HEADQUARTERS – The Fight System

3 – HQ Setup from Ankles

3 – HQ 2 Ways to Clear Ankle Grip

3 – Headquarters Passing Series

This is one of our most important drill series for passing the guard.

What we need to understand conceptually is that, fundamentally, we have two major threats at close and long range in our opponent’s guard – at close range, the threat is submissions like the triangle choke and armbar. At long range, the primary threat is the opponent’s open guard sweeps – which can also pitentially lead to submissions by leg lock against us if we don’t take a position to mitigate that risk.
We need to find the right “happy medium” between those two risks where we are out of range of their submission threats, but still stuffing their open guard and being heavy against their sweep attempts. The answer to that puzzle is the Headquarters Position – allowing us to stuff the open guard sweeps and set up our guard passes while staying out of the range of the triangle and armbar threats.
But which threat is greater? The submission threat is greater, because if we are swept we can still recover using our own guard and avoid being submitted, so we have to remember that it is safer to pass up off the ground using the headquarters as a setup to pass the guard.
Here you can see that we’re putting this drill series in 3 stages – setting up the HQ vs different guard scenarios – vs sitting upright opponent, vs scissors guard, etc. Then we’re looking at the 3 main ways of passing from hand positions based on their reaction. Last but not least we’re passing around the north-south to the far side using the pinwheel spin to kimura-stepover armbar (Juji-Gatame.) Altogether you have a dynamic and functional pass-to-finish system that is one of the most reliable ways to win in rolls and competition. The reason why this passing strategy is so effective is that you will be able to access a high-percentage finishing pathway whether you finish your pass to side control or mount (using your standard seatbelt grips and ratcheting to the arm triangle, americana, or spin-armbar,) or if your opponent does win the underhook on you as a last-ditch pass defense, you will now be able to spin around the north-south all the way to the other side and use the Kimura-Stepover-Armbar from the “Off-Side” top control. If the opponent is able to fight up to their knees, however, we’ll simply revert to the sprawl-FHL-to-Backtake sequence from Fundamentals 2, which will lead us to the RNC finish.

3 – Headquarters Pressure

4 – Open Guard Standing to HQ

Being on top and passing the guard is fundamentally about sweep defense: putting together balance, agility, and pressure to make your opponent feel your weight and get right back to position if they stumble you with their guard sweeps.
As we know from our Level 3 fundamentals course, the “Headquarters” Position (HQ) is the universal checkpoint to defend and shut down guard sweeps, stabilize, and set up a clean guard pass. So we want to suppress their open guard and get to the HQ position as quickly as possible.
However, the point of vulnerability is when we have to stand up to open the closed guard, that’s when the opponent will go for their open guard sweeps and we have to train sweep defense with live situational rounds just like takedown defense and get to the HQ from those sweep defenses.

4 – The Secret to HQ

THE SECRET TO HEADQUARTERS (PRESSURE PASSING) PART 1:
A great technical knowledge lecture about the “Headquarters” system, AKA pressure passing, where we’ll be discussing:

– Fundamental movement patterns

– WHY use the HQ system? Top vs Bottom game analysis/discussion

– Solving the puzzle of clearing their ankle grips

4 – The Secret to HQ Pt. 2

The Secret to Heaquarters Position (Pressure Passing) Part 2:
Countering their turn-down. This knowledge lecture is all about using your initial knee pressure to recenter the pass (run the hips flat) so that you can finish more of your passes directly to a stable top control, which is always our first choice.
But it’s very important to have the “Pinwheel spin” ready as a backup system, and to do it right so that you don’t give them the belly-down single leg!
So the whole form of the Pinwheel is to carefully keep that target leg of your out of their reach and get to the far side as quick as possible, going completely around the North-South and skipping the NS pinning phase entirely.
Also looking at submission entries and back takes along that pathway.

4 – Opening the Guard Standing and Defending Sweeps to Force HQ

More about opening the guard standing and defending sweeps to force HQ –
Fighting hands-vs-feet can get old pretty quickly! Legs are bigger than arms, stronger.
If you focus on bringing in your own legs to use your knees and elbows together to build walls – you make the battle unfair and automatically win.

4 – Headquarters Staple Defense to SLX

4 – HQ for Early SLX Prevention

This is an early preventive vs the leg lock entry (called “ashi garami”, “SLX,” meaning “single-leg X-guard, the sweeping position which you can finish with a straight ankle lock from on the ground.)
If they do manage to get to the SLX/ashi, your last ditch will be to step on the bicep as they attempt to wrap the overhook, push down their hooking leg, and hit the “Jose Aldo” (rip out running escape.)
This is what the term “layer of footlock defense” refers to that I call out when we’re drilling – there’s layers, and the earlier, the better! Simply having the Headquarters (or “float passing”/“pressure passing”) position in the first place is a huge advantage! Watch how relevant the shin-frame positions are to the danger of the foot lock!

4 – Headquarters v.s. De La Riva

In Fundamentals 3, we worked on setting up HQ from standing double ankle grips vs their open guard, stuffing the feet to make the HQ position. Although it is better to get the ankle grips and set up HQ preventing the De La Riva hook from coming in, sometimes we get caught in the DLR midway through our pass and need to re-make our HQ and re-pass from already being entangled in the DLR hook. In Fundamentals 4, we are looking at the key details of re-building the HQ position and re-establishing our top pressure when the opponent is already ahead in their open guard game.
This is a critical skill to be competitive.

4 – Headquarters to Force-Halfguard

Forcing half-guard and half-guard passing are some of the simplest and yet the most difficult fundamentals on the path to blue belt in my program. I put it right at the end on part 4 of the white belt fundamentals because it involves complex hook play combined with precise balance and pressure. Mastering the half guard will require a studious, slowed down approach. It’s not a matter of fast reactions but knowing the right detail in advance. Achieving the blue belt is for the serious student of technical grappling who’s already deeply committed to getting good at JiuJitsu. So, bear with me if these video tutorials seem long or slow, it’s the nature of the subject matter – but I know for anyone committed to getting over the hump with it, you’ll find these very valuable if not indispensable. Studying will really help you keep things straight in your head and remember the positioning under fatigue, so here you go!

4 – Headquarters and Negative Passing

4 – HQ to Force-Half to Mount

By now you thoroughly understand the value of the Head-Quarters (HQ) position to simply shut down all of the opponent’s open guard sweeps – allowing us to just maintain top position without getting swept and keep that pressure on them until we pass, and also being a great position to retreat to should our opponent escape our top controls and start to put us in trouble!
The Force-Halfguard position is equally important to our top game for exactly the same reason as the HQ is important from longer range. The Force-Half shuts down everything the opponent can do to us in a very CLOSE range. In their full guard, whether their Butterfly or Closed guard, we have to constantly be wary of the danger of sweeps and submissions, but in contrast the Force-Half allows us to neutralize the opponent while maintaining continuous pressure – without having to retreat to a safe distance to avoid submissions. This helps athletes get away from the cycle of attacking and retreating to same distance when on top. To pass the guard we have to KEEP GOING FORWARD until we’re past the danger of the submissions, and the Force-Half is one great way to do that.
While the Half-Guard can be an offensive position from bottom, in the Force-Half we are choosing to enter into a dominant positional angle that neutralizes their offense by running their hips flat and keeping their shoulders pinned to the ground – skills you’ve been developing since early in our program.
Note that this seemingly small advancement – into their half guard – puts us in position to win a 7-point battle in the sport of Brazilian JiuJitsu: i.e. 3 points for the guard pass and 4 points for the mount position – should we pass to mount and stabilize the position for 3 seconds. So, you can see why for anyone who wants to compete in BJJ the halfguard position both top and bottom is a critical skillset. While even a young child can learn the basic idea of forcing half guard and pushing down their leg to step over to mount, to execute this effectively there are key details and subtleties to the weight placement and hip placement to it that have to be felt in position with somebody who knows it. So, this is a great example of how grappling technique has to be passed down through mentorship or learned directly through competition with someone who knows it. Competitively you’ll typically learn by losing to someone who knows a technique, so of course we recommend learning through mentorship long before competing!