There are so many things you can focus on in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu if you want to improve in it; such an enormous, incomprehensible amount of details… Which makes it quite easy to become lost and confused in regards to which paths of BJJ development you should take. However, a good approach towards getting out of this confusion is disregarding the details for a second, and focusing on the big picture. On the concepts and principles that make everything work.
The legendary Marcelo Garcia understands this well; his emphasis on using sequences will make your Jiu Jitsu growth exponential.

IT’S NOT ABOUT INDIVIDUAL TECHNIQUES…

Marcelo starts by pointing out that he sees that Jiu Jitsu, as a sport, is improving; but through finding different ways to give points to athletes when they achieve a certain position… Which, in turn, leads to a segmentation of what is supposed to be a whole!
„A whole? What does that mean?“ What Marcelo is saying, essentially, is that he doesn’t want to allow BJJ to be looked at through the lens of merely achieving a dominant position and then holding it; but he wants to see it improve through the ultimate aim of getting a submission!

In different words, he wants every jiujiteiro to be able to continue applying techniques until they get the submission. To be able to utilize the moves in a sequence, until the other person taps! Therefore, Marcelo emphasizes that you can’t be good at just one move. For, if you are good at just, let’s say, one sweep… Then how will you be able to continue dominating your opponent if that technique fails? What will you do afterwards? It may even come down to not trying to hit the sweep at all; the fear of not knowing what to do next and of getting reversed yourself after you do a technique can be too great in and of itself.

… BUT ABOUT USING THEM IN SEQUENCES!

That’s the reason, Marcelo explains, why it’s necessary for jiujiteiros to think about how they can start with a certain technique and then tie in other moves until they secure the submission hold.

He asks his students to think of techniques they would like to use in a combination. This can mean, for example, knowing how to do a certain sweep technique after pulling guard; and then getting into the Half Guard because you know that you can use this position to get into a more dominant one. And afterwards, perhaps, taking the opponent’s back and choking them out.
Basically, he’s asking his students to try and think about using different techniques together, as a whole, one after another in order to achieve the submission.

PRACTICE YOUR COMBINATIONS

At the end, Marcelo invites his students to find a sequence or two that they’d like to get proficient in and then practice it with their training partners. The partners are supposed to be dynamic; not so much that they’re actually defending the submission attempts, but to move around just enough so that they’ll provide a good challenge for the other student.
This will also lead to a yet another degree of progress. Because the students will have to adapt their sequences to the efforts of their training partners, they’ll also be forced to understand how and when to utilize other techniques when necessary; to further reinforce their already expanding Jiu Jitsu skill-set!

Marcelo talks much more in detail about the importance of knowing how to use sequences and combinations of techniques, as well as demonstrates examples of how to do that on the video below:

Learn Marcelo Garcia’s Complete Butterfly Guard – You’ll Have An Unfair Advantage As You Successfully Attack Any Opponent (Large Or Small) -As He Has Proven Time After Time

• Get a total masterclass in the most successful butterfly guard of all time, as Marcelo Garcia teaches how to attack and defend from his favorite guard position.