Garry Tonon recently pointed out a common issue faced by “sport Jiu-Jitsu” practitioners…
That, in sport settings, BJJ athletes often find themselves unprepared when caught in adverse positions – leading to a quick tap, especially when mounted or having their back taken.
Tonon elaborated on this during a recent BJJ Fanatics podcast episode, stating:
I’m not, like, a huge proponent of “sport Jiu-Jitsu”. That’s not really what I’m talking about.
But stylistically, what I’m talking about is, like…You’ll have a guy that, you know, competes at a high level.
And chances are if he was in a self-defense situation, he’d be fine.But, it’s like – they get mounted or they get to their back taken.
And this is what we saw when we started to see EBI or, you know, getting an arm lock situation.
So what happens then?
In Tonon’s eyes, that’s when the athletes’ game “melts”:
You know, the game melts. Because they’re never there.
They never practice it.And it’s, like: “Hey, man. Didn’t we get involved in this to be able to defend ourselves in the first place?”
In contrast, self-defense situations don’t offer the luxury of tapping out and resetting. The ability to escape and survive from disadvantageous positions is crucial.
Tonon advises that even sport Jiu-Jitsu athletes should focus on defending from poor positions that mimic real-life self-defense scenarios:
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