I had the huge pleasure to visit Jimmy Pedro’s school in Wakefield, Massachusetts. Today, Jimmy is going to show us judo grip fighting for jiu-jitsu. Jimmy is the best judo competitor in U.S. history and also the best judo coach in U.S. history. Jimmy is a 4 times judo Olympian and U.S. judo team coach.

I was very excited to be there and film with him, because for me he is like the Fabio Gurgel of judo. In my opinion, Fabio Gurgel is the best jiu-jitsu teacher in the world and Jimmy Pedro is the best judo coach in the world. So, it’s a huge pleasure to be here with him.

Jimmy is going to show us how to avoid letting people make grips and if they do make a grip, how to break it. Jimmy is famous for his ground-game, grip-fighting and how to avoid letting people get good grips. I think this is very important for jiu-jitsu, because grip fighting can help a lot. You don’t need to have great judo if you only know how to avoid letting people make grips. Or, if you can break grips very easily, then that can make a huge difference.

So, let’s see how Jimmy does it.

Here is the breakdown of the key points for judo grip fighting for jiu-jitsu:

1.     First, Jimmy’s hands are always up and he’s always trying to attack his opponent’s hands. He’s not just looking for the sleeve because if his opponent reaches and Jimmy only grabs the sleeve, the opponent’s hand will still come and Jimmy can’t stop it from making a grip.

2.     So, Jimmy always goes 2 hands on 1. When he comes out to fight, the first thing he’s going to do, is attack the wrist. If he controls the wrist, then he controls the hand. Jimmy pushes the wrist down and away from his body. He secures and takes all the slack out of the gi and he holds it. Now, Jimmy has control of the opponent’s hand. The key with this technique is that all the slack has to come out of the gi. Now with control of the opponent’s hand, Jimmy can dictate the movement and move the opponent where he wants.

3.     If Jimmy’s opponent does make a grip on his gi, in order to break the grip, Jimmy has to explosively use both hands together. The hand that is controlling his opponent’s sleeve will snap down, and his other hand will snap down at the opponent’s wrist. At the same time Jimmy’s body will pull away. Once Jimmy pops off the grip, he pushes it across his opponent’s body. Now Jimmy can control the movement of the fight.

When I make a grip on Jimmy’s gi and he pops it off, it’s so quick and explosive that it hurts my fingers. Also, when Jimmy controls my wrist, I feel like I can’t move that entire side of my body and he has great control. Jimmy gets such good control by straightening his arm out, pressing down with his whole body, leaning on it and locking his arm. This makes it very hard to lift your arm.

Thank you so much Jimmy Pedro. I hope you guys enjoyed this great technique. Oss.

If you are looking to improve your standing game, I highly recommend this instructional from Jimmy Perdro & Travis Stevens, the 2 best male Judo competitors in the US history. Click Here To Check It Out.