BJJ / Grappling Tips: Open Guard Passing with tips from Stephan Kesting, David Onuma and Rico Vieira

Pass the open guard!

Dealing with the open guard in jiujitsu is a challenge, but it's also an inescapable challenge. Without a guard passing game, there is no jiujitsu.

In this first video, Stephan Kesting of GrappleArts.com share his 4 top tips to passing any guard. These tips are:

1. Grip fight, Grip fight, Grip fight.
2. Don't be a one trick pony
3. Be fast for mobility or heavy for pressure
4. Stabilize the pass



Stephan is a great jiujitsu communicator and his words and video really sum up his valuable grappling advice very well.

Gradings, Belts and BJJ: CFS Biannual Grading 25th November 2012

Grading in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is quite a big deal for many reasons:

1. There are very few belts*: You automatically start BJJ with white and between that and black belt you only have blue, purple and brown so in total most of us will have a grand sum of 4 major gradings**

2. Gradings in BJJ are performance based (in most places). If you are technically*** at the level equivalent to a blue belt, purple belt, brown belt or black belt then you will most likely get it really soon****

3. There are very few solitary activities in BJJ / grappling. Even most of the warm-up drills requires a partner. There are no kata as such so, while you have to do the work yourself, you are always part of a group. You can not become good at BJJ / Grappling without good training partners to work with you. Steel sharpens steel and all that and therefore, when it's time for you to achieve a grade, it's time for your team mates to cheer and clap for you, shake your hand and / or give you a manly hug and, if your team does this kind of thing, whack you really hard with their BJJ belt!

4. The belts are not uniform in their progression. What I mean by this is that if White belt represents 0% skill and black belt is 100% skill***** then this doesn't mean that blue is 25%, purple 50% and brown 75% skill so, in a way, each belt has a deep meaning of its own and should indeed be celebrated.


With that being said, this weekend saw the CFS Biannual Grading at Mill Hill Jiu Jitsu Club. The grading was preceded by a training seminar conducted by two black belts. Mr Andy Nugent taught a great seminar on entries and finished of the straight knee bar. Leg locks are dangerous which is why many academies never focus on them but if you are to follow Andy's fantastic advice and drills anyone can approach this topic and study it very well.

This was followed by head instructor Mr David Onuma's Game Changer Seminar. I call it this because rather than focusing on just one topic, Professor David shared entries and adjustments that helped completely change the way we approach i, the mount position and ii, passing the De La Riva guard.

My training partners for the day were Miad Najafi who heads up the Brighton branch (Elements Martial Arts) and Simon Chan (a brown belt in BJJ under Master Ricardo De La Riva who teaches BJJ in south London) and it was an honour and a pleasure to share the mat with them. It was the first time for me to meet them but hopefully far from being the last.

The seminar concluded with sparring for those who wanted to stay but not before David lined everyone up then, along with his branch instructors, conducted the belt and stripe grading and David handed out Student of the Year Awards to those who have been nominated by the branch instructors for working extra hard throughout 2012 to improve their jiu jitsu (happy to share that our gym had not one but two names: Mr Don Barr and Mr Graeme Kidd). The following names (in the order they feature in the picture) were called and received (to many surprised faces) their new belts from the boss:

Shareef Esoof - Blue
Tim Bowden - Blue
Damien Roberts - Blue
Yousuf Nabi - Brown
Gary Baker - Purple
Matt Macguire - Purple
Steve Payne - Purple
Tom Gent - Blue
Lewis Renney - Blue
Andrew Bell - Purple

Oh yeah. We were asked. We voted. There was a belt whipping!

That concluded what was for me a long weekend of training. I arrived in London on the Saturday already to train with my instructor for three hours (mount top and bottom seminar) and then we rolled for an hour in his private dojo where I learned a ton. So approximately 7hrs of jiu jitsu training in two days. Not bad for a Part Time Grappler :)

Until the next time

*for adults, that's mostly it. Some schools employ the green belt as an intermediary between the white and blue belt. Kids have a much bigger range of belts.
**obviously stripes, if your BJJ academy uses them, on the colour belts are a big deal too and if you stick with BJJ for the long run there is the red and black and the solid red belt to look forward to but we're talking after being a black belt for 31 years you can apply for your red and black (also known as coral) belt from the IBJJF.
***patching holes in your technique with athleticism and attributes will not get you the belt and trust me, good instructors can always tell!
****most instructors take pride in grading someone to any belt level so they often take a number of factors into consideration such as maturity, experience, consistency of training, competition participation and / or results, teaching experience...etc.
*****every black belt I've spoken to told me black belt is the start of the true jiu jitsu journey so this is just a hypothetical statement



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ZHOO ZHITSU IS FOR EVERYONE!

Liam "The Part Time Grappler" Wandi

Proudly sponsored by Predator Fightwear: Built for the kill and Brutal TShirt: Made By Grapplers For Fighters

BJJ Tips: Side control posture breaking and the value of your jiu jitsu instructor knowing you

BJJ seminars are a fantastic way to learn grappling techniques. My favourite ones are with instructors I have some form of a relationship with*, such as my own instructors or people I have come to learn from or roll with over the years. Why? Because they know me and where I am in my development and what I mean with my questions.

Yesterday, a small team of 6 Lab Rats travelled down to London to the Mill Hill Jiu Jitsu Club for the first Biannual grading and seminar with the CFS-BJJ head instructor David Onuma and his friend, training partner and super-nice guy Nick Brooks (Roger Gracie Black Belt, head instructor at MHJJ). We have known David (and Nick, thru him) for quite some time, learned from them and rolled with them on several occasions.

What this means is that when, during the Q&A section, I asked about good side control attacks two things happened:

1. My coach David came around and added a few details on how he works to kill the arm posture on i, the far side ii, the near side and iii, how one posture attack can lead to the other. Tips he gave me were fantastic and beautifully suitable to my game.

Here is an example of some basic posture breaking from side control top by BJJ Black Belt Dr. Marc Hagebusch, head instructor and owner of Texarkana Jiu Jitsu:



2. Nick presumed that I have done all I can to break my opponent's defences but he has somehow managed to maintain and airt-tight defence. I am in side control top, but don't quite have the arm posture broken so he showed me how to advance my position to a far more dangerous one (and gain a few nice points along the way)

CFS BJJ Team get together at Mill Hill BJJ Nov 2011

The Combined Fighting Systems - BJJ Team, headed by Mr David Onuma had their bi-annual get together this gone Sunday and The Labs BJJ - No Gi - MMA and Fighting Fit Manchester were represented by a barmy army of 9 (Martyn, Anna, Carol, James (who trekked all the way from York!), Damien, Paul, Don, Andy and yours truly). We all travelled down from Manchester to sunny and beautiful (can you tell I love it?) London for the 3 1/2 hr seminar and BJJ grading, kindly hosted at Mill Hill BJJ Club.

BJJ road trip: Roger Gracie HQ, CFS HQ and Mill Hill BJJ

Damien: We are here in London for a reason! ;)

Training at Royler Gracie black belt Eddie Kone's EKBJJ, training with our CFS head coach David Onuma and finally training with Roger Gracie black belt Nick Brooks at Mill Hill BJJ. That was the plan.

Andy: Did you know that elephants prefer baked beans to jam? FLYING ARMBAR!

Due to unforeseen circumstances, we switched from EKBJJ to Roger Gracie's Headquarters in Ladbroke Grove. Training for two hours privately with David Onuma would conclude our Saturday. Sunday saw us training at Mill Hill with Nick and his crew.

Damien never cared much for Jay's robot dance

BJJ Affiliation: BJJ black belt David "Malandro" Onuma

http://combinedfightingsystems.blogspot.com/2011/06/cfs-bjj-manchester-labs.html

"It is with great pleasure following 6 months of training, that I formally announce and confirm that the BJJ program/team at Fighting Fit, Manchester Labs, Manchester are now officially affiliated to me via the CFS BJJ Team."

Mr David "Malandro" Onuma, founder of Combined Fighting Systems

After over a year of flying solo, the awesome team that is the Labs is now formally affiliated with BJJ black belt David Onuma.

Creating an affiliation was never something we took lightly at the Labs, as evident from David's quote. I remember talking to our head coach Martyn about what he looked for in terms of affiliation and his exact words were: "opportunity for growth in terms of technique, guidance in development of the syllabus and someone who fits in terms of personality". It has always been the goal to find more than just a source of grappling knowledge but someone we want to learn from and look forward to having at the Labs - Manchester on a regular basis.

I am very pleased to have David as that person and I can't wait for our next session on the mat.

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BJJ / Grappling Interview: Mr David Onuma Talks to The Part Time Grappler

"It helps to be one with the infinite riches of the subconscious mind"


As many of you know, we recently had the pleasure of having Mr David “Malandro” Onuma for a BJJ / No-gi Grappling seminar here at the Labs @ Fighting Fit Manchester. We liked it so much; we’ve already scheduled him for a second one! It was all luck that I was chatting to my good friend Seymour Yang, of the Meerkatsu fame who mentioned David and how he can “transform and guide” our BJJ that I took the step to contact him and here we are now. (Thanks Seymour!)


The more I talked to David, the more I was impressed with his genuine love for the arts (yes, plural!) and for his dedication to the Part Time Grappler Lifestyle. I decided he was indeed ideal for the now world famous Part Time Grappler Interview. Here is part one of that interview:

Malandro and a bunch of Rats.

 
Hello. Why don’t we start by you telling us a little about yourself? (Name, Age, where you are from, family size)

My name is David Onuma. I was born and raised in London, although of Nigerian heritage. I am 43 and come from a large family

Are you currently working / studying? Is that Full time / Part time?

I work full time as lawyer and help to run a busy practice

You also set aside time to practice a sport. Which sport(s)?

I am a die-hard martial artist. It's as much a part of me as my skin!! I actively train/study 6-7 martial arts, with a lot of cross training between them as well as strength and conditioning

How long have you done that?

I started in martial arts when I was 12, but then started to take it more seriously when i turned 16 and got heavily into Wing Chun. At that stage I was young, good looking and had an Afro! Apart from the other martial arts, my first exposure to grappling came in 1996 via Guro Bob Breen. I met the Machado family in 1998 and got my Blue belt in BJJ in 1999. I didn't do much gi work after that due to the lack of BJJ in this country but I started training with Roger Brooking in 2003. I got my purple belt in 2005, Brown in 2008 and Black Belt in Jan 2010

Do you follow any special diet? Do you use any dietary supplements?

Yes I do. I try not to eat too late at night and avoid eating red meat more than once in a week. I eat a lot of fish, chicken and veg. I drink MONAVIE (which is an excellent multivitamin based supplement with the major ingredient being ACAI)

How do you manage to fit your training around work, study and family time?

It’s a way of life for me really so it’s more a question of how I fit everything else around it. It's like asking me how I manage to drink tea, orange juice and water all in the same day....I do. Of course it’s not as simple as that but I am in martial arts for the long haul and not for some kind of quick fix. I therefore accept that it may take me longer to achieve certain goals due to time constraints. Having said that, anything is possible if you believe it can be done. It helps to be one with the infinite riches of the subconscious mind :)

Stay tuned for part two of my Part Time Grappler interview with Mr David "Malandro" Onuma where he talks about motivation and shares his best time management tips.

If you can't wait that long, David was interviewed by none less than Carl Fisher for Kombat Clinic. Check it out.

Most importantly, click here to register for David's upcoming seminar at the Labs (Saturday 2nd of April) and train with the man whom 9 times World Champion Ricardo Vieira calls "Malandro".



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