of you accomplishing that.

2) Control the Space

This is a concept that applies to every position in Jiu-jitsu; the ranges dictate what is possible.  In half guard though, I think it is especially important because it is so easy for the balance of control to be shifted with small alterations in positions.

For example, when I was a white belt, the whole idea of preventing the crossface from the bottom of half guard was very prominent on the forums and such. But as I developed my game, I noticed that I didn’t need to focus on using paw grips to prevent it. Instead I could just shoot super deep on the underhook and glue my head to their chest. It made all my attacks from the position stronger, and it naturally took away the possibility of a crossface.

So if you switch the perception and look at it from the top, a difference of inches made it significantly more difficult to flatten an opponent with the crossface.

That’s one example but the key is to learn when you have to play tight and when you have to play long, and it will depend on your opponent’s position relative to yours.

3) Control the Near Arm

One of the first lessons I learned about half guard is the importance of fighting for the underhook on the same side as the trapped leg. From the bottom, it’s still crucial if you’re playing the underhook half guard game, but from the top, you have more options.

Let’s take a step back first though. What does the underhook accomplish? It helps you flatten your opponent and prevents your back from being taken.

If you pull up on the elbow of the near arm or push it across their body, what does that accomplish? It helps you flatten your opponent and it makes it hard for your back to be taken. Now if you underhook that arm and drive your head into the space between their far shoulder and head, what is accomplished? The same thing.

Those three grip configurations accomplish the same objective and they can reinforce each other. That’s why the double underhook situation is not fun on the bottom. So don’t forget about the near arm when you focus on passing half guard.

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Why so serious?

Right now, I’m working on a large project, and some of my teammates are assisting by sending me any random jiu-jitsu questions that they can think of. This post was inspired by one of those questions because I received one that just didn’t fit my project at all, but it was fascinating on its own merits. So I’m going to share that question in its entirety and then walk through my thought process on it.

The Question

John Doe is a black belt opening a school. Explain how you believe the curriculum should be structured. Are there differences between structuring it for competitors vs the general public? How would the structure affect the business and inspire creativity in expressing the art?

Choice of Focus

First of all, what’s in the curriculum matters very little. I reject the idea that there is such thing as basic or advanced technique. There are just techniques that work and those that don’t, and our task is to find techniques that work for us then figure out ways to make them work better.

What matters more is how and why you teach. For example, my coach once said that his goal isn’t to teach people how to fight, instead he wants to inspire the development of character through the martial arts. That’s the vision he has for his academy, and the curriculum should be a reflection of that.

My vision is different. I’m far more focused on personal expression and growth. So if I had an academy, I would say that my goal is to inspire others to view the mat as their canvas and movements as their paint strokes. I want them to see that they can take this art and create something that is uniquely their own, and I want them to progress in that journey consistently.

For that reason, I believe that a choice doesn’t have to be made between competitors and the general public. If the goal is to create an environment that encourages all students to create their own unique expression of the art, competition becomes only one option for achieving that end.

When Competition Matters

Competitors warrant no special treatment, but competition does have specific benefits for students, if they view it with the right mindset.

First of all, you have to reinforce the idea that the result matters far less than the process. No matter what the result is, the true benefit isn’t attained on the podium; it’s attained before and after they step on and off that mat. What matters is what they have to become in order to achieve the result they desire, and failures are just temporary setbacks, if they never stop moving forward.

If they approach tournaments with that mindset, there is nothing that can be lost, and like a rising tide the whole gym will be elevated. So competition should always be accessible and encouraged but never required, and the willingness to strive for victory should always be more worthy of praise than the result.

Business and Creativity

The business of jiu-jitsu can never be ignored because if you can’t convince people to exchange dollars for your services, you can’t keep the lights on. Again though, I believe what you do is less important than why you do it, and I credit [easyazon_link asin=”1591846447″ locale=”US” new_window=”default” nofollow=”default” tag=”bjjcanvas-20″ add_to_cart=”default” cloaking=”default” localization=”default” popups=”default”]Start with Why[/easyazon_link] for that belief.

One of the arguments the book makes is that customers buy why you sell not what you sell because it reinforces the image of who they want to be. A good example is the Apple commercial series that aired some years ago. In it, the Macintosh was represented as a young hip guy while the PC was an older stick-in-the-mud. The intent of those ads was to create the impression that Apple is young and hip, and you can be too.

That imagery has been a part of Apple’s brand for decades. I’m not sure about now, but in the past, Apple was all about challenging the status quo and being a rebel with a cause. That was their why.

My why is to inspire growth and creativity, and key to that is early successes. Why? It’s because you can’t get to growth and creativity until you get past the steep hill that stands before you on your first day. The steepness of that hill is different for everyone but the small things like performing a technique right for the first time matter because it proves that you can learn.

That’s what I mean by early successes.

So any curriculum I develop will be focused on creating those early successes that encourage you to continue on. In my mind, progress is sexy, even if each step forward doesn’t cover much distance. For that reason, I prefer to focus on depth over breadth.

Curriculums

I have avoided the question of how curriculums should be structured because I don’t believe that there is a definite answer. I say that from the perspective of someone who has visited many gyms. Not once yet I have walked into two different gyms and seen the same exact structure.

How Jiu-jitsu is taught is a reflection on the gym and why it exists. It tells you what their purpose is and what they wish to accomplish.

So I can’t tell anyone how to structure a curriculum. All I can focus is how I would do it, and my focus would be early success, growth and creativity. So here are some things I would like to do:

• Create a basics class focused on chain drills so that students would not only learn basic techniques but also how to start chaining those movements together.
• Select a concept or movement every week, and then spend the whole week demonstrating how the concept/movement applies to jiu-jitsu in as many different situations as possible.
• Create a class focused on Q/A so that everyone can troubleshoot and brainstorm scenarios as a group.

Now those are all ideas that I want to test but they are all a reflection of my why. So they represent the brand I want to create. That makes it personal, and it makes it art.

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In Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, there is no one true path to mastery. You don’t have to have a certain body type. You don’t have to be young. You don’t have to be athletic. You can start at any level and travel as far as you desire. That’s why it’s such a beautiful art.

The issue lies in conveying that it is an art. Technique doesn’t work exactly the same for everyone. We all have different attributes, and some of us even have handicaps.Those differences must be acknowledged, but they are not obstacles to growth.

The obstacle lies in focusing solely on technical instruction.

Consider this. If I wanted to teach you how to paint, would the best method be to show you stroke by stroke how to replicate one of my paintings? Yes, in time, you may intuitively piecing together the underlying concepts through diligent practice, but is it the best method?

Add on to that the fact that many aspiring painters will fail to replicate even the most basic work over and over again. That’s not because they don’t have the potential to be great. They just haven’t done anything quite like painting before, and there is a wall that must be smashed before the world of possibilities becomes visible.

What If the Focus Changed

There are common elements that bind all technique together. I call them building blocks. One of the best examples is the shrimp. It is just one movement, but learning that one movement can give you a head start on learning and creating countless techniques.

Another example is the mechanics of a blood choke. When you understand that cutting off blood flow to the brain by blocking the carotid arteries is all that a choke requires, you can apply that concept in many ways. It is the foundation of learning, improving, and creating technical chokes.

Concepts and movements are the building blocks of technique.

Often, those building blocks are not focused on. Instead, we focus on the end result. In the grand scheme of things, that means that one piece of the puzzle is focused on instead of the glue that binds many pieces together.

What if the focus changed though?

What if a building block was singled out and focused on with technique being taught only to demonstrate relevance? How would that affect learning in the long time? Just imagine if you had been given a sense of how the grand puzzle pieces together at an earlier stage in your development. How could it have sped up your progress?

Actually don’t answer that. Instead experiment by doing the following:

• Take every new technique you learn and break it down into its core concepts and movements.
• Make a list of the concepts or movements that you see in more than one technique.
• Link the positions that you want to become better at with the concepts and movements that apply to them.
• Focus on mastering the movements and understanding the concepts that have the most applications to the style you want to create.

Experiments

On the teaching side of the equation, I put this idea into practice at Crazy 88. I taught classes Monday and Wednesday that both focused on the mechanics of chokes. The goal was to introduce and reinforce the concept, while also highlighting the possibility of troubleshooting your own technique.

Every technique shown was geared towards that purpose. For example, I taught the anaconda choke. It’s an arm triangle variation, and that means that one side of the neck has to be cut off with your opponent’s own arm. It’s one reason that those chokes can be difficult to get right.  All explanation and troubleshooting was done from the conceptual angle. So the idea was just constantly reinforced.

In the end, I was confident that even if they took nothing else away from the class, they had that concept. In fact, it cemented it in my own mind as well.  Since then, I’ve just been seeing chokes all over the place.

Issues and Opportunities

It is easy to teach how you were taught. The same can’t be said about reducing technique to bits and pieces and demonstrating how it can be put back together.

Take the shrimp for example. It has wide applications in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, but can you think of twenty techniques that use it as a core movement right now? I couldn’t. I know they exist, but I’ve never taken the time to focus and identify it when I use it.

Many movements and concepts are like that. They are extremely relevant to the development of skill but they receive only a basic level of focus. The challenge in changing that lies in analyzing all the technique you know to identify the building blocks.

It will be a daunting project, but just imagine how much you will improve as a result. The video below will help you as well because it reinforces the significance of conceptual focus.

Since this article was written, there has emerged a new instructional that focuses on conceptual instruction. I have it, I like it, and I recommend it. Beyond Technique will help you accelerate the rate of your growth, and I hope that this style of instruction becomes a new trend in our art.

Continue reading]]> After I finished that last post on training acceleration, I couldn’t wait to apply the idea. The first opportunity I had to do so was a No-Gi Advanced class I taught at Crazy 88.

Beforehand, I decided that I was going to give them one of the most developed tools in my arsenal. It was a basic attack from half guard, but it has so many layers of complexity.  My goal was to demonstrate that by focusing on the entries and the execution.

I even took some time to write out a conceptual blueprint for the class, and I’ll share that with you.

Class Structure

• Warmup – 10 minutes
• Technical Instruction and Practice – 45 minutes
• Situational Rolling – 35 Minutes

Conceptual Blueprints

I’m going to share two blueprints with you. One I wrote real quick shortly before class, and the other I wrote afterward for a future class down the road. Let’s see if you can tell the which one was written first.

Who is listening?

• Advanced Students at Crazy 88 (Mostly blue belts)

Step I – Outcome: By the end of this class, they will….

• Understand that basic attacks can be made more effective by improving entries and developing set reactions for your opponent’s counters.

In order to achieve this they need to know:

• How it can be done by seeing a clear example of entries, initiation, and execution

In order to achieve this they need to feel:

• Excited about looking at their own skill set in the same framework.

Step II – Relevance: Why should they care?

• Because if you make your basic attacks more effective, it will create more opportunities to use more advanced techniques as well.
• Because thinking about your technique in this way may inspire innovation.
• Because figuring out how to make basic attacks work will increase your conceptual understanding of why they work.

Step III – Point: What’s your message in one sentence?

• Even the most basic of attacks can have layers of complexity.

Who is listening?

• Advanced Students at Crazy 88 (Mostly blue belts)

Step I – Outcome: By the end of this class, they will….

• Use underhook half guard because it’s effective.

In order to achieve this they need to know:

• Entries into the positions from bad situations
• The concepts and movements that define the technique
• Common reactions and how to counter them.

In order to achieve this they need to feel:

• Excited about trying out the technique during rolling.

Step II – Relevance: Why should they care?

• Because half guard is the bridge between many positions
• Because  focusing on the entries and execution will give them a far more effective technique
• Because the technique I’m teaching has been battle tested.

Step III – Point: What’s your message in one sentence?

• Even the most basic of attacks can have layers of complexity.

Technical Instruction and Practice

The first thing I taught was the technique itself. After drilling that, I started adding entries from similar situations. Kept it simple though and only showed three.

After that, we moved on to dealing with common reactions. Again, I kept it to only three, but I included a bonus trick.

Now the advantage to using this format is that they got many reps in on the basic technique. So even if they only pick up one or two of the entries or tricks, the basic form is still being reinforced.

Situational Rolling

The rest of the class was all situational.

The position was set to a neutral half guard position. The goal on top was to pass or submit, while the person on bottom had to focus on sweep or submit. There was no time limit, and they went until a person “won.”

After that another person would come in, and it was back to it.

Overview

It’s simple. I like this class structure, and I’m going to improve on it.