Improving Guard Play Through Games

Previously I talked about how you can use games to improve your  stand up skills, but some people wanted more info on other things like passing or guard play. In this article I'll talk about guard play and playing from the bottom in general. These games will hopefully allow you to improve your guard retention, escapes, sweeps and submissions.

Pass/Sweep

This is the easiest and most basic game. Most of you have likely played this before. One person is on bottom and tries to sweep while the top person is on top and tries to pass. As soon as you sweep you  win(or if the top player passes you lose). When this happens just reset and do it again. This gives you a lot of chances to work on your guard retention and sweeps.

Focus

Here you should be trying to look and feel where the opponents weight is and choose the appropriate sweep for the situation you find yourself in. Use your sense of touch and sight to guess which sweep will work best in which situation. Overtime you should find your decision making is getting sharper and you are able to sweep and off balance people more quickly. As the guard player you should focus more on getting the sweep rather than just retaining guard. Try to stay on offense as long as possible and try to quickly counter their passes into your offense. 

Variations

A useful variation on this is to start from a specific guard and then stop if the person gets out. This can help you really focus on a specific guard and how to use it. Not only will it help with sweeps from there, but it will also help you retain guard and keep them in that specific guard. However, being less specific and not choosing just one guard, will allow you to learn how and when to transition between different guards, so choose the variation depending on your needs. Another thing you can do is allow submissions, which is useful if you find yourself always sweeping as passing up submission opportunities. 

You can also work on certain sweeps and limit yourself to a narrower set of techniques than what you usually do. Perhaps you might want to give your go to De la Riva sweeps a rest for these rounds and only try some of your B game moves.

You Shall Not Pass

For this game all you have to do is stop your partner from passing your guard. Just retain your guard for the full round without sweeping or submitting your partner. The top person should be relentless in their passing and try a variety of different moves. The bottom player should be trying to off balance their opponent, but don't sweep them. If they top player falls just reset and if the top player gets stuck in a position such as closed guard, just reset. The goal is to stay dynamic and not get stuck in one position too long. Don't just hold the passer in a position such as worm guard for the whole round. If you get into something like 50/50 just let them go, so you can keep working on your retention skills. 

Focus

The bottom player should be working on using their legs to track the passer, frame effectively and use their limbs to keep the top player from advancing through their guard. Don't focus too much on sweeping and instead try to keep them off balance if you get to a guard position. The guard player isn't really looking to work their offense from here, but more their defense. Try to play an open guard without and initial connections. Let the top player lead the dance and try to stop them after they attempt their pass. The top player should be throwing as many passes as they can at the guard player and the guard player should be working on defending them. 

Variations 

You can do this from supline or try to remain seated the whole time and of course you can mix both together. Another thing that can be useful is doing this with tennis balls in your hands so you can't grab. This might be especially useful for those coming from a gi background and are used to using grips for retention. You can also try doing it without one hand or even both. 

Escapes 

This is also an easy game that many of you have likely played before. Choose a bad position and then try to escape from it as fast as you can. Common situations would be mount, side control or the back. However remember to also include some less common situations such as crucifix, kesa gatame, etc. Also don't limit yourself to the basics of the position. Get more detailed and start working out of mount with 1 arm isolated or flattened out halfguard when they have a good crossface. This is a great way to work some of those bad situations you always find yourself in and will help you come up with new solutions.  

Focus

When doing this you should be trying to escape as quickly as you can. Sometimes when stuck in a bad position it is better to wait for an opening before you attempt your escape. However, for this game I think it is better to work on making space and getting out of the bad position as many times as possible. This will likely make you tired, but that is also beneficial. Learning to escape while you're tired is also an important skill. The point of this is to improve your escapes so you need to spend all of your time trying to do that instead of worrying about getting submitted or getting into a worse position. Remember the goal should be to escape as many times as possible in a round, not go without being submitted, so don't get into a death match where you are trying to fight out of a triangle. 

Variations

An easy variation is allowing or disallowing submissions during this. If you need to work on submission defense or you are worried about getting caught in a sub add them into the game. If you just want to focus on getting out or are worried about opponents who have amazing control, stick to just the position. You could also do a Judo style variation where you have 20-30 sec to escape. This will give things more urgency. You can also do partial submissions instead of the traditional positions. You should do the EBI spiderweb position. You could try halfguard with a partially locked darce choke, etc. Create a variation based on your own particular weakness. 

Derrick Lewis/Just stand up

For this game you want to get up from bottom position as fast as possible. Vary the starting positions and work on using various approaches to get back k to your feet. This type of thing is usually neglected in BJJ, but it is actually really important for MMA and self defense applications. Even in BJJ you'll sometimes need this skill and you'll be happy you did when it gets you out of a terrible situation.

Focus

You should be trying to get up ASAP and staying safe while you do so. Don't get so concerned with standing that you fall into a trap. Also as you are doing this don't forget about sweeps and reversals. It is much easier to stand up when you are on top. Often times just trying to stand up will setup opportunities to sweep your opponent and from there getting back to your feet is usually easy. 

Variations 

Try this from many different positions, so you can experience standing up from everywhere. If you just do BJJ, I'd focus on guard, turtle and maybe side control. If you have more of an MMA or self defense focus you can add the mount, knee on belly, the back, etc. You should also try this with and without subs for both people. Doing this will help you integrate submissions into your game and teach you how to utilize dilemmas. However removing submissions really makes you work on your stand up skills. 

Double guard

Both people sit down and have their right foot inside their partners legs, but their left foot outside. Grab each other's right leg and start. Your goal should be to take the back, pass or submit your opponent. You should try to avoid disengaging from the entanglement if possible. This is most useful for building skills with berimbolos and leg attacks. Some of you might disregard this game and think it is only for those lightweights that do double guard pulls in matches. I'd ask that you reconsider. You will often find yourself in this position from a backwards sweep or if someone drops back on a leglock. Being skilled in this position can help you put a quick end to the match. When doing this try not to stand up or come to your knees unless you have the pass. If you can't pass the guard 5 sec after standing/kneeling then just restart.

Focus 

Use your time with this game to learn the various leg entanglements and how they work together. When you have inside position, leglocking positions are usually easier to get to, but when you have outside position, berimbolo style attacks are easier. Play between these and get a feel for when to do what. Also work on switching between positions and even legs. Don't fall into the trap of only doing one side. Learn how to play both sides and then switch between the 2 legs and various entanglements to get what you want. This is a great game to play while you're injured as it is generally low impact and doesn't require explosive movement, but of course be careful with leglocks. 

Variations 

You can vary the starting position and often times this can make things better if your skill levels aren't perfectly matched. Let a lower level person start in the saddle or with grips on both of your legs. This will help you learn to pummel out of bad positions, while giving your partner a chance to attack. You can also remove submissions all together if you prefer and just do bolos. Another common way to do this is just start from 50/50 and try to sub each other or take the back. Another way to play is to have one person just try to escape, disengage or stand up while the other person focuses on attacking. This will help you against people who don't want to play this game. 

Kuzushi game

The objective here is to off balance your partner. Start from a guard of your choice and the attempt to either knock the person down to their butt or their hands. You don't need to come on top, but you should be trying to get them off balanced enough that you could easily sweep or attack a submission. The top player just needs to keep their balance.

Focus

You should be working on your timing and trying to understand the top plays weight distribution both through feel and visual cues. Often times people just go on autopilot and try moves from their favorite guard and then are surprised when they don't work. By paying more attention to their balance and choosing the correct technique, you can unbalance people more easily. You should also be focusing on combinations as you often can't get someone's balance broken enough to attack with a single move. Instead of trying to break their balance with one powerful move, gradually break it with a series of smaller techniques and put your partner is increasingly worse situations.

Variations 

Obviously this game can be done from various guards. Another variation you can try is keeping them off balanced for 3-5 secs. Knock them down so their hand touches the ground and then try to force them to keep that hand down until you count to 3 out loud. You can also attempt to do 2-4 move combos. Knock them down to their knees on the left side and as they come back up knock them to their knee on the right side. As the try to get their balance back, knock them down backwards to their butt. Working this in combos can really help put things together and teach you not to rush your moves. 

Connection Game

For this game all you need to do is make dominant connection to your partner and hold it for 5-10 seconds and you win. Your partner will try to avoid letting you get the connection you want. You can start either supine or in seated guard, but your objective is to grab someone with your hands or legs and control them so they can't move away. You can get wrist grips, de la riva guard, half guard or double underhooks from butterfly guard. Anything that doesn't allow your partner to get away, but doesn't put you in danger(so no pulling them into mount) and of course agree on the win conditions before you start. Tell your partner what grip(s) count as a win condition and decide based upon your own personal circumstances and preferences. Once you have your grip, count to 5. If they can't escape before the time is up you win. You can also do a 10 second count if you want to make it more difficult. 

Focus

The main thing here is to get your grips and keep them long enough to do something with them. Often times we attempt to get the grips we want directly, but against better people that sometimes doesn't work. This is your chance to experiment and learn how to upgrade your grips or trick people into giving you what you want. Work on switching from one grip to another and watching for people's reactions and see what opportunities open up. 

Variations 

Naturally one variation is to change the time you need to hold the position, but IMO doing it longer than 10 sec serves no real purpose. A better variation might be to require someone to achieve 2 different positions, so first go to DLR and then RDLR and both must be held for 5 sec. You can also give the top person positions as well to increase the difficulty. Ex, if the top person gets to a bodylock pass position or chest to chest half guard he wins. You can also use some unusual positions instead of just guards. You can add the arm saddle as a win position if you want to work on your choibars, do leg entanglements for your leglocks or even the front headlock position if you want to work on heisting into chokes.  

Finish Them Game

The objective here is to get either a submission(or a sweep). The bottom person starts in a very advantageous position and tries to finish their partner. Their partner simply tries to escape the bad position as quickly as possible. As an example the bottom person could start from closed guard and the person on top lays down on their chest with their right arm crossed over the center line. Start the round  and the bottom play should immediately try to go for the submission or sweep. If the top player manages to get their arm back and posture up, just start over. This allows the bottom player to get lots of reps in in these very specific situations. Of course from these positions there is usually a primary submission, but you can also look for the secondary submissions or sweeps and more importantly look for the signals that let you know you should switch to them.

Focus

I think there are generally 2 types of people this game is good for. Those who lack confidence and those with too much confidence. If you are someone who is gun shy, use this game to start getting used to firing off submissions quickly. Try to attempt 2-5 submissions every min you play and don't worry if you fail. Of course you should be trying to finish the subs and the defender should be trying to escape, but try not to turn things into a death match as this will only waste time and increase the risk of injury. 

Ideally this game will help with your timing and show you when certain moves are available. It will also show you how to work through people's defenses and give you multiple chances to see common reactions to certain moves. 

Variations

As I said above you can do purely submissions or you can add sweeps and backtakes as well. If you are like me and you mostly sweep from the bottom, you might want to remove this option so you can focus purely on submissions. However when you choose a position, find a place where you have multiple options available so you can learn which move to use at which time. 

In general start closer to the submission if you are lower level than your partner and farther from the sub if you're a higher level. Ex. Starting from shin to shin going against a beginner, looking for a leg lock. Starting from SLX with their hands posted on the ground when going against your instructor.

My Advice

When trying to improve your guard, work on just open guard retention first and then go from there. If you can stop passes when you don't have any connection it will make your life much easier. If you can do that start working on your own personal trouble areas. I think all of these games can be useful for everyone, but it is important to think about what is holding you back from having an amazing guard and start working on that first. 

The great thing about these games is that you can keep doing them over and over and they don't really get stale. Whenever you are working on a new guard you can bust these out and use them to pressure test what you're doing or develop new skills. Almost all of these are good for the top person as well and will help you develop skills there, so if you're doing these with a partner don't think that you're wasting you time being on top. 

You can vary the intensity with these and sometimes that is useful to help you get more reps in. The "You Shall Not Pass" game can be a really good warm up or cool down if you aren't going at a crazy intensity. Due to that that can be done before or after every class.

Hopefully these games will help you develop you guard and of course come up with games of your own. Each person has different strengths and weaknesses so feel free to adjust these games to meet your own needs. These games have helped me develop my guard and hopefully they will do the same for you.