Favoured Techniques: The Flower Sweep.

Every practitioner of Jiu Jitsu has a favourite technique or two that they like to hit. We all have go to subs from top mount and moves that you like to hit when you've got a guy in your guard. For whatever reason, whether you think the move looks cool, it works well with your style of game or body type or if you use it so often it's just ingrained into your muscle memory so much so that when your mind is feeling heavy from the exhaustion of rolling against multiple opponents you instantly go for that one favoured move (making you a bit predictable but when you are really knackered it's the only thing that springs to mind).

Now I personally have quite a few moves in mind when I thought about this ranging from those that have been with me since my early days training in Burham, to techniques that I have learned through Chico Mendes at Trojan Free Fighters Bristol, to stuff that I've only read about or seen on YouTube. And the beauty of this particular part of my blog is that I can waffle on about where I first learned the technique (if I remember) and how much success I have had with it in rolling and maybe what back up plans I've ever used in the event of a failure.

The first of these "Favoured Techniques" that I will feature on here will be a move that I consider to be my go to sweep from closed guard. This is the first sweep I nearly always try when I have a guy in my closed guard and has been for the best part of 2 and a half years. Now you'd think that that would probably have to end now with the writing of this article (should anyone I know actually read this) but I am fairly certain that all of my regular sparring partners are fully aware of my love for this sweep and yet it still continues to yield results with a fairly high success rate. I don't know if I can attribute that to any kind of high skill level with this particular sweep or if my body type and flexibility lend themselves well to the completion of the move, but I have always found a better sweep to not sweep ratio with the use of this move. 

The sweep I refer to today is known as the "Flower Sweep" and was first taught to me back in the very early days of my Jiu Jitsu  journey (I think possibly my 4th ever lesson or something like that) by Ian Rossiter, then Head Instructor at Somerset Jiu Jitsu Alliance located in King Alfreds Sport Centre at Burham on Sea on Thursday nights. It was not the first sweep from closed guard that I was taught (that was the scissor sweep) but it was the sweep I preferred to use and found more instinctive and intuitive.

The situation I have found of best utilising this technique has been when your opponent is postured up in your closed guard, possibly ready to start to break the guard, with one hand high up you body, possibly making a grip for your lapel, the other hand down low attempting to pressure your hips or grip on your belt. I would then take the arm with the hand gripping my lapel (or whatever it's doing) by the sleeve in a tight grip, with the hand opposite (so if it's his right hand on my lapel I'd grab it with my left) and pull it so it's stays in close to me. At the same time I would be using my other hand to reach down and secure a hold of the lower leg of his gi pants, sometimes this can be a knee but I more often prefer to grab the pants near the ankle. This may require a slight hip adjustment to reach down depending on how flexible you are.

With those two grips in place I can open my guard and simultaneously swing the leg on the side where I have the gi pants gripped, up to my opponents shoulder, while the leg on the side where I have the hand secured near to my upper chest drops down to provide the trip. I would then push with the leg against the shoulder whilst pulling on the gi pants to overbalance the opponent and add a little pull to the secured arm. This motion will flip the opponent over my other leg onto their back whilst I grab hold and use their momentum and a handy little push off my elbow to take myself over into mount. That particular move in competition is worth 6 points if the mount is secured correctly.

I have included a video with a close representation of how I perform the Flower Sweep. It was unbelievably difficult to find a semi decent video of the Flower Sweep in just the style I wanted on YouTube so I hope you appreciate this effort uploaded by BaltimoreSelfDefense.

That's all for now guys \m/