The Collar Sleeve Guard may look quite confusing at first glance, especially for beginners. But it isn’t! Once you figure out the basics that make it work, it may very well become one of your best friends.
For that reason, we’ll examine the Collar Sleeve Guard in two parts: the first breakdown, with all focus oriented towards offense, done by Alec Baulding; and the second breakdown, with more of a conceptual and defensive framework, by Rafael Mendes.

So, in this first part, let’s take a look at Alec Baulding explaining it in great detail!

COLLAR SLEEVE GUARD – SETTING IT UP

The Collar Sleeve Guard setup doesn’t have to be anything complex. Alec shows a basic variation of it, from an Open Guard position.

Essentially, when the training partner goes to grip one side of his pants, Alec establishes a grip on his sleeve and puts a shallow Lasso in place.
As far as the other side is considered, if his training partner establishes a grip there, Alec can pummel his leg to the inside and start playing the Spider-Lasso Guard. If he doesn’t, however, then Alec has an entry for the Collar Sleeve Guard; he gets a cross-collar grip and places his other foot to the training partner’s shoulder. He uses the cross-collar grip to pull his partner towards himself, while using the foot to push him away. This way, he establishes great control over him.

To end the setup, he repositions the shallow Lasso leg to the partner’s hip and shifts further to the side. He now has a Collar Sleeve Guard.

OMOPLATA SETUP

There are heaps of great submissions that you can set up from the Collar Sleeve Guard, but the most obvious one is – Omoplata.

To start setting it up, Alec pulls the training partner’s arm so as to separate the space between his elbow and knee. Then, as he continues pulling the collar, he shoots his „hip leg“ to the side of the partner’s arm, in such a way that his calf muscle clamps on top of the shoulder. From there, he crosses over the arm and locks a triangle on it.
Once here, you must watch out that your opponent doesn’t place their knee onto your stomach. As soon as you see them trying to do that, let go of their sleeve and go under their leg, shooting your arm straight up. Then, let go of the cross-collar grip, post your elbow to the mat and use it to help you sit up, while making sure that their sleeve remains in your hip. To end it, grab their Gi high as you can and finish the Omoplata from there.

TRIANGLE SETUP

Setting up the Triangle from the Collar Sleeve Guard may be even simpler! Alec demonstrates that what you need to do is push off of your opponent’s hip while you pull them into your guard. When you do that, use your other leg to shoot over their shoulder. Then, lock your legs, pull their head towards you and re-adjust your lock in order to finish the Triangle Choke.
Make sure, as Alec points out, to keep your hips and lower back close to the mats; if you don’t, you will get stacked.

SWEEP SETUP

If your opponent closes the space between their elbow and knee, making it difficult to put your foot on their hip, Alec shows that you can un-Lasso your leg, rock yourself a bit more to the side and get in the De La Riva.
Then, place your other foot to the opponent’s belt knob, turning it to the inside (which makes it more difficult for them to defend). Now, place their hand in-between their legs. This will make them off-balanced; and you’ll be able to knock them down to the mats by simply pushing their collar across your body.

Watch the video below to see much more of Alec’s details on this and other offense-oriented techniques from Collar Sleeve Guard:

Stay safe and always keep your guard with the Collar Sleeve Guard: Xande Ribeiro’s revolutionary diamond concept of defense.

• Learn Xande’s diamond concept that lets him defend, escape, and reguard against the best in the world.
• Take away the pressure and get back to guard with these keys to Xande’s defensive system.
• Everyone from beginners to black belts can learn from Xande’s methodical system of escaping some of the worst positions in all of BJJ.