Ryan hall's defensive guard and certain passes/positions

I love the dvd set to start, but I just have some questions for people who have watched it but maybe can either identify a bit that I missed or have worked in out how to apply his concepts in positions he doesn't address.

Firstly, what do you do if someone passes to knee on belly instead of coming straight to side control or leg drag? They're outside of your arm defense layer range but inside of your legs and knees, does this negate the system of concepts or is there a layer I'm missing here?

Secondly, in what I've come to think of as a hierarchy of defense layers, some guards fit into a specific place in terms of distance management of specific pass defense. Certain passes call for a specific layer of defense because they assume they've passed certain layers already I. E. If someone leg drags to the leg drag position, you sit up and depending on distance either go straight arm or collar tie. Someone knee slides and depending on the stage of the pass you can either rdlr or knee shield to stop it, followed by the arm centric layers of defense if they get passed those layers first. Where in the layers of defense would you put single leg x and x guard? Which wall level do these fit into and do you have examples?

Thanks in advance.

 

Hello

I have watched the DVDs a few times now, and the way I see it is that some guards are less defensivly sound than others if you follow Hall's concepts.

In his dvd he uses spiderguard/open guard, DLR, RDL at the longest range, I would think that X-guard would be a long range guard, but it requires you to get underneath your opponent as opposed to say spider guard. So what I take from it is that it is better to work pure defence in spider guard or DLR than in X-guard. X-guard is a sweep or backtake waiting to happen, not a place you hang out defending.

Of course it is possible to get comfertable wnough to "hang out" in those positions as well, but I think the point is that mechcanically there are less points of control defensivly speaking, than in the ones Hall uses when he demonstates his concepts.

 

I guess this makes sense, it's n articulation of what i was thinking, i guess x and one legged x are one step from a sweep and one step from passed so fall more on the "attack straight away and dont use them as a layer, although i have had some success with subbing in one legged x for rdlr when people step over your free leg in dlr ( scoot towards the leg they step over your free dlr leg with and insert one legged x). I guess it fits in where you can fit it in if you use Hall's stuff to give you a framework and not a blueprint.

On to the knee on belly problem, it's still my biggest concern that i can't find an answer to on the dvd, too far away for arms, too close to bring your knees in. Suggestions from people who've seen the dvd and either had success defending the pass to KOB or who've theorised around it?

 

I watched it, here is what I think. 1 legged X and regular X are the positions you get to sweep someone. He talks about getting underneath the person to sweep so these two would be an option to get to to sweep from. You can get to regular X from Spider guard and you can get to 1 leg X from seated guard.

As for the knee on belly, I see it as more of a final destination. There are certain things they have to do to get there and thats where you have to stop them. For example if they bull fight to get to knee on belly you can sit up, get the grip on their sleeve that is holding your pants and extend your arm, there is your arm defense. In short, you have apply your different layers before they get to knee on belly.

 

My issue is, every other type of pass has several layers of defense after it, whereas someone can go to knee on belly and attack from there. They don't need to come in close enough where you can frame them off with a collar tie, and are too far away for straight arm and leg defenses. Grabbing the sleeve works for bullfight passes, but one good defense to grabbing the sleeve is actually knee on belly, try it, have someone cross your sleeve during a pass, then pop up to knee on belly with proper posture. It changes the elevation of your arm being sleeve crossed and as soon as that's done they lose the same leverage and can either a) have the arm peeled off and now your stuck in Kob or b) follow your arm up, in which case they're giving you the armbar.

There's also the issue of, what if they say get as far as the pass with a knee cross pass, and instead of sliding up to kesa gatame, they pop to knee on belly, you don't have the sleeve ad a knee cross defense and now they're between ranges of defense layer. I have a lot of partners who do this to finish passes and then hang out Kob and attack. I just can't find a layer in that range that isn't just a Kob escape, which I find undoubtedly against people good at the position who either attack off of escapes or switch sides as soon as you start to defend the Kob.

 

Wait, so you're sitting up with the sleeve across, and then they go KOB?

 

i always liked ryan halls videos and i just picked this video up hopefully i'll have the time to watch it sometime this month

 

How do you bring the elements of the DVD into your game ? I wateched part of the 1st DVD with someone the other day and it got me wondering how are people using these DVD's ? Do you watch the whole thing and try to remember parts when rolling ? Do you just skip through and look for the troubles you have ?

 

back in the day i would just skim over footage of my trouble areas. As for some reason if i had trouble in a certain area of my game, and i'd go watch some footage of that area i could instantly retain that footage and id actually focus on pulling off the new material in my rolls, obviously it would need some tweeking, then a new trouble area would arise and my priority would be on that new trouble area that my training parnters seem to be taking advantage of.

more recently i would just take an part of the dvd and just isolate that in my training-rolls for 2-4 weeks, and move one to another part of the dvd and repeat. a good dvd set could take me 3-6 months to digest and incorperate fully into my game, and at the end id not only have the material down, but i'd also have self discovered numerous variations and new strategies concepts from playing and focusing on the material for so long. that were not touched on in the dvd set.

now i just watch the fottage once as i cut it up and catagorize all the footage from a dvd set for later use when it's half gaurd bottom month i might looka at my folder and just download a catagory like lock-down for example to my phone and review it all month, as i'll be focusing on playing that area of my halfguard for the next month but i'm just anal like that now

 

With more conceptual sets (I consider everything after deep half and back attacks to be more conceptual. Arm triangles and guard passing starts off on the very conceptual trail (I never saw inverted guard) and then defensive guard and open elbow are even more so IMO)

Regardless I'd watch them once through. Then, On arm triangles or guard passing you could say "this month I want to focus on the side choke/Ezekiel style arm triangles, then I'll work on the darce/brabo arm triangles after. Or maybe on the guard passing you could focus on re watching the sections on passes than involve going to the around the guard, like the leg drag one month. Then the next check on going under or through the guard, etc.

With these new ones I can see how it might be trickier to apply. The open elbow has been easier, since he focuses a lot on it also on the arm triangles and guard passing sets, and you can see the open elbow really easily on those, and then when taking the back.

For the defensive guard I'm just trying to keep the concepts in mind when I'm playing guard. I'm not drilling anything specific from it right now.

 

For defensive guard I watch I first just went back and forth searching for fun staff.
Yesterday I started working on it. I'm working on the secondary walls first. I'm doing a bit of feeling around for that positions but mostly just did positional sparring with a friend. We were taking turns with one guy passing and the other trying to defend with the various secondary walls.

 

While watching a lot of his more "conceptual" dvd I just skipped the conceptual parts at first.

 

It's not necessarily that defense, although yes, my instructor teaches knee on belly as a defense to this because you can lean on the guy and push him back down, so everyone does it where I train. There's also a lot of passers who like to x pass straight to kob. Now I'm not saying that there aren't defensive layers before that step, but obviously people on top passing are going to get this far into a pass sometimes despite the earlier layers (as Ryan is basically admitting with the existence of every secondary guard wall).

Another issue where this comes up is if they for get deep into a pass, knee slice for instance, and then at the end pop up to kob. Between the point where the knee across comes off your leg, which allows you to sit up and collar tie, they pop up to kob.

Everything else on the dvd is a prayer answered for me. Was training this morning and working only the defensive guard walls and setting the next one in chain up. Now, before the dvd I knew all these positions and blocks existed, I even chained a few together (dlr, rdlr, knee shield) but the combination of all of them and knowing which sequence comes next in a pass block attempt are game changing after no drilling and just an active thought process when it comes to bailing from one wall as it's compromised and setting up the next. It genuinely feels like a passed has so many different obstacles to overcome and has to block a reset to a further guard wall at all times and I can suddenly understand why top class guys say that guard passing is the hardest thing to do in bjj.

As to how I use the dvds, I usually watch through once first, then go back and cherry pick things as I work on them. A lot of Ryan hall's conceptual stuff seems to change my perspective on what I'm supposed to be doing, in a way that watching it all through helps me internalise some concepts which I can apply immediately, and then go back and work on specific chains sequences and actions. First time I watched the arm triangles dvd I walked into training, hit three one handed arm triangles and the ezekiel he shows. The arm triangle was already one of my go to's and the dvd just took away the issues I sometimes had with the correct pressure simply by explaining what I was working towards instead of just feeling it. My approach works for me but might not work for you.

 

That makes me feel good about the way I'm approaching this dvd set. I'm just trying to actively think about it, and so far, it's helping. I'm not actively drilling any of it. As to what you said about the arm triangles dvd, that's exactly how it was for me too. Side chokes and brabos were already a huge part of my game too, and that Thanksgiving day I trained at a nogi open mat and landed 2 one arm side chokes, a nogi ezekiel, and 4 brabos on one of my tougher friends. Like you said, it took away some issues that I sometimes ran into and gave me a concrete idea on what to feel for. It was a huge breakthrough for me and gave me a lasting mental confidence that made me believe in myself and my game.

I'm hoping this defensive guard set works the same way, but the open guard is a bit more intricate, so I think it's going to take longer than just going in and having a big breakthrough the first time around. Transitioning between guards as an opponent is attempting to pass at different ranges is probably the biggest thing I could improve on right now, so I'm really hoping that it will pay off with enough time and work.

 

One of the biggest takeaways from the defensive guard for me is something that he doesn't explain particularly well (for Ryan Hall that is, on anyone else's dvd set it'd be great instruction) but that in context of what I observe and feel from my instructor and took away from the rickson seminars I attended but didn't internalise. The concept that in open guards you're not pushing away.

It's completely counterintuitive, because if you're not pushing away someone is crushing you right? Except they aren't, you align whichever guard structure you happen to be using at the time so that it's essentially like meeting their pressure by jamming an iron bar at the right angle between them and the ground.

Your skeleton is the iron bar and when they push on it you don't collapse, because your legs are lined up with your spine and your spine is lined up with the ground there's only so far structurally they can bend you without being so strong or heavy until they run into a structure behind your structure. In the words of rickson, you are connected, it's not mystical, it's structural. They take the pressure off, you follow them so you are taking up the space they leave without pushing them off you. It's physics in that when they give you a little pressure you give them a little pressure back, when they pressure in, your knees bend and meet your chest, your chest meets your spine, your spine meets the ground and the ground pressures back into them.

That's the bit that "connects" with me into what rickson teaches. The other bit is what rolling with my instructor is like. You lean into him and he supports you, he is your base. In closed guard this takes the form of you posture up, lapel grip on his chest. Then he starts to rock his knees gently towards and away, straight and at angles. Not pushing not dragging you into him, just rocking, you move, he rocks, your Base Is unstable you have to readjust, but every time you do he rocks again, suddenly your leaning slightly too far one way or the other to compensate for the rocking, maybe you lean into it or he changes how much he's pulling and you posture up a little too much, and damn if he's not using that millisecond of the wrong pressure to sweep or attack a submission.

Now think de la riva, you pressure in, the legs support you, you pressure more, your Base is solid, this guy is getting crushed. Except it's not and he's not. He is your Base. He is allowing you to lean on him, he's supporting your weight, he takes away the support, maybe he bends his knees into his chest, you drop half a foot and your weight isn't over your hips and suddenly your reviewing why your vision seems to have flipped upside down and trying to work out what magical powers these black belts have and start wondering if you can find that crossroads that Robert Johnson went to.

Watching the dvds, this clicked for me. I'd been ill and off for a month, walked in at the start of this week, pulled closed, gently rocked my legs back and forward felt the slight over compensation and suddenly I'M Robert Johnson.