At what point do you tap in a blood choke?

[Dirty Dog]

Let me rephrase my last bit:

What order you get those last two in doesn't really matter at my level.

Sounds like you learned a lesson they didn't know they were teaching. That's great.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

@skribs I think I've figured out the issue you've been dealing with. People at your gym are under the impression that there's one way to do things. Idk why, they should know better. Even a white belt in BJJ can tell you there's many ways to do things. Think back to your TKD tactics - sometimes a super fast spin kick is exactly what you want. Sometimes a quick "jab kick" with your lead leg is what you want. Sometimes you want a jab kick followed by the spin kick, to trick them.

Same for BJJ. No one technique is perfect, it's all a matter of how you fool the opponent into falling for your next technique. Which means that any technique can work if you set it up properly. And also means any technique will fail if you didn't set it up properly.
If someone is complaining to you about the order you set your techs up in, they either haven't learned this yet (which I've seen brown belts who don't understand this - they just have a really good understanding of techniques so it doesn't effect them as much), or they do, but are assuming you don't, and advising you assuming you're a noob.

 

[Martial D]

The purple belt at my gym was giving me a hard time for tapping early to a choke yesterday. I felt pressure on both sides of my neck and so I tapped. He told me that if I'm in a choke and I can still breathe, then it's not too late and I should fight out of it. But...a blood choke isn't an air choke. Airflow isn't restricted, but blood flow is.

When do you tap to a blood choke? Is it something you feel in your neck or in your head?

He's a nice guy and I think he's trying to be helpful, but sometimes I think he forgets that I'm a white belt and only been doing BJJ for a few months.

Tap as soon as it's locked in. The idea is to not let it get to that point. Your own safety is always paramount.

 

[dunc]

Frustrating exchange from yesterday.

Professor demonstrates a crab ride. His sequence of events are:

1. Hook the far leg
2. Grab the far ankle
3. Hook the near leg
4. Grab the belt
5. Crab ride

Me and my partner start drilling. Brown belt coach comes by and tells us we're doing it wrong, we need to grab the belt before hooking the near leg. So we start doing it that way.

Black belt coach comes by and tells us we're doing it mostly right, except we need to hook the near leg before grabbing the belt. So we switch back.

Brown belt gets back to us. "You're still doing it wrong."

It's my opinion (after this class) that securing the far leg first (hook and grab) is the most important, and after that you need both the belt and the second hook, but what order you get those in doesn't really matter.

Often the order of things has a big impact on the success rate of a technique in BJJ
However, usually this is most apparent at high levels and you can get away with small errors at the coloured belt levels so there's a good chance that the brown belt is misunderstanding a detail
I'd listen to the black belt

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

So it's already been addressed a couple times in here that the "if you can still breathe" logic is wrong.


What hasn't been said (I think) is someone else shouldn't be the one telling you not to tap. With the exception of some glaring instances where they know they haven't got it right, you're welcome to tap whenever you feel you need to. Asking why you tapped is perfectly fine, if they didn't think they had anything tap-worthy at that point, but telling you not to tap is not okay in my book.

I reread this and have to change my caveat. Even if I know I don't have the sub, if they tap I'm still letting go. The reason is that I don't know if there's some other way that I'm injuring them that I don't realize, and that's not worth the risk. I'll still just ask afterwards why they tapped.
Ultimately that part wasn't relevant to this discussion, but saw my own response and realized it needed a correction.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I reread this and have to change my caveat. Even if I know I don't have the sub, if they tap I'm still letting go. The reason is that I don't know if there's some other way that I'm injuring them that I don't realize, and that's not worth the risk. I'll still just ask afterwards why they tapped.
Ultimately that part wasn't relevant to this discussion, but saw my own response and realized it needed a correction.

There are also times I'll give up a lock without a tap, because I know where it usually causes injury. I had a training partner whose joints were very strong, and his pain threshold was very high. Another student broke this guy's hand practicing an exercise, because he didn't tap out. He didn't really even feel much pain when the bone in his hand broke.

So, yeah, I'll release if they tap, and if it feels "too early", I'll ask them about it. If they don't tap, but I feel like the lock is as far as I can safely go, I'll release it, then ask them if I actually had the lock.

 

[Dirty Dog]

I had one who simply would not tap. He went to sleep a few times, but nope. Never would. So it's best to get him locked in and then release him.

 

[Tez3]

You might cheat him out of the ability to figure out if he is making the technique work or not.

And that would be a bad thing? 😁