Alright purple belts, this is what you all have been waiting for. As a white belt, I asked you to move. As a blue belt, I asked you to connect. Pressure is a skill that needs to be developed over time. Before we drop 100 kilos (an ode to Robson Moura, one of my favorite artists), there are perquisite skills you have had to conquer. Now that you know how to move and have a sense of physical connection and sensitivity, you have the capacity to apply serious pressure.
To apply pressure, you need to know its sources and how to use them together. Build a high pressure game by understanding each source of pressure independently, and then learn to use them together. A key insight to understand in maximizing your pressure is that gravity only works so hard. There is an old line of thinking that pressure is just letting gravity do the work, but this isn’t so. No experienced grappler will be phased if you take a nap on them. Pressure is a force you must generate. Here we go:
Sources
Driving
The most powerful source or pressure is your legs. Although pressure feels like you are being smashed into the mat, the strongest pressure doesn’t push you straight into the mat, but rather pushes relatively parallel to the mat. You need to be on your toes, and driving with your legs. The power of your legs must be the primary source of your of your pressure. This requires being on your toes so that you can drive into the mat.
Pulling
As you connect to your opponents upper body, your arms should be pulling in. You should not have your elbows on the mat. Think of doing a row, or squeezing a watermelon so tight it explodes.
Twisting
You should be contorting your opponents body in different directions. As an example, using your shoulder to push some ones head away, as you pull their arm in. Think of wringing out a wet towel out. You can also do this by pointing the shoulders and hips in different directions.
Fitting In vs Focal Points
Fitting in to your opponent is closing all the spaces that you can. Make them feel you. Close the gaps. Use your entire body. Using focal points is minimizing the surface area in which you apply pressure. Both of these concepts are important. Maximizing connection can increase the level of control that you have and gives you greater sensitivity to your opponents body. Creating focal points will increase force felt in a single place. You will have to balance these two concepts with each other, move be able to seamlessly move between them. Luckily, you have already focused on movement and connection, so you have the capacity to do this.
Suffocation
There are two methods to make breathing difficult. One, is the direct application of pressure to the chest. The other is to directly cover the face. This source of pressure is the icing on the cake. Its what is done to finish the job after you have layered on the other mechanisms of force.
Pressure Points
No, not Dim Mak points of death. That’s silly. Pressure points are areas of the body you should be focused on to maximize effect. One of the primary purposes of pressure is to stop movement, so mechanically you should be focused on areas that prevent movement. Pressure is most relevantly felt in the upper body. The shoulders, arm pits, elbows, jaw lines, and chest cavity, are the areas of the upper body that will have the greatest effect in immobilization. You can apply pressure to the hip joints and knees to secure passing sequencing, but upper body pressure is required to truly force a pin.
100 Kilos
Apply these forces to these places, and you will have game ending pressure. This is an important high level skill that will be necessary against any experienced grappler.
Is this the end of the pressure game? There is more to come. As you develop devastating pressure, I’ll be developing the brown belt addition of your journey.