Technique vs. Concept

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One of the things I heard a lot when I started BJJ is that lower belts learn techniques, upper belts learn concepts. While these are usually fairly distinct categories (i.e. armbar is a technique, "keep your elbows tight" is a concept), In some cases, there's a specific concept that applied to a technique, for example, "Pinch your knees" when you apply an armbar, but also when you apply a number of other submissions. However, I want to look at where technique failed me, and where concept has fixed some techniques that I just did not understand.

Technique: The Anaconda and the D'arce
For those unfamiliar, these are both variations of front headlock chokes (similar to the guillotine) which lock a figure-4 around the opponent's neck.

• Anaconda Choke:
  • Dig the choking arm across the neck and out past the arm, lock your figure-4 outside.
  • Gator roll towards the trapped arm to get them into position.
  • Walk towards their legs to finish the submission.
• D'arce Choke:
  • Dig the choking arm under their arm and across the neck. Lock a gable grip and scissor clamp your other arm on the back of their head. This is also the position you would use for the Japanese Necktie, but we're not looking at that submission right now.
  • Push them onto their side.
  • Sprawl or walk towards their head to finish the submission.

Learning these from a technique perspective, this is what I got:

• One choke gets the grip from neck-to-arm, the other gets the grip from arm-to-neck.
• One choke rolls, one choke pushes.
• One choke walks towards the legs, one walks towards the head to finish.

Could not keep straight which one was which.

Concept: Figure-4 Choke

• Lock a figure-4 on your opponent's neck and arm.
• The elbow inside the figure-4 makes an arrow pointing the direction I want them to move, and then the direction I want to walk.

This doesn't necessarily help me remember which one is which, but that's not important during a roll. I also need to remember the extra step of using the scissor clamp to set up the D'arce. But this is something that I can actually apply now.

Previously, I just excluded these techniques from my repertoire, because there are two stages where I could go the wrong direction for the grip I have, which means I have a 25% chance of guessing the correct order-of-operations, and that's not counting any failures to execute on my part or successful escapes on my opponent's. But now that I've built a conceptual form of attack that works for both submissions, I can start to work it into my gameplan in rolls and start to really work towards understanding these submissions.