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"I do understand, to some extent, guys wanting to go out and be aggressive and have this assertive, imposing style. But that's how it was when I was learning from Rorion, and that's how I still teach.
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They're showing Jiu-Jitsu, but they're not showing that kind of Jiu-Jitsu. Most places you go people are just showing moves. And I don't know how many guys out there these days are talking about it in those terms. That's what you have to manage with an untrained guy.
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He's going to try to wrench his way out any way that he can. The assumption is that this guy is going to keep fighting you right up to the bitter end: not with a counter or a defense, but by going crazy. You have to focus on weathering the storm. When you get mounted on a guy like that, you can't rush into things. But the thing is, the average guy you fight out in the street is going to be a lot more like that white belt. It's different from rolling with a blue belt who may be good and fast but who's mostly doing moves that are recognizable as Jiu-Jitsu. What's it like rolling with him? You probably catch him, but up until that point it's kind of crazy, kind of wild and unpredictable. Think about a big, strong white belt on his first day of class. You mount on an untrained guy in the street and he's going to go crazy. You at least know that he's probably going to do some kind of technique to try to deal with whatever you're doing. It's one thing in a Jiu-Jitsu match or even an MMA match, where the guy's defenses are somewhat predictable. "With so many people today the mentality is to go for the submission all the time. It was a lot of things like that, things that an untrained guy in the street might do and probably would do. You'd go to make the frame on the neck and he'd try to roll you off. Keep your base." He would shake you up, try to throw you off. Make a frame, break the grip, take the arm." Rorion would have us in that situation and he'd tell us, "Maintain the mount. Nowadays you might have a guy tell you, "When you're mounted on the guy, and he has you in a headlock, go for the armlock. Even the fundamentals were different, because there was this absolute focus on the reality of a street fight. It was different than a lot of what you see in Jiu-Jitsu today. He wasn't saying, "Do this guard and this guard and this guard." He said, "When you get mounted, when you get in a headlock, when you get mounted on top of the guy…" It was the basics. Rorion wanted people to understand what it would be like in the street. "When I was coming up, the emphasis was always on the reality of the situation. As long as you have a good start to Jiu-Jitsu, everything else is going to be much easier. The people who come to me are going to get solid fundamentals that are going to serve them in whatever focus they pursue. I don't pretend that I'm going to be everything for everyone.
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I have students who start with me and then they fall in love with the sport of Jiu-Jitsu, or they want to pursue MMA, and they go find someplace to train where they can focus on that. It's always been my specialty as a teacher. "My focus has always been on the self-defense aspect of Jiu-Jitsu, on the fundamentals. The following is excerpted and compiled from Richard Bresler's memoir Worth Defending: How Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Saved My Life, now out in its second edition.