Technique Positional training

[thugpoet]

Positional flow drills. Tons of them online.

thanks, for the link but that's more of a flow drill vs positional sparring both are effective for sure

 

[yetanother]

you can do this for positional drilling or technique drilling, but sometimes we start rolling and once you use a sweep (or get a submission) then you can't use it anymore. it just forces you to try new things and get out of comfort zone. obviously there are times when you drill something over and over, but the "one and done" drill can expand your horizon

To me it seems a super stupid and counterproductive. Goto moves are worth their weight in gold and being to reliably pull of things is the goal.

 

[Judoka1532]

It seems the best guys are using a ton of positional of positional training to get better.

How do you structure an effective positional training protocol?

For any sport in general?

EDIT: Dang I forgot i was in the grappling forum (thought it was strength and condition)

Where's my dunce hat?

 

[RightToBareKnuckles]

To me it seems a super stupid and counterproductive. Goto moves are worth their weight in gold and being to reliably pull of things is the goal.

well that's just like, your opinion man! it's not done a lot, and for sure you want to drill those go-to moves that are reliable or just work well for one's body type.

when ben askren was on joe rogan experience, he had some good thoughts on how the BJJ schools (at the ones he's been to) could benefit from more structured training, drilling moves more often. i know gyms vary in their style, but i thought he had some good advice

 

[yetanother]

well that's just like, your opinion man! it's not done a lot, and for sure you want to drill those go-to moves that are reliable or just work well for one's body type.

when ben askren was on joe rogan experience, he had some good thoughts on how the BJJ schools (at the ones he's been to) could benefit from more structured training, drilling moves more often. i know gyms vary in their style, but i thought he had some good advice

I saw that segment and I agreed with him, when I was teaching classes twice a weak I was trying to run them that way and people where actually picking up the moves we worked on (even brown belts, had one actually switch his game to stuff we where working).

 

[JinKazama]

sucks but definitely helps, most times u fight out of bad positions but in this case u restart back in the awful position ie bottom side

 

[stevenandrew]

We do something almost every class.
So we do the normal thing where we go warm ups then a few techniques.

Then we go back to the wall, and three to five people will be put on the mat on the bottom, and the line feeds each person. We start in a certain position, usually from whatever technique we were working that day. Usually guy in the bottom has to sweep or submit, guy on top pass (or possibly submit). So it can be closed guard or a specific open guard, and sometimes we'll start from the back, rarely from mount.

My coach is Brazilian and calls it spexifix training. for more visit zoro tv

To structure an effective positional training protocol, focus on isolating key positions (e.g., inside fighting, against the ropes) and practicing transitions between offense and defense. Use controlled sparring to work specific positions and responses, shadowbox in different scenarios, and incorporate conditioning to stay effective under fatigue.

 

[Foppa21]

One of the big advantages of positional is that it lets you focus on the area your working on and get some flight time.

Say your working DLR, a 10 minute open roll could well see only seconds of DLR whereas with positional you get 10 minutes.

For most people, it's the only way to force people to try the position/technique that was taught that day. A majority (I'd say 90%) will go to their "A game" if you go straight into training, rendering the last 30-40 mins of teaching and drilling redundant. There's also the problem of, putting yourself in a position to train a bad position because it's not something I want my students to do regularly either (put themselves into bad positions) so it's best to start them from there.

When I played hockey, it used to drive me up the wall. We'd spend a whole hour drilling breakouts and when we have a 10 min scrimmage at the end, the goalie would shoot the puck down the ice to some winger after a goal is scored while I'm standing behind the net setting up behind the net to run the breakout we'd just spent an hour drilling

 

[Quebec Nick]

For most people, it's the only way to force people to try the position/technique that was taught that day. A majority (I'd say 90%) will go to their "A game" if you go straight into training, rendering the last 30-40 mins of teaching and drilling redundant. There's also the problem of, putting yourself in a position to train a bad position because it's not something I want my students to do regularly either (put themselves into bad positions) so it's best to start them from there.

When I played hockey, it used to drive me up the wall. We'd spend a whole hour drilling breakouts and when we have a 10 min scrimmage at the end, the goalie would shoot the puck down the ice to some winger after a goal is scored while I'm standing behind the net setting up behind the net to run the breakout we'd just spent an hour drilling

We don't do warmups at my school, just come in early and do it by yourself

I coach one class a week and I try to only take 30 minutes for techniques and drilling. After that it's three 6 minutes rolls of positional sparring, followed by 3 regular rolls. So every bodywill have at least 36 minutes of live sparring. Afterwards it's open mats

I really like that ratio, I believe that you need a lot of time rolling in specific positions, but knowing techniques is still pretty important.


For positional sparring, my best format is ''king of the mat'' so you do as much pairs you can fit on the mat and you have 2-3 people waiting on the wall for the first winner. Every type of positionnal sparring has a way to ''win"

One most fun is guard passing rounds. From any type of guard, let's say from knee shield. The guy under as to sweep, submit or to take the back. The guy over as to pass to side control, mount or manage a back take. Sometimes I add some new rules, like last week, if you get to SLX, you win, because we were drilling SLX entries in the techniques.

The funniest one is ''submission rounds'' You start from side control (or mount, or back) the guy over, can only win if he gets a submission, he can work on it all he wants, from any position, but he loses if he gets reguarded. The guy on the bottom just have to escape to guard or come back on top out of any submission.

That drilled helped so many people to actually get good at submissions, it also made the class environnement more chill, it's almost impossible to not tap a couple of times in those rounds. People try new stuff, work outside of their A game

 

[Foppa21]

We don't do warmups at my school, just come in early and do it by yourself

I coach one class a week and I try to only take 30 minutes for techniques and drilling. After that it's three 6 minutes rolls of positional sparring, followed by 3 regular rolls. So every bodywill have at least 36 minutes of live sparring. Afterwards it's open mats

I really like that ratio, I believe that you need a lot of time rolling in specific positions, but knowing techniques is still pretty important.


For positional sparring, my best format is ''king of the mat'' so you do as much pairs you can fit on the mat and you have 2-3 people waiting on the wall for the first winner. Every type of positionnal sparring has a way to ''win"

One most fun is guard passing rounds. From any type of guard, let's say from knee shield. The guy under as to sweep, submit or to take the back. The guy over as to pass to side control, mount or manage a back take. Sometimes I add some new rules, like last week, if you get to SLX, you win, because we were drilling SLX entries in the techniques.

The funniest one is ''submission rounds'' You start from side control (or mount, or back) the guy over, can only win if he gets a submission, he can work on it all he wants, from any position, but he loses if he gets reguarded. The guy on the bottom just have to escape to guard or come back on top out of any submission.

That drilled helped so many people to actually get good at submissions, it also made the class environnement more chill, it's almost impossible to not tap a couple of times in those rounds. People try new stuff, work outside of their A game

For gen pop classes, we have warm ups because it's potentially dangerous to let people loose completely cold. I try to keep them short though.

It's usually:

• 7 mins of calisthenics (including the dreaded hip escapes down the mats) and I'll usually be able to incorporate a movement for the day's technique tree in there. I can also work out who's really new and might need extra help that day
• 7 mins of partner drills. I try to incorporate a entry into the subject position but sometimes I'll revert to a basic takedown thread if I feel we haven't done any in classes lately
• 30 mins of technique
• Two 2 min rounds of positional sparring, top and bottom of the days' position
• However many rounds left at 4 mins each of free rolling.

 

[Einheri]

I think an advanced class should predominantly consist of positional sparring.

 

[shunyata]

My coach is Brazilian and calls it spexifix training.

I could hear this in a Brazilian accent all the way from 2019.

Followed by "AJUST AJUST!"

 

[Foppa21]

I could hear this in a Brazilian accent all the way from 2019.

Followed by "AJUST AJUST!"

"AJOOST, AJOOST"

 

[Quebec Nick]

For gen pop classes, we have warm ups because it's potentially dangerous to let people loose completely cold. I try to keep them short though.

It's usually:

• 7 mins of calisthenics (including the dreaded hip escapes down the mats) and I'll usually be able to incorporate a movement for the day's technique tree in there. I can also work out who's really new and might need extra help that day
• 7 mins of partner drills. I try to incorporate a entry into the subject position but sometimes I'll revert to a basic takedown thread if I feel we haven't done any in classes lately
• 30 mins of technique
• Two 2 min rounds of positional sparring, top and bottom of the days' position
• However many rounds left at 4 mins each of free rolling.

I teach one class a week and do some replacements from time to time

It's 0 warmups
25- 30 minutes of techniques
3 positional sparring 6 min rounds king of the mat style
2 6 minutes rounds of free rolling

It goes about 1 hour and 10 minutes with the breaks between the rounds

Then it's open mat so if you have the energy you can do as many rolls as you like

 

[Smato_rules]

I learned so much doing positional sparring. Really my whole guard passing and side control escaping system I developed started from a few days of hard positional training when our team was getting ready for our first naga tournament six years ago. Everyone bitches and moans about it now, and I personally hate having to do it with games I don’t play like dlr, but it absolutely has its place.

I also am a big fan of finding something specific to hunt for and spam it for months on end. I developed a great game off of the straight armbar from side control just spamming it for the last year, when someone would do something that gave me trouble I would tell everyone I roll with that escape at the end of the round (were a really small tight knit gym); their defense would get better and my attacks would adapt to their defense. Now a bunch of other guys are doing the attack, we all know the basic escapes so well and it’s a pretty deep well to go off of, it’s really cool to see

 

[yetanother]

For most people, it's the only way to force people to try the position/technique that was taught that day. A majority (I'd say 90%) will go to their "A game" if you go straight into training, rendering the last 30-40 mins of teaching and drilling redundant. There's also the problem of, putting yourself in a position to train a bad position because it's not something I want my students to do regularly either (put themselves into bad positions) so it's best to start them from there.

When I played hockey, it used to drive me up the wall. We'd spend a whole hour drilling breakouts and when we have a 10 min scrimmage at the end, the goalie would shoot the puck down the ice to some winger after a goal is scored while I'm standing behind the net setting up behind the net to run the breakout we'd just spent an hour drilling

The position of the week is wasted time in most schools. If I work on a new guard for a week or two using it will very likely get to a level where using it will make me a worse grappler as it will be a weakness compared to using stuff I trained for a decade.

It really either needs to be focused really seriously to get it to a high level or I should have the option to be exempt and be free to spend the time on drilling my own shit.

 

[shunyata]

The position of the week is wasted time in most schools. If I work on a new guard for a week or two using it will very likely get to a level where using it will make me a worse grappler as it will be a weakness compared to using stuff I trained for a decade.

It really either needs to be focused really seriously to get it to a high level or I should have the option to be exempt and be free to spend the time on drilling my own shit.

We usually run a position for the whole month, outside of our fundamentals classes which focus on the basic positions so people can get to the point where they benefit from the deep dive.

One month of half guard (get ups, sweeps, and passing it), one month of butterfly, one month focusing on x guard, slx, dlr and passing them, etc. Positional live training will sometimes be focused on position of the month, other times weaving it together into overall open guard vs passer, other times the positional round is just straight takedowns with reset on points.

 

[Foppa21]

The position of the week is wasted time in most schools. If I work on a new guard for a week or two using it will very likely get to a level where using it will make me a worse grappler as it will be a weakness compared to using stuff I trained for a decade.

It really either needs to be focused really seriously to get it to a high level or I should have the option to be exempt and be free to spend the time on drilling my own shit.

We go through each position/guard/scenario in 3-4 week blocks.

Respectfully I disagree. I think it still comes back to the person and what they pick up and how they can incorporate it into their overall grappling. Showing K guard for a week after never seeing it before doesn't necessarily do it in a competition the next week (though I hit a sweep I saw for the first time in a magazine, remember those?, while being driven to the venue of a tournament once).

Most will revert back to the stuff we've been doing for years/decades, I do force the position for at least a few shortened specific rounds just to ensure there is a somewhat live exposure to it after drilling it. There's also the exposure of the other end, yes it might not work for you, but it might work really well for someone else so you'd better know how to defend it. My thought behind it is, if you never try it, you'll never know if it might work for you. Most students to mid purple need guidance there, IMO. Afterwards everyone's free to do almost as they please in the free rounds.

Drilling your own stuff, is for week before competition or open mat time. My issue with that in general classes is that it distracts the rest of the class. The brown belt working matrix guard in the corner gets the attention of the white belt. White belts wants to do that too "bruh, you can't even hip escape decent".