Good guard passing starts before anyone grabs a collar, presses a knee, or drops shoulder pressure. It starts with range. In this private class with two long-time couple clients near Chipping Norton, we worked through three guard-passing games. Each game isolated a different distance between the top and bottom player. That made the lesson clear, safe, and easy to repeat. The aim was not to collect techniques. The aim was to understand what each range demands.

Tonight my couple clients returned for the first lesson in a new 10-hour course on submission grappling. They have trained with me since 2019 across a wide range of disciplines. The current focus is guard work, split into three ranges. Tonight we worked on mid-range guard passing.

This week my couple client completed their latest 10-hour course in submission grappling. The theme was passing mid-range guards. That means dealing with the awkward space where the bottom person still has useful legs, frames, grips, and angles, but the top person is close enough to apply pressure and start breaking those defences down.