Lloyd Irvin takes a lot of grief for his marketing approach--which has more than the whiff of "direct mail" to it. But I've always been impressed by his basic message of optimism when it comes to succeeding in jiu jitsu.
Tommy made a good point months ago that a lot of the success of guys like Ryan Hall has to be attributed to training intensity. I suspect that if most of the people I train with on a regular basis trained at the same clip as Hall, then they too would see impressive gains in performance come tournament time.
And while Irvin's ability to gameplan is probably the most impressive aspect of his method and coaching, what is probably most useful is his philosophy of specialization, which comes across very strongly in his latest e-mail advertisement discussing the double-upset run of Lloyd Irvin black belt Mike Fowler in the ADCC 2007.
When you think about how Irvin must have learned jiu jitsu, it makes sense. As a jiu jitsu orphan at the tender age of a six-month blue belt, Irvin must have found it difficult to learn new techniques and, instead, must havet focused on all the variations and transitions possible for the few techniques a six-month blue belt might feel comfortable with.
Years later as a coach, we can read how he passed on his "former favorite submission, the triangle (choke)" to both Mike Fowler and Ryan Hall. While it was Hall that went on to make the triangle his patented submission, it is clear that Irvin's approach was to give his fighters a few basic tools and train them to become lethal with them.
Irvin refers to "mastering every single transition of a single submission." I think that is key to becoming very hard to handle on the mat. I'm reminded of the Marcelo Garcia line "I'm always going to get the choke."
Obviously this doesn't mean not learning as many techniques as possible. But jiu jitsu at the top levels is more about being a poet than a librarian, it seems to me. And that means being good--almost insufferably good--at what you're good at first and foremost, especially when it is time to compete.
Irvin says that his trio of finishing techniques were the triangle choke, the kimura and leg locks (when they were allowed). I like the idea of cultivating both a "go to" choke and a "go to" arm/shoulder attack; it's something I've thought about from time to time. I'm looking to try a lot of different things over the balance of the year--as I pass my own "six-month blue belt" mark: a much, much more aggressive guard and being far more active on top.
I'm hoping by the end of the year I'll have a good sense of what attacks are most efficient for me and which ones aren't. Early money is on the mata leao as far as the choke slot is concerned. And I'm praying that the jiu jitsu gods bestow upon me something other than the americana when it comes to attacking the arm and/or shoulder ...
