Flow Diagrams for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
Right at the start of my grappling career, I stumbled across this flow chart of Rickson Gracie’s on the web:
This gives a pretty good insight into the way Rickson thinks. As you can see, his whole game is based around the mount position.
Over the years, I have used flow diagrams a lot. These flow charts are a very effective training tool because they instantly let you see where there are gaps in your technical knowledge. Also, just the act of sitting down and making the chart consolidates all your knowledge and reminds you of moves and techniques you may have forgotten.
Types of Flow Diagrams
Because jiu-jitsu was created around positional strategy, I personally like to create my flow charts around certain positions, i.e. mount, or closed guard. But there’s nothing to stop you for creating more specific diagrams around particular sweeps, submissions or whatever.
Below I have included a very basic closed-guard flow diagram. I usually do my flow charts freehand, but this time I digitized one of them so it’s easier for you guys to read. Unfortunately, It came out a little small – click on the image to enlarge it.
So you can see that when I’m fighting from my closed guard, my main strategy is to try to break my opponent’s posture.
How Specific?
If you have a large enough piece of paper, there is no limit to how specific (or broad) you can be with your flow diagrams. As you become more skilled and your depth of technical knowledge increases, the natural progression will be an increase in the complexity of your flow diagrams.
In my opinion, creating flow Diagrams for Brazilian jiu-jitsu is a much more effective method than regular note taking. If I were any good at drawing, I’d even add in little sketches to each of steps in flow diagram.
Let me know if this has helped you, and if you have any tips of your own for making flow diagrams.
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Tags: Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Techniques
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Comments (17)
Nic,
You are taking the game to the next level as usual…. really awesome
I will most definitley be taking your chart and putting lots of thought into it so as to put it into practice on the mat!!
Thanks
Trevor
There is no way that this sort of visualization can’t help your game. I can’t believe I haven’t thought of doing this already. I will definitely be mapping out my go to positions/subs/defences for my favorite spots!
Thanks!!
Fantastic, I first came across the idea of thinking in this way with this basic positional chart from grapplearts,
http://www.mat-time.co.uk/2009/11/positional-hierarchy.html but never really took it any further. I love your way of steping it through from each positon, definitely the way my brain works.
Awesome. As I was working as an IT analyst, I used to draw some of these in my spare time by I let it go… I am glad to see that Black belts like You or Rickson are doing it. It gives a lot of motivation to start it again!
You’re indeed taking the game to the next level.
Really good concept – great work. What program did you use to draw your flow diagram?
Thanks Mitch – I used a program called MINDMAP on Mac. It’s pretty easy to use. Let me know how which software you end up using if you try make your own diagrams.
Nic,
You are taking the game to the next level as usual…. really awesome
I will most definitley be taking your chart and putting lots of thought into it so as to put it into practice on the mat!!
Thanks
Trevor
Great idea. I’ve just had a go with FREEMIND (as it says FREE and produces an end result very much like yours).
Going to add a hyperlink where a node ends in a new position which I cover with a different map.
Excellent diagram, thanks Nicholas!!! I’m only just starting out in Jiu-jitsu but having a visual aid like your flowchart has helped me to piece together each technique being taught to us by our professor’s (especially as my favourite position at the moment is the closed guard). Do you have one for the mount to share with us newbies??
This concept is new for me but looks like a great way to help you develop stratigies from the different positions. Something to look into in my efforts to increase my tournament preparations. Good info.
Thanks
Mike Castro
http://www.teamtooke-cypress.com
Great concept. I’ll definitely look at doing this. Just a couple of questions for you, what’s a :
a) Koala;and
b) cutting armbar?
Thanks.
Nic, thanks for this – more jigsaw pieces as you would say!
Thanks so much for the article about flowcharts and in particular for your closed guard flowchart. As a newcomer to bjj, this really helps me visualize the moves.
great, i love mindmap.
It’s a good idea. Do you have several map, by position ?
Awesome! Thanks you. I can see how this will definitely help my game.
The more I check your site the more I like what you teach ! Congrats !
I’m from Brazil, Santos, SP !
Hope I can go and pratice with you someday !
Nice work you got on the internet ! congrgats again !
I love doing mental jiu jitsu and using charts like this. I remember when my instructor told me about how he studied Rickson’s flow charts and then started making his own. I know that when I started using these techniques my progression became much faster too bad more school don’t teach this sort of thing to beginners.