Sometimes in life, we need simplicity, focusing on the basics and this kind of things. Sometimes, however, you just have to go crazy. As in life, so in BJJ. Of course, first you need to learn the basics, but then you can get on a little more crazy and spectacular things such as cartwheel guard pass. While it is not one to go for all the time, it is one that can definitely help you in certain moments. Below are some of the situations where you can get a little fancier with your BJJ game.
Cartwheel Guard Pass
Cartwheel Seated Butterfly Guard Pass
You want to pass guard in spectacular way?The use of cartwheel guard pass is great for this. It looks awesome and complicated but it’s not as difficult as you might think. However, before we start, you just must ask yourself if you can do a normal cartwheel. If the answer is “no” go back to reading this text once you have learned it. Ok, if we all already can do a normal cartwheel on the ground, it’s high time to add our training partner to this.
The situation is like this, our opponent is sitting in the butterfly guard and we are standing in front of him. You could do a lot of things here, but we’ve decided that we want to be fancy. Therefore, one of our hands goes on the ground right between our training partner legs. The same side foot is forward. And the other hand we try to put on his shoulder. At the same time, it helps to do a cartwheel and to keep him in a place. When we have it all we just do cartwheel and land behind him. Spectacular and simple at the same time.
Standard open guard cartwheel pass
Ok, when we already know cartwheel seated butterfly guard pass, we can go crazy even more and try different variations. In this case, it’s about the use of cartwheel pass against the standard open guard. In this version, the cartwheel is used less to go directly over top of the person, and more to entangle the opponent’s legs, dragging them to the side where you can then scramble for an advantageous position. The movement itself is simple. You do a normal cartwheel and you are just kinda taking legs of your training partner with your legs. Greater art in this technique is an element of surprise. To have good results while doing it you must mask your movements.
Omoplata Cartwheel Counter
Most likely, numerous of you already tried or at least heard about shoulder roll escape from omoplata, right? If it sounds boring for you let’s try another counter roll to omoplata – Cartwheel Escape. Imagine, you’re caught in the omoplata, but your opponent has not yet controlled your belt, back, legs, or hips. You can try to do shoulder roll escape, but we’ve already found it boring, so you’re trying to do cartwheel counter. Post to your free hand, put your head on the ground and jump over his body. You don’t have to go high. In fact, sometimes it looks more like a short hop. And so here at one moment, you went from potentially match-ending submission situation to controlling your opponent in sidemount. As in the previous case, it may look a little complicated, a little spectacular, etc. But it’s really not that difficult and doesn’t require as much gymnastics experience as you might think.
Z Guard Cartwheel Pass
Z guard gives us another opportunity to use cartwheel. Imagine that: Your opponent has you in half guard and is jamming his top knee into your shoulder, sternum or belly, making it hard to close the distance and smash him. The situation is not good. You have several options that you can do now, but you want to be spectacular, so you choose cartwheel. First of all, when you are in such a situation, you need to get up from your knees and turn. This hip motion gives you the windshield wiper. Now you need to hop away. Then you come up and over him. Again, spectacular and easier than you fought and the same time.
Cartwheel Armbar Escape
This technique is only for people who, in addition to wanting to be fancy, are also not afraid of risk. It’s a cartwheeling escape to an almost finalized armbar. It is quite dangerous because if something goes wrong your arm could get seriously hyperextended. Better don’t do it, but if you still want to try it, first see how the best do it.
The moral is this: even those spectacular looking techniques are often simpler than we think, you don’t have to be incredibly athletic to do them, etc. So just keep your mind open. Give it a try. See that you can also do it. Then, just for entertainment, learn all the crazy techniques. As many as you can. Have some fun. Just don’t forget to do the basics and you will be ok.
