The Shintaro Higashi Show - How to Stay Loose While Grappling

Episode Date: February 28, 2022

In any sport, you become "loose" and "effortless" as you improve your skills. The same is true for grappling, but it is complicated by the fact that your default instinct is to become "stiff" in order to prevent yourself from getting thrown, taken down and choked. How can we fight this instinct and stay "loose" while grappling? In this episode, Shintaro and Peter offer some advice on how you can stay loose while grappling. Please support us on Patreon if you can: https://www.patreon.com/shintaro_higashi_show. Any amount helps!

Hello everyone, welcome back to the Shintaro Higashi show with Peter Yu. You ever feel sometimes you're grappling and you're tight? Like lockdown tight, stiff? Right, stiff farming, you find yourself stiff farming and you're not flowing, you're not smooth. And you're going against someone that's just sort of a lockdown situation. And they're bombarding you with choppy movements. Right. On the contrary, have you ever find yourself going with a person

who's really smooth with things and loose, and you just can't do anything about it? And they have sort of achieved this flow state. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's what it's about today. How to stay loose while grappling. Yeah. So what does it even mean though?

Like I think a lot of times you can feel it, but I don't think a lot of people know. I think that's the biggest problem. It's a very, very convoluted thing because when you're doing judo, you're working out with someone and you're a beginner and then all of a sudden the higher belt says, relax, relax.

Stop being so tense. Relax, relax. And then you relax and you get launched. But when you're tense and stiff, they have a hard time throwing you. Right. That is true. So there's a little bit of a conflict there. There's a cognitive dissonance.

Right? Yeah. there there's a cognitive dissonance right yeah i think person telling me to stay loose if it's going to lead to me getting thrown i think this that's like one of the biggest obstacles you need to overcome like uh to get over the like go from a beginner to an intermediate grappler yes yes and it is true it's harder to take down someone that's stiff it is but being stiff also shuts down your own offense because you're fully defensive if you think about offense and defense working together right if you're watching sport like basketball if the ball is traveling in this direction, one team is defending, other team is offensive. There's a clear offense-defense and the ball transfers possession and the ball is going in the opposite direction. Now, this team is offense, this team is defensive.

In grappling and fighting arts, those things kind of happen simultaneously yeah the lines are blurred yes lines are blurred and if you really focus your attention on one of those things you could increase the amplitude of your offense by just being straight offensive if you want to increase your defense if you just focus on defense your defense increases but your offense decreases. They kind of work hand in hand. Except if you're very offensive, they say best offense is also good defense. So it has sort of this compounding effect.

Because when you're offensive, naturally they lock up, so you don't have to defend yourself. Right. So that's the place where you want to be. Offensive in a way where the opponents shut down therefore you don't have to defend yourself and in order to be offensive you need to stay loose yes that's correct yeah and it's sort of the optimal state of attacking if you look at any sport if you watch a great golfer they line up their shot with the ball in the golf club and you know they're outside in the sun unlike us sitting in a basement get no vitamin d they walk up to the thing and

their shoulders are relaxed and they swing the thing back and then they're loose and then they swing right through the thing right looks effortless uh-huh right but have you ever been to the golf range and you're sort of a novice and then you say, okay, let's compete to see who could hit this ball the farthest. And none of us are great golfers. You're going to squeeze the club and you're going to swing back and then you're going to rip it as hard as you can. Right? Yeah. It doesn't, you can't hit it far like that.

You can't really hit it far like that. Yeah. So it's kind of like that can't really hit it far like that yeah so it's kind of like that we're naturally have a tendency to have this fight or flight response to where we stiffen up at the very onset of stress right and it's natural for instance if you're falling in a way right you're back to spasm up to protect your spine so it's physiology yeah right how do you overcome that right the idea when it comes to this right and then it just speaking of physiology of staying loose makes it better makes it easier for you to transfer energy from your core to your limbs i guess absolutely yeah yeah so your energy

you you can hit hit, you can throw harder, you can punch harder if you're loose. Yeah. Yeah. So that's going back to the offensive side. So I think one thing people say when a higher belt tries to teach this point to a beginner, one concrete thing people usually say is that oh you can shake your shakes your partner's gi yeah to relax and i kind of i used to do that but i kind of stopped doing that now yeah for a variety of reasons but like what does that even mean like does it actually help shaking the gi no it's nonsense i have very strong feelings about it okay it actually has nothing to do with staying loose yeah and it's very interesting i'm actually making a series of judo videos about why

the japanese shake the opponent's gi yeah wow they do they do shake like the pros shake check the girls shake the geese yeah but they do it with certain intent and the reasoning is very very hidden and if you listen to the language the coaches aren't saying shake the gi they're saying move your lapel hand so move your lapel right so as you're moving your arm, the Gi moves too. And then they're moving really quickly. So in Japanese, they don't say shake the Gi. They say move your hand.

Move your lapel hand. It's a byproduct of moving your lapel hand. And they're moving it with purpose. Because if we're trying to game this hand up the person's collar to control their head more, moving the hand is advantageous. Because if I'm just locked on really hard and then they're pinning this arm down, there's downward force on the arm, that arm's not going to go up. Right.

So maybe you move it faster outside and then you cut the hand right by sharply moving your arm violently then their opponent's grip might loosen and then you could climb up the collar kind of like that it's very hard to visualize it so i don't want to like do a disservice check out check out your youtube video yeah video i've been uh and you know i've been known for saying don't shake the gi yeah i don't think you've ever said that yeah i do shake the gi but that's a byproduct of me moving my arm here's another example that's going to make sense you ever watch boxing yeah the target is the head right and i'm trying to connect my hands to their face correct right right so in order to create a moving target they move their head right yeah so it's harder to hit

yes exactly if i have sleeve hand and now i have the lapel hand and i know their hand is trying to target this part of my elbow right to pin it down to pin it down but they don't have their hand on it yet as soon as i grab the lapel look i move the elbow so now it's a moving target and now they're gonna have a hard time settling their hand on the gi so that's why when you see two on one position in japanese judo i have two hands on and you have one hand on and my one hand on the two hands on the part that you don't have is the sleeve I want to move my arm

to make it a moving target so your partner can't grab onto it tightly yeah exactly so now while the arm is moving they're fishing around

to grab that hand I cut the other hand so now I got two you got none no i see and that's the moment where you go marote senagi because there's no contact for you to resist my movements right right right right so shake the key to loosen shake the key to distract not really distract not really i think there's a lot of like if us when you play a sport in every sport you see a pro doing certain moves but then on the surface level you think they're just doing it for like shake the gear like they it looks like they're shaking the gear but they're it's actually the byproduct a lot of times when pros do certain moves, it's the byproduct of something more fundamental.

Yes, absolutely. I think it's very interesting. Like karate guys who are just hopping up and down, hopping up and down. You don't see that in boxing. You don't see that in Muay Thai or Thai boxing. Why are they the only people? Actually, Taekwondo also.

Yeah, Taekwondo, they bounce around a lot too. So what's the purpose behind it? So I've been in a room with striking coaches who are like, bounce up and down. Why?

What's the purpose behind it? Bouncing up and down is a byproduct of whatever I'm trying to do. Why do karate guys and Taekwondo guys bounce up and down as a byproduct of whatever i'm trying to do why do karate guys and taekwondo guys bounce up and down i don't have an answer to that i kind of do but i don't want to like oh okay well it'll be uh it's not a karate show we could have a karate episode too actually if anyone's interested yeah well yeah that's actually that would be actually interesting you know you've done karate a little bit, right?

Yeah, yeah, a lot of it. A lot of it, right, with your dad? Yeah, yeah. Cool. All right, so staying loose, yeah, go ahead. Yeah, staying loose. So, yeah, so shaking the gi, I mean, it has a different purpose. And so, and it goes beyond, like we talked about, it goes beyond just judo and other grappling arts

you know so wrestling too you're not really like good wrestlers i lose and is it the same idea like even in wrestling like it because you want to be attacking and they always say like a lot of high school kids the you know beginners kind of lock ear to ear in a collar tie right never want to be year to year because now you're locked up upper body and then a lot of uh isometric contraction right so now you're like locked up there and now you can't freely move and faint and right take the other person out of position because now you're locked up and stiff right right so it's kind of the same idea yeah and i will tell you like how do you get loose how do you not go into sort of this lockdown mode when you're actually grappling and jujitsu kind of has a nice tool to train it specifically uh-huh bjj i'm saying something

nice about bjj you usually do yeah i do i usually do i'm pretty positive about it like that's sort of my overall demeanor when it comes to this martial art yeah uh but the thing that they have that's very unique to them that a lot of other martial arts have also but is not focused on is flow rolling but is not focused on is flow rolling. Best Russian wrestlers do this. Hours and hours and hours. They flow wrestle. They relax.

They go for underhook. They go for body lock. They lift. They put the person down. And they have sort of this reduced intensity training we talked about in the other podcast. They have this. Specifically. They do this.

The best guys do this japanese judo guys they train and they like to relax even wrestlers that are american wrestlers they kind of have this kind of training methodology but judo guys don't do it as much it's not really part of their curriculum because it's choppy and aggressive a lot of the times when you come to look at novice players. Because they think of judo as sort of like this Olympic style, like one or two off attacks, right? Right, right. So jiu-jitsu kind of has the culture of, hey man, let's flow roll and hang out and go from position to position. And the reason why they can do this a lot better is because the risks are lower

i see i see low rolling what's the risk if we're not finishing submissions we're just fighting for position we're just on the ground right now i'm in side control now your knee elbow escape and as your knee elbow escaping the knee shield comes in and i hop over to the other side and then you know you decide to turtle and now i'm attacking the back and you do a sit out turn in and then you know i'm trying to put my hooks in you defend it i'm looking for the neck and going for the arm bar you know you hitchhiker out of the thing and there's zero risk there because we're not trying to submit each other uh-huh when there's reduced risk you could do things more relaxed when the risk of when you're training judo is getting slammed on your head you're locking up that the fight and fear uh yeah flight and uh fight and fly yeah

yeah because it works if you focus all your attention on defense and a good example is this in j, they have team tournaments all the time. So it's a seven versus seven. Sometimes it's weight class. Sometimes it's the seven best person on their team. But they do it all the time. University team championships, high school team championships. And then they tally up the wins.

Sometimes you go up and it's like two to two. And then, you know, the fifth person going out there is not as good as the other person. And the other person's a champion. The coach says, I want you to go out there and draw. Just don't get thrown. So now that athlete can just focus on not getting thrown. To force a tie. Right. And then, you know, I know the next two guys in this team will be able to go out there and perform and win whatever right right right so it becomes part

of a strategy but when the coach says don't go get thrown now the game is different because the objectives are different right if you focus 100 on defense Your defense is going to get better. Right, right. Kind of, kind of, right? I'm like kind of oversimplifying things. Yeah. It's hard to throw someone that's fully defensive. Right. So to tell someone that's fully defensive and stiff to relax so you can throw them, there's a disconnect there. I see.

Yeah. I see. I see So teaching them and drilling them In a way Where there's reduced risk of getting bombed Will ultimately let them Train in a way Where they're relaxed

I see So what kind of method do you suggest To reduce the risk We did this yesterday We did grip fighting Dominant position Hold it for 5 seconds Reduce the risk. We did this yesterday. Oh, yeah? We did grip fighting, dominant position, hold it for five seconds, reduce the intensity little by little so let the other person work out of it. Right?

And really focus on that losing position. Because when you're losing position, it's very natural to get stiff or like drop down for a bailout technique or a tomonage. Right? But stay in there. Stay in that pocket. There's no risk of you getting slammed stay in there relax and then work yourself out of it by doing light attacks okay no one's trying to throw anybody here there's no risk of getting thrown if you're in dominant position you're not

attacking so now you'd be putting yourself in bad situations where the opponent is not going to bomb you and you're actively attacking with the means to improve position without the risk of getting put on your head. So now these people are becoming more comfortable. So now when they're actually doing live grappling, live fighting, they're like, okay, I've been here before. I'm not going to be as tense. I see. Right. I see. So that's one way. they're like okay i've been here before i'm not going to be as tense i see right i see so it's kind of way it's kind of counterintuitive counterproductive to tell beginners to just relax i guess yeah they can't do it it's their natural default yeah yeah we have a white belt

right now he's just crazy tense and crazy and my indirect way of trying to correct that behavior is telling them listen you're not trying to compete with the black belt in front of you the green belt in front of you if you're trying to compete against that person that person will beat you right right that will person will put a hurting on you the goal is to learn and they are your guide you're not competing with them so try things in a relaxed manner because they're instructed not to put you on your head so now they have a little bit of a different mindset going into that round therefore they're a little bit more relaxed oh this person in front of me is not trying to take my head off or slam me oh i should trust this person so this it's it even goes beyond just training it's about community too you gotta like

beginners have to feel have to be able to feel comfortable with other others that you're running a dojo and there are people who feel for fearful of each other you're gonna have a lot of stiff athletes yeah yeah yeah athletes defensive posture people trying not to get thrown and going for one offs and two off so they're getting frustrated um great way for injuries to happen and it's not it's it's not even that fun that way no it's not that fun but you know there's ways around beating stiff opponents you know right going the opposite way cutting the the hands, trying to off-balance them in a different way, going underneath them for a tomonage or faking tomonage, creating movement, pulling their head down.

There's a whole system behind it. But that system is often not taught because the people who are competing don't compete against guys that are fully defensive. don't compete against guys that are fully defensive. Yeah, right. So a lot of the instructionals out there are how to do judo against another offensive judo player, and this is how I won a championship. Right, right.

Has no connection with actual dojo judo where you're fighting novices who are stiff. I actually made a DVD about this. Yeah. Breaking through the stiff arm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Sanjuro Fanatics. That's why, like, the champions don't teach you about this.

It's a really, really long-winded commercial. That's right. Got you, guys. We got you. Yeah. But nice, nice. Yeah, that BJJ flow rolling. Yeah, I've done it, and it yeah i'm not i wasn't used to it

but yeah i think it's it's a very good way to even just warm up and be safe and um yep i didn't that was a good revelation that i didn't think it was a mindset problem i just thought it was a technique problem like people sniffing it up but it is a mindset yeah yeah so i guess i wasn't focusing on the right thing i always try to explain the mechanics and all it doesn't go low risk no ego low risk yeah ego comes into play i will never lose to this guy i will never let this guy throw me yeah you're gonna be stiff natural default of human nature you know uh you know like you ever like have a teacher call on you and you weren't prepared in school right probably never happened to you because you

went to princeton but it happened to me all the time did you do the reading last night ah you know and you kind of get this like you start stiffening up right and your hands get sweaty and then your heart starts beating how can it be a loose competitive optimal athlete when that sort of response is innate that's right and it works too i mean defensive wise you of course you can't attack yeah and then your friend next to you is like hey man just relax everything's gonna be okay it's like screw off man i'm failing this class like i'm gonna have to take summer school yeah right right. It is stressful and it's a natural response. And same thing with Randori. Yeah.

So focus on that mental side of things, guys, when you want to stay loose while grappling. And I do have to say, right, if you're in dominant position a lot of the times, especially in Nuwaza, a lot of it is isometric contractions and you do want to stiffen yourself. For instance, if you have the person's back, you have the hooks in and you have the over under you want to lock it in so the person's not going to go away so you're making yourself stiff in

certain shapes right i see certain situations you need certain situations yes so it's a interplay between molding your body certain way stiff relax stiff relax because sometimes you do have to kind of Step on or push the face away or whatever it is. You know Makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, it's a new once approach. Yeah Anything else? No, thank you guys for listening to me rant and Thank You Peter. I appreciate you for doing all that you do Oh, thank you. Thanks for having me. Yeah, cool and If you guys have any suggestions you know send us send them our way support us on patreon for more direct access to us and stay tuned for the next episode guys yep thank you guys thank you