When I first heard Baret Yoshida was coming out with a new book, Principles of the Art of Submission, I was interested. When I found out that it came with a DVD, I got excited. I had always heard of his instructional tapes are among the best for no-gi, but I never liked how they were only on VHS. I ordered the new book/DVD combo off budovideos.com the week it was released. When I received my copy and took it out of the package, what first struck me was how small the book is. It is only slightly larger than a DVD case, or about the size of Eddie Bravo's book. Aside from the nice laminated jacket, it's all black and white. The photos are also pretty small, though this is partly due to them trying to fit enough pictures to show the move without skipping details. The book is Japanese and Engrish, and suffers from some funny typos and bad translations, but it's intelligible. That's not to say the book is all bad. They show close-ups of important details, give alternate angles and shows grips or positions without a partner so you can make it out better. Despite the Engrish, they do an okay job of explaining techniques, though each photo is given one sentence of explanation or less. But to be honest, I had just read Kid Peligro's Black Belt Techniques and The Essential Guard so I had spoiled myself with pretty photos, large print and lengthy text, so don't worry about the book too much. Anyway, the first page of the book contains an item that solves all its problems: A DVD of Baret demonstrating and explaining every move, doing it at full speed and showing it in slow motion (from two angles). Each technique has its own chapter, and you have the option of watching them all in a row, looping a single one or watching them all at full speed (without any instruction). Any shortcomings of the book are more than made up for by the DVD. Like in his original instructional tapes, Baret never seems comfortable in front of the camera and has some nervous ticks like clearing his throat and fumbling with words, but he still does a good job of explaining and showing the techniques. Some may complain that he doesn't go into the move in enough detail or show how the techniques go together, but considering he shows 87 techniques (with variations), I forgive him. So far all I've addressed is the quality of the presentation, but not the content, the techniques themselves. And I am happy to say they are great. He shows a wide variety of setups for chokes from all most major positions, such as arm-inside guillotines, drop guillotines, reverse guillotines (which are like a brabo choke, only without an arm inside most of the time), arm triangles and more. He shows how to use one guillotine to setup each other, or other options like taking the back or triangles. I don't have much faith in the no-gi ezekiel and baseball bat chokes, but maybe that's just me, and if you do like them, I'm sure his setups are fine. How shows setups for armbar, reverse armbars and bent armlocks a variety of positions. Most of these are solid and useful, but one or two seemed iffy to me. All of the triangle setups are solid and are often shown in combination with armlocks and omoplatas. He shows a pair of kneebars from north-south, but that's it for leglocks. He shows a variety of ways to take the back from different positions, often when they defend submissions, such as off an americana from mount or a countered kimura from side control. The guard passing is nothing revolutionary, but it's all reliable. He breaks closed guard with his knee or by standing. He shows the double under pass, as well as using it to flip them to all fours and taking the back (which I've loved for a while now). He also covers passing open guard by binding the leg as well as going over or around them, and he addresses passing half guard. He shows several guard pass counters that lead to submission, such as defending the double under pass to setup a triangle or using an armdrag against the binding pass. As for sweeps, he shows one from half guard, three from a two-on-one open guard (a no-gi spider guard of sorts), and three from butterfly guard (including one that ends as a x-guard sweep). I liked them all, and found the two-on-one open guard interesting. Almost every technique is high percentage and well-presented. I know some people are concerned over the uniqueness of moves in instructionals (if they are also in other series), and I think you can find some in other DVDs, but that is an unfair comparison when this priced as a book ($25 on budovideos.com). As a book with a companion DVD, it is an incredible reference with a wealth of information at an affordable price, and I highly recommend it. You can order it here.
Either I've never used them enough to like them, or I've never liked them enough to use them, but does anyone get the no-gi ezekiel or baseball bat chokes? Or at least use them to setup other submissions? They've always seemed pretty unreliable to me, but maybe someone around here can fill me in on their success with them.
I don't know about the ezekiel, but the no-gi baseball bat is very effective. Besides being a personal favorite of mine, I know several people far more skilled than I who are absolutely killer with it. I run it from knee on belly, side, and mount. Done properly it is an extremely quick finisher, and it can also be used to set up all sorts of other submissions.
I use the no-gi baseball choke and find it one of my go to moves. The no-gi ezekiel on the other hand I have never found use for in live rolling.
