Class notes: fighting from your back

Going to your back is something that Lee firmly advises against from an MMA perspective, he is more understanding in a pure grappling perspective. This is the one aspect of my own training that I am working on to improve. My default is to go to the back and so I am trying to work harder to give it up and spend more time in more dominant positions. As this has been habitual for me I need to break the patterns and create new ones. Later on in the session during free form I managed to secure submissions from side control (head and arm), side control (upward shoulder rotation with leg), centre control (mount) chest smoother. I also got to work on relaxing during some very painful vice grips on the head and neck.

Leg with shoulder suppression(triangle) to downward shoulder rotation (kimura)
If they try to defend the triangle by hooking the freearm under your hips, this prevents you from passing the leg across your hips to close the choke. Hold his head tight and keep his structure folded, swap the legs over as this will apply more pressure to his shoulder and not the neck. Keep your alignment on the same plane as his chest. Squeeze your knee towards your chest and begin to manipulate the arm around your leg for the double wrist lock (upward shoulder rotation). A key point when applying the DWL is to pin your elbow to your chest as the fulcrum. The will ensure his ability to escape is limited. Now you can line your torso off line to him to get the arm.

Side control escape and submission attacks.
The person on their back has to escape the side control position, the person in top position makes them work for the escape. As they escape something will be left open or available. This was about looking for a range of submissions on the escape. Once the submission is found, positions were swapped and the drill continues.

Arm drag from sitting.
We finished it by taking side back control. The first video is the great Marcello Garcia working his arm drag. I read once that he is so good that he tells high level guys what he is going to do and still manages to pull it off.