No, this is not an impromptu game of "which one of these doesn't belong with the others." Actually, it's just a set of observations about the half guard I made over the weekend while watching both the Leo Viera division (under 65 kilos) and the Jacare division (77-87 kilos) at the 2005 Abu Dhabi Combat Club tournament.
I've been working the half guard with some faithfulness over the past several months--too long, on some ways, for me not to hav more to show from the effort. But this is the road of the self-taught insofar as much of what I'm trying to build by way of a half guard game from the bottom is coming straight out of Eddie Bravo's Jiu Jitsu Unleashed (as opposed to a lot about passing the half guard, which both Mamazinho and Rodrigo have focused on over the months).
What's happened is that my interest in the half guard has dove-tailed with some interesting things I've been reading about the Marcelinho guard (mostly from Aesopian's excellent reporting) and butterfly guard (Stephan Kesting mostly, from Grapple Arts. I'm thinking that thinking about the half guard and the Marcelinho/butterfly guard together might help me build a bottom game that I can rely on.
First, here's a link to Kesting's superb Butterfly Guard/X-Guard Q&A ...
Watching ADCC over the weekend, I was struck how one fighter (who ended up losing, actually, on points) managed to pull half guard repeatedly, and then reposition each time it looked like his standing opponent would get out of range. (Interestingly, Michelle/Wags has been drilling us in a way of moving on the ground to "chase down" a standing opponent.) Anyway, what was interesting about the fitht (which I think was the Robert Sulski v. Bento Ribeiro match) was how Ribeiro moved on the ground with his half guard attack.
Ribeiro showed how pulling half guard requires active legs, not just the inside leg that you want to shoot between the other guy's legs, but also the outside leg that you want to swing over and trap the guy's leg. This leg will also likely be a "trailing" leg if the guy is trying to get away from you.
In other words, say you're pulling half guard and the guy moves to your right. If you've tried to shoot your right leg through, then you need to roll on your side so that you are still facing the guy. You also need to use your left leg to hook over his trailing leg (his right leg if he's moving to your right/his left to try and pass). As long as that leg is draping over the trailing leg, then you've effectively got a half guard. An open half guard, to be sure, and you don't want to "sit there forever", as Saulo puts it. But that is enough to slow the guy down so that you can get your other leg in place.
STAY ON YOUR SIDE. If you are on your right side and he moves to your left, as if to move behind you, then roll over your left shoulder and switch the leg attack (i.e., stab with the left leg and trap the trailing leg with your right.)
Or something like that.
