The 10 Things Every Grappler Should Know; Part 8

How to Control The Position:
This is probably one of the most important skills you will learn in grappling and Brazilian Jiujitsu in particular.
Knowing how to control the position is the first thing you should be concerned with.
As I've said before in this blog, Position is everything.
Without the ability to control the position, all the submission skills in the world are almost useless.

Controlling the position is paramount if you are to succeed at setting submissions up as well as tiring your opponent out and if practicing MMA, then even more important at using or avoiding strikes and ground and pound.

I remember when I started out, my instructor used to spar with all the students and put us in bad positions like Mount or Knee on Stomach, then would let us squirm to get out and when we were exhausted would give up the position only to regain a superior position over us again and not let us out. He would do this without attemping any submissions to finish us.

Now, although this sounds cruel, the point was quite simply to make us understand the huge importance of controlling the position and escaping the position.
Quite simply with the ability to control the position came the ability to have your opponents at your mercy.

The fact is that most advanced grapplers only use a few basic submissions most of the time. Their skill in combining them is one thing that makes them more effective then those who aren't as advanced but the biggest difference is their ability to control the position better than those less skilled.

Focus your training on this and remember, the speed at which you can apply a submission, the strength you can use to force your opponent or any other factor is great but without position control and dominance, you will never be your best.