[Private Lesson Concept] Going through Your Progressions
Plus the Importance of Technical Knowledge
One of the biggest problems in Jiujitsu is that your opponent doesn’t let you do what you want to do to them.
To make matters worse, they’re trying to strangle you while you’re trying to work through your techniques.
It’s this constant ebb and flow of training that leads to some amazing highs and some not-so-amazing lows. And it isn’t until you start developing skills that you’re able to finally start seeing the fruits of your labor.
This day and age, we’re constantly bombarded with people selling courses and other instruction based on “conceptual knowledge”. The idea of concepts versus techniques isn’t new. Nic Gregoriades and Kit Dale are some OGs who were selling this idea over 10 years ago.
Understand this: Concepts make your techniques work.
Concepts are, in my opinion, more synonymous with fundamentals than they are with “training hacks”. You still need technical knowledge. As example, in order to execute a concept like “connection”, you need to first (read: Step One) make a grip. And in order to execute a concept like off-balancing, you’ll need to then move your opponent (read: Step Two).
My case in point is the meticulousness of Danaher, Gordon and Mikey Musumeci when they explain their instruction. It always starts off conceptual (read: fundamental) but then gets into the “nitty gritty” as Danaher says.
This “nitty gritty” is the technical component. These are the procedural, step by step, and “systematized” behavior that gets you from point A to point B. And as Gordon has said (paraphrased), if you are simply trying to get by using concepts (as an example from an Instagram debate he had, a guillotine is a guillotine versus an arm in guillotine with a high wrist versus an arm in guillotine with a gable grip), you are not going to know how to behave with each distinct technique.
It’s profound when you think about that each armbar defense shares similar fundamentals but when you think about the technical component, they often vary greatly. So, sure, you can get the gist of an armbar defense by simply knowing its fundamental components but unless you’re aware of each and every technical distinction, you’re going to fail at higher levels.
With this in mind, I’m here to tell you that concepts ARE important. I’ve said this before in another post:
I recently had the thought that foundational skills provided the basis for fundamental skills. Without foundational understanding, the fundamental concepts have no bearing. Moving one step further, fundamental skills are what make the techniques work. And finally, technical skills are what maximize effectiveness and efficiency. — Foundations, Fundamentals and Technical Skills
Foundational understanding allow you to develop fundamental skills. Fundamental skills are what give effectiveness to technical skills. Technical skills are what maximize efficiency.
And now, if you want to maximize efficiency, you need to understand the technical components and much more, you need to understand the idea of progressions, how to work through them and how to move to other progressions in the event there is adequate defense or resistance.
Beyond the paywall, I’m going to talk about the importance of these progressions specific to the scissor sweep since it’s such a common technique. The scissor sweep has about 5-6 steps. And with each of these 5-6 steps, there is an “attack vector” or a “vulnerability”. However you want to describe it, each of these terms is what I describe as an opportunity for something to fail.
As a matter of fact, an important concept to remember is this: Each step in a technique is an opportunity for it to fail.
With this concept in mind, what I want you to focus specifically is the amount of thought that goes into each step. I’ve even given some options, as quick examples, to illustrate the resistance points where we either have to fight to get back into a part of the procedure, or we can branch off into a new progression.
Alright, let’s dive in.
Below the paywall you’ll find two videos:
The Importance of Progressions with regard to the scissor sweep [8+ Min]
I’ll go through each step and talk about troubleshooting resistance at each step
A Deep Dive into the Scissor Sweep [15+ min]
Just a bonus video on a lot of tips to help you with your scissor sweep
Enjoy and let me know what you think!
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