Insights for the struggling white belt... & Blue

Competing as a white belt, 2011 or 2012.

 The hardest part of jiu-jitsu is signing up. Just kidding, we like to say that to make you feel better. It will always be hard. The hardest part is not quitting, which is why there are so many blue belts compared to black belts. For those of us who know that we’ll never quit, let me give you a guide to feeling good about getting your ass kicked on the regular. Today I’m going to discuss some positions and moves that I suggest you work on at the beginning of your journey. White belt! Please tag all of your white belt friends. This is for adults, as I treat youth differently. Please keep in mind, that this is a lot, and it won’t be overnight.

The hardest part of jiu-jitsu is signing up. Just kidding, we like to say that to make you feel better. It will always be hard. The hardest part is not quitting, which is why there are so many blue belts compared to black belts. For those of us who know that we’ll never quit, let me give you a guide to feeling good about getting your ass kicked on the regular. Today I’m going to discuss some positions and moves that I suggest you work on at the beginning of your journey. White belt! Please tag all of your white belt friends. This is for adults, as I treat youth differently. Please keep in mind, that this is a lot, and it won’t be overnight.

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First of all, everyone begins their jiu-jitsu journey in a different way. You may be in your twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, and I even train with those who started in their sixties. Some may have wrestled, some may have been a football player, while others may have not played any sports at all. With that said: Don’t compare yourself to anyone else. Even if you started the same day, and train the same amount of days. Doing this will certainly make you feel less worthy, or on the flip side, will encourage you to develop an out of control ego. Both are bad for you.

Where do you begin? Every academy is run differently. My academy has four units for white belts.

1. Positions, Transitions, Escapes
2. Guard - Including all of the fundamental guards (full, half, butterfly, etc), both bottom and top position.
3. Attacks and Defenses
4. Stand-up - Grip fighting, Fundamental wrestling, judo (trips, throws), Clinch, and pulling guard for sport jiu-jitsu.

The order is not the most important because jiu-jitsu is a journey and you have to learn it all! People say that the fight always starts standing, so you should start there. Though I honor all opinions, I disagree. You could have been blindsided or tackled and then the fight starts on the ground. Either way, you’re not ready for a fight until you know both. You can join the class at any point, however, if you decide to pursue jiu-jitsu beyond regular classes, I would start with the fundamental self-defense positions. By that I mean, after rolling if you want to drill with a partner, or if you have a drills class that lets you work on whatever you want, or if there is and open mat time that you can spend drilling with a partner. Take that time and work what you feel is important but use this as a guide. I think basic self-defense positions is a good place to start because it will absolutely help in you sport jiu-jitsu as well. In fact, the scoring system is based off of how you would do in an actual fight, to a large extent. Mount and Back Mount are 4 points, because if you get there in a fight, you’re in the best spot (besides getting up and running away from danger, where you are much safer). Passing guard is 3 points because you passed the neutral zone and are in a more dominant position. Sweeping is worth 2 because you are sweeping from a ‘neutral zone’ but on your back instead of in a top position. This is not worth the same as passing because typically, it puts you in another ‘neutral zone’ but on top, allowing you to pass and score those additional 3 points. Obviously there are counter arguments to everything I just said, but fundamentally, it’s sound. So where do you begin drilling?

Everything I’m about to say is my opinion. Feel free to disagree, I’m open to feedback and general discussion. I can’t make that clear enough.

1.  Start with mount escapes. Mount is a crappy position to be in, and you will be there quite often as a white belt. Two of them!

• Trap and Roll
  
• Some variation of Hip Escape, Elbow Escape, Shrimp to guard.
  

2.  Next drill side control escapes - I prefer to drill this before back escapes simply based on the  pain factor. Being on the bottom of side mount hurts. Two of them.

• Some sort of underhook variation that leads to a top position, back to the feet, or guard recovery.
  
• Full commitment on guard recovery. When rolling as a white belt, getting to guard will allow you to rest and think, until you’ve drilled enough to develop muscle memory of different guards and sweep/sub setups. For now, get to guard. Guard is good.
  

Using fundamental guard in the advanced division to secure a victory. 2019

3.     Back Mount escapes. This is a dangerous position. Some find this more dangerous that mount because you cannot see your partner and what they are attempting. In time, you will feel this without seeing, but for now, at least in mount, you can see what’s going on. The goal in the beginning is to get your back on the mat and take it from there.

• Fall toward the choking arm, but not until after you’ve cleared it over your head and are not in danger of the choke. Get your back on the mat and then go from there. Falling this way typically allows you to control your opponents upper body by controlling their arm, therefore making it easier to get a top position, but even if you can’t, some sort of guard recovery is available.
  
  
• Fall toward the underhook arm. This could be safer to avoid the choke, but I find it harder to get to a top position from here. Either way, get your back on the mat and then go from there. Usually to some sort of guard.
  
  

Once you have the basic trouble positions under control, then I would move on. When to move on is up to you. Of course, you still want to drill other positions. Just make sure you spend MORE time on these. You can’t amount an offense until you can control the pace of the round a little bit. Even if that means just getting neutral positions over and over again. That’s a win!

So where you go you from here? Ok, this is in no particular order, but I advise my students to have two moves from most positions at white belt. Two allows you to go for one, and switch to the other if choice A isn’t working. Fundamentals only. Defense and offense. Eventually, you will start developing within positions that your “game” is going to naturally gravitate towards. And you’re not going to force this. You’re going to fall in love with it.
If you are reading this and you are a white belt, just think about what you would do in these situations as you read each one.

• Two escapes from mount
• Two attacks from mount
• Two Escapes from side mount
• Two moves from top side (whether it’s a transition to mount, or an submission from side)
• Two escapes from North/South position.
• Two attacks or transitions from NS.
• Two escapes from scarf hold
• Controlling scarf hold, and maybe a sub or two.
• Two escapes from back mount
• Two subs from back mount
• Two escapes from turtle
• Two attacks from turtle
• Two guard sweeps
• Two guard passes
• Two half guard sweeps or recoveries to guard.
• Two half guard passes
• Two open guard sweeps
• Two open guard passes
• Two closed guard submissions
• Two open guard submissions
• Two butterfly sweeps
• Two butterfly passes

For those who have trouble learning this way, you can think in concepts rather than moves. I believe this to be harder in the very beginning, but once you have a little bit of a base, then thinking in concepts will be easier. I will definitely cover concepts in a future blog, and I know the perfect person to help me write it, a black belt by the name of Brian Shealey.   :)

Once I have basic ground knowledge down, then I would get to the stand-up. I know, I know, the fight starts standing. Well, we are not doing this to fight. If you learn how to start with take downs and then you get into a fight, but haven’t learned the ground aspect, then you are just a fish out of water on the ground anyway. But I do agree that the standup is equally important. My instructor, Lee, when I first, joined had us defending strikes, and closing the distance to a variation of a body fold takedown. I understand that not all schools cover strikes, and that’s fine if you’re ok with it. I’ll get into fundamental takedowns for ROLLING at the academy.

1. You’ve got nothing without understanding grips. I just call this grip fighting. Drill how to establish a collar and sleeve grip (the fundamental setup for takedown in jiu-jitsu), and drill how to break other’s grips from your gi. There are a lot of details here for me to get into, so ask an upper belt or you professor.
2. Fundamental Wrestling.
   1. Double leg
   2. Single leg
   3. At least one counter to both.
3. Fundamental Trips
   1. Inside trips
   2. Outside Trips
4. Bodylocks
5. Throws - These take time, and should be drilled hundreds of times before attempting it live.
6. Arm drags
7. Pulling guard

Those that wrestled will have an advantage here. USE IT! If you didn’t wrestle, don’t compare yourself to those that wrestled. Just focus on a few of them for now. They didn’t get good at wrestling overnight.

So where do you go from here?
Answer: Mount escapes! Enjoy the training - it will last forever, if you love it.

Jiu-jitsu is hard. There’s no way around it. If it were easy, there would be a lot more black belts. There would be a lot more brown belts. There would be a lot more purple belts. But it’s not easy. Competing is not easy. But things in life do seem to be easier, because jiu-jitsu is hard.

Now, I have to go proof-read because I’m still a white belt in writing. But I'm improving :)

Comments and questions appreciated
-Greg