Review of "Under Pressure: Leg Entanglements" by Brian Glick

[skribs113 133]

This is an instructional that has me re-thinking my approach to reviewing instructionals. Granted, I'm very new at this. So it makes sense there's a bit of a learning curve. We'll get more into how my thoughts changed throughout the course of this instructional through the course of this review.

We have a blue belt at my gym who is a leg lock specialist. Also, I'd like to get a better understanding of leg locks before I get to brown belt, where heel hooks, knee bars, toeholds, and a bunch of other submissions become legal. For this reason, I sought a leg entanglements video, and this one seemed like a great choice.

At first, I was pretty frustrated with this video series.

• He tends to use a lot of Japanese terminology without defining it. He's a Danaher student, so that makes sense. But he starts off the video series explaining that "Kuzushi" is important, and the term "Kuzushi" isn't defined for another hour or two in the video.
• He doesn't differentiate between what is legal for upper belts only. As a purple belt, I found myself questioning a lot of the positions (as evidence by the other thread I made on this video series). I had to ask my Professor a bunch of follow-up questions regarding rules. I complained that the video didn't explain "this is for upper belts", but my Professor told me they won't do that in an instructional.
• He doesn't always explain the "why", sometimes just the "what". However, over the course of this video, I'd say that the vast majority of the time he does explain why. Just every once in a while when he misses it, it stands out.
• He assumes you've watched previous videos in the series. I actually am thinking about at least 1 of the 2 videos (on the Clamp position, which I think would help me with my size). Similar to my problem with Kuzushi or with variants of "Iremi Ashi Garami", I didn't know what the clamp position was until the first chapter of the 6th video.

From what I can tell, Kuzushi is off-balancing your opponent. Ashi positions are leg lock positions, Ashi Garami is essentially Single Leg X guard, and Iremi Ashi Garami is the SLX hook with the outside leg, and a cross-side hook with the other leg.

Additionally, Brain Glick's intentions for this video were different than what I hoped to get out of it. He was presenting a series of attack sequences starting from various guard positions to enter into and attack leg locks. What I was hoping was to learn how to win the leg entanglement battle when your opponent is attempting leg locks. How do you win 50/50? How do you maintain dominance in an ashi position without letting your opponent get into an advantageous spot? If your opponent has you in an ashi position, how can you effectively leg pummel to get into a 50/50 or even an advantageous position? Unfortunately I did not learn that.

However, I've come to rethink how I'm approaching instructionals. Instead of looking at it as I go through and deciding based on every little thing, I'm instead looking at what I got out of the instructional and how well overall presented the material was. I do think my old reviews still stand. There's two that I rated S tier and one I rated D tier. The two S tier instructionals I feel were nearly perfect, but there were specific elements that I missed for one reason or another. The D tier instructional was just very hard to get through.

So let's look at this from my new perspective.

• The video series was very well presented and very comprehensive within the scope the author intended.
• Of all of the videos that I have watched thus far, I have come out of this video series with the best understanding of the material, because he did the best job explaining the important details (when he eventually defined the terms), and he did the best job of ensuring that all important details were on camera at the correct angles to see them.
• I came away from this video (after asking my Professor my follow-up questions) with a better understanding of leg entanglements.
• I will most likely purchase another instructional from this series down the line, specifically his Clamp video.
• But...I do think he could have done a better job of defining terms as they're being used instead of waiting until much later in the video.

With all of that in mind, my overall score for this instructional is S-tier.
Tiers are F, D, C, B, A, S, SS.

 

[Tony Dismukes112 8]

From what I can tell, Kuzushi is off-balancing your opponent. Ashi positions are leg lock positions, Ashi Garami is essentially Single Leg X guard, and Iremi Ashi Garami is the SLX hook with the outside leg, and a cross-side hook with the other leg.

Just want to confirm that you are correct on this.

 

[wab25]

From what I can tell, Kuzushi is off-balancing your opponent. Ashi positions are leg lock positions, Ashi Garami is essentially Single Leg X guard, and Iremi Ashi Garami is the SLX hook with the outside leg, and a cross-side hook with the other leg.

I wanted to add a little more detail here.

"Kuzushi" is used with this definition in all the Japanese martial arts (that I know of).... while they all accomplish it differently and maybe demonstrate it in different situations... it is very commonly used in all Japanese arts. Most of the BJJ folks I have trained with or talked with are also familiar with that term.... this is probably why this one was not defined.

"Ashi Garami" is "leg entanglement." Different Japanese arts may have different "techniques" by this name, which may be different than the definition that is used in BJJ. I believe BJJ uses the same definition of this term as Judo does... but if you ask a Danzan Ryu guy about Ashi Garami, you will get something different, but still a leg entanglement. I believe a few other Japanese arts may also have different variations for this term.

So, Kazushi is commonly used by all Japanese arts and a few more to be off balancing. Ashi Garami is used by Japanese arts to be some sort of leg entanglement, however the specific techniques may be different between the arts. (While Judo and BJJ may be the Single Leg X Guard)

 

[skribs113 133]

"Kuzushi" is used with this definition in all the Japanese martial arts (that I know of).... while they all accomplish it differently and maybe demonstrate it in different situations... it is very commonly used in all Japanese arts. Most of the BJJ folks I have trained with or talked with are also familiar with that term.... this is probably why this one was not defined.

The only Japanese terms I believe are fully universal to BJJ are kesa gatame (mainly for the memes), seioi nagi (I know I spelled that wrong), and maybe ashi. The others may be fairly common, especially in schools that are more of the Danaher style of keeping with Japanese names. However, my Professor barely even cares about the names of things in English or Portugese, often times just calling something "arm lock" or "choke" for example.

There may be a few terms I missed, but I think if you look at BJJ as a whole, Japanese terms aren't fairly common.

I do think martial artists training Japanese arts (and to a lesser extent, this specific group of BJJ folks) tend to assume the Japanese terms are more universally known than they are. For example, people on Taekwondo forums (i.e. r/Taekwondo) using a ton of the Japanese names for the techniques and stances. I could at least understand using the Korean terms there...

 

[wab25]

I do think martial artists training Japanese arts (and to a lesser extent, this specific group of BJJ folks) tend to assume the Japanese terms are more universally known than they are.

That was why I wanted to add the details that one is pretty much set in all arts that use it..... while the other is a little less settled.... the translation to english is settled, but the translation to technique has some variation.

The terms you brought up: Kesa Gatame and Seoi Nage are also more on the settled side... where all arts (that I know of) that use these terms are talking about the same technique.

 

[skribs113 133]

My issue with this topic is: if you use local language names (i.e. English in America), even if the terms are different, you can get an idea of what is meant. For example, an ITF guy may call it a "turning kick" where I would call it a "roundhouse kick", and while I may initially think it's a spinning kick, at least I know what realm of technique we're talking about.

I've had the term defined for me recently, and I couldn't tell you what "soto gaeshi" means. I am guessing some kind of throw? Or sweep? Or joint lock? I believe it was from a Judo video, so that's my best educational guess. I at least know with "turning kick" that there's a kick and there's some sort of turn. But without knowing the root words in Japanese, I can't even contextualize a definition.

 

[drop bear114 53]

I try to go with the naming conventions of professional wrestling.

 

[Kung Fu Wang114 144]

I try to go with the naming conventions of professional wrestling.

I don't understand why people have to use the Japanese terms. I use the term "Chinese wrestling" instead or "Shuai Chiao" or "Shuai Jiao". If I can just save 1 person not to use Google translation, it will be worthy.

The only problem to use the English term is when 2 different associations use different English terms, it may be difficult to communicate.

For example:

- ASCSA uses "waist lift".
- USSCA uses "hip throw".

 

[skribs113 133]

I don't understand why people have to use the Japanese terms. I use the term "Chinese wrestling" instead or "Shuai Chiao" or "Shuai Jiao". If I can just save 1 person not to use Google translation, it will be worthy.

The only problem to use the English term is when 2 different associations use different English terms, it may be difficult to communicate.

For example:

- ASCSA uses "waist lift".
- USSCA uses "hip throw".

But "waist lift" and "hip throw" are also a lot easier to communicate with each other than a non-Chinese speaker saying "Shuai Chaio".