Private Lesson Concept: The 3 Second Rule + Making your Escapes Better by doing NOTHING
It’s amazing how much better your students perform when you start yelling at them to “hurry up and move!”.
I was leading a little competition style training yesterday and I had our competitors get round-robin’d. I was doing my best to count points for the few pairs we had going at each time so that I could help them keep this in mind with the short round-robin rounds.
One of my students was down by 2 points and after an escape and a scramble, ended up back in closed guard. There was 30 seconds left on the clock. I told him he needed to get out and pass. He struggled.
Ten seconds left.
“YOU HAVE TEN SECONDS YOU HAVE TO GET OUT AND PASS NOW!!”
Within 3 seconds, he broke the closed guard and attempted to pass…
Six seconds left. I told him “JUST JUMP OVER HIS LEGS NOW!”
He jumped.
Two seconds left. He landed awkwardly in his training partner’s side, training partner’s knee still framed against the hip.
Timer goes off…
He couldn’t quite clear his knee and even if he did, he would not have earned the points…
Why? The Three Second Rule.
Now, before I get to the Three Second Rule, I want to talk about something interesting about my student and his struggles before I got in his ear versus how easily he was able to break the guard open.
Often times, when we lack urgency, we spend too much time thinking and deliberating about what techniques we should use.
This may lead to more mistakes but this is great for learning. In the case of my student, once I yelled that he had 10 seconds left, he immediately figured out how to open the guard and pass. Unfortunately, he was unable to finish and settle into side control because time ran out.
Now imagine if he had that urgency just a few seconds earlier?
He would have maybe had time to finish his pass AND collect points for the guard pass (Per competition rules, 3 seconds to settle in).
The Balance Between Urgency and Conservation of Energy
In my opinion, Jiu-jitsu is about conservation of energy and efficiency. This is the goal we all strive for as jiu-jitsu practitioners.
BUT, I do believe that whether you compete or not, you need to develop a sense of urgency in bad situations.
Now, that does not mean that you should panic and freak out when your opponent is threatening you. But it does mean that when you’re faced with being put in a bad spot, DO NOT CONCEDE.
Do everything in your power to defend the position in this late stage.
This is the moment to go absolutely apeshit and try to get out before things get worse.
Why?
For the simple fact that life becomes much more difficult AFTER your opponent settles in.
In today’s email I’m going to go into the biggest mistake beginners make when defending sweeps and guard passes as well as how to escape in those critical “3 seconds” as well as what to do when your opponent settles in so that you can make your escapes more effective AND efficient.
[Hint: You’ll do absolutely nothing].
There will be a technical video on the best ways to escape in those 3 seconds as well as a technical video example from side control and a sparring narration.
Let’s DIVE IN
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