Personally, I feel most comfortable passing butterfly guard because my mortal enemy, the triangle choke, is not an option. At worst, it is a contest of balance and I feel like I've always got at least a 50/50 shot in a balance contest against most.
So it interesting to be training right now techniques that from my perspective turn an open or spider guard into a sitting guard (much better for me) and a sitting guard into a butterfly guard (even better still for me).
Tuesday's technique had us hop down with both knees on the outside of the legs, closing the legs together as much as possible and bringing them as tight against the guy's butt as possible. "Head butt" the guy in the chest to get his back to the mat and bring your arms up against his sides with elbows tight, further locking his legs as tight as possible.
Open up on one side just enough to slide your arm underneath the guy's leg. It should be easy to do because the guy will likely try to follow your leg with a hook, creating the space for you. Underhook the leg and grip the belt or the gi near the back.
Make sure to keep pressure on the other knee! There is a triangle choke danger here as you hoist the leg up on your shoulder. If you keep your weight on the off leg, then you should be fine. From here you want to take a big step with the leg that is on the same side as the leg underhook. You should step to about right under the guy's armpit on that side.
As you do this, you can use your other hand to feed the collar to the hand of your leg-underhooking arm. Get nice and high near the neck. From here it is a basic underhook pass.
I worked with Brock - who is looking pretty slim and trim these days as he moves from over 200 to under 185. Brock is one of those guys who started training a few months after I did and it's always interesting to think of those guys I remember training with as white belts literally years ago who've continued to train. One of these days, these same guys (and gals) that I started training with at more or less the same time will be black belts: the Brocks, the Angelas ... And it is crazy to think that, if I keep improving as they have, one day I'll be standing there right alongside them wearing a black belt of my own.
If part of getting better is learning how to get better then I think I'm getting better. Thursday morning for The Daily Planet, I'm interviewing this guy Daniel Coyle who wrote a book called, The Talent Code. His thesis is that "greatness isn't born, it's grown" and he does a fascinating job of showing how a certain kind of experience in the material world, a certain kind of training, tends to lead to the kind of chemical and biological adaptations in the brain that lead to almost stunning acceleration in performance in a variety of fields.
And without getting too far ahead of myself, the training that I've been able to do - the sparring in particular - over the past few days, starting with Ro on Saturday, then with Connor on Monday and Angela on Tuesday - I think is exactly what Coyle is talking about. I'm already starting to feel a shift in attitude about passing the guard (which has been my focus for the past week) from standing. The fear is starting to fade and the idea of trying to pass from standing has started to feel more like the default mode. If I'm understanding Coyle, this willingness to fail over and over again that I'm courting by trying to pass on the feet is the first step in the right process. We'll see how it goes (though I don't think I'll be bringing up jiu jitsu in the interview - at least not specifically.
