Pushing legs

From a taijiquan perspective, I need to start thinking about bjj as pushing legs. Sure, you, random reader who studies taijiquan, say “pushing hands is not meant to be literally pushing hands”, and you, random reader who studies bjj, say “huh?”. Suffice it to say there is a similarity. However, when I try rolling, almost immediately [...]

Bjj day 2

Pollen season is winding down and I feel healthy enough to get back to real training again. This week I did yoga three times, zhan zhuang and qigong pretty much every day, taijiquan one day, and finally made it to my second formal bjj class. Too many training notes to jot down for now. Some [...]

Josh Waitzkin interview

Here is a great interview I found on EmptyFlower.net in a thread called “Attacking during the blink”:

He talks about breaking down the complexities and making smaller circles and fancy techniques not being “it” and condensing biomechanics, bringing things from the conscious mind to the unconscious, speeding up perception (slowing down time) at will, and more.
AND, [...]

Dan Inosanto

Very old video training with Bruce Lee:

Training with John Machado. Dan is apparently 71 and a Machado BJJ black belt in this video. Geez! Talk about mastering all ranges. Look at how well he moves at age 71.

Rickson Yoga

Here is Rickson Gracie doing ginatisca natural in a clip from the famous video Choke:

What is with the really weird breathing technique?
And here is a cool video where he flips over when picked up and looking like he’s about to eat a slam:

Adapting jiu-jitsu for kids

With no jiu-jitsu classes for kids around, I wonder how the schools who do have kids’ classes adapt the art for kids. I assume they also follow judo conventions of no joint locks below a certain age. A friend of mine has a daughter who trained bjj for a while. He seemed to recall some [...]

Rambling on reverse engineering some of the bjj innovations on judo

I have been reading about how judo’s innovation was really in a teaching / training approach and not in techniques since almost 100% of the techniques already existed in different jujutsu schools. Extending that approach, bjj added techniques but also some different rules for its sport formats. Those innovations add something that could probably be [...]

A few drills

Nice video of bjj drills I found on Sovann’s blog that I must go back and watch, so embedding it here, too. This is really push “hands” at every possible weird angle. I like that second guard pass where he slides in. Would never have thought of it. Will try it later. Huh? For some [...]

yoga and zhan zhuang and bjj

There is a wuji sort of asana in yoga called tadasana (mountain pose). Its purpose is like wuji standing in some respects as far as I can tell - to help quiet the mind. They both are about balancing “heaven” and “earth” energy. That similarity leaves off in zhan zhuang practice that is more about [...]

What’s “natural” in fighting

Sometimes I have read or been taught that this or that system tries to use “natural” movements, modifying them minimally, so that in a real stressful encounter, one can use these skills rather than trying to recall extremely technical skills. Following the KISS (keep it simple stupid) principle is advocated in various combatives manuals. People [...]