It's not from the X-Guard book, it's from Gracie Mag's site or something.

And The X-Guard really is well set out and detail-rich, but as with all books it's still just a book. It's about half and half gi and no-gi and it mentions which gi techniques directly transfer to no-gi, and it contains some leglocks like heelhooks you probably wouldn't use in gi, but it's still only as good as the training time you put into it.

Sweet. Thanks.

I started BJJ with Marcelo and Fabio (the victim in the above photo sequence), and have continued with Fabio since Marcelo moved to Miami. I quickly found that I had -- probably because of wrestling -- a fairly easy time getting to side control, but I wasn't really sure what to do from there. When I asked Marcelo for some tools, this was the first submission he taught me for that position. The main trick for me was learning to use the armpit/lat to push the chin up while transitioning to north/south.

As for nomenclature, when I asked Fabio the name of this choke he said "it's just a guillotine from another angle."

I have worked on this with a guy at my gym. A little trick that we have found is if once you get the choke, hip switch and drop the back of your lat against the side of their face and then sprawl out, it helps to get your armpit closer to their neck.

North south choke 35 seconds in.

YouTube - Omega vs. Sirc (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6B7yepxGU8M)

here is a jeff monson video tutorial.

http://www.onthemat.com/video/video/170/Jeff-Monson-69-Choke

We trained a variant of this a few weeks ago where you have your arm around the opponents opposite shoulder as well as his neck (it was way easier for those of us with long arms). You use your ribs cage to force their head toward their shoulder as you walk your body around to the N/S position. Once your there you can either use muscle to cinch the choke or keep walking your body towards their shoulder to tighten it up. IIRC we had the shoulder trapped in the choke along with the neck because of a sweep we were doing that gave side control with the loose choke hold already in place. I haven't been able to try it outside of drilling yet though.

yeah, i've actually learned 3 variations:

1) As shown in the original post where you just have control of the head (hardest to get the tap)

2) the video linked to in bonez05's post where you have head and arm with the arm NOT pulled across (second hardest to get the tap)

3) you have head and arm, but the arm is pulled across in sort of an north-south variation of an arm triangle (easiest to get the tap)

This is actually something I have been having a lot of success with lately. It seems to be pretty high percentage because people are more worried about me passing to mount or knee on stomach so the north-south transition is easy. Another reason I like this is most people don't seem to work their N-S defense as heavily as their side escapes. The pressure and clearing is absolutely essential. Also it seems easier to really sink in the choke in no gi compared wearing the jacket. Thanks for bringing up and discussing all the details.

So whats wrong with the crank again?

Any tips for pulling this off in the gi? I end up in this position a lot more in the gi than out of it lately.

Or do you folks fairly consider this a no-gi choke only?

This choke works well in combination with the brabo and guillotine from side control. You can overhook the head, from side control, and then transition to the guillotine if they turn towards you, the brabo if they defend with their arm hard, or the monson if they stay on their back.

As far as gi versus nogi, i know all of those chokes are supposed to be no gi oriented, i suppose because they are fairly easy to defend by grabbing your sleeves, but as long as you use them as a set and have something to switch to when they defend hard, they can work in gi.

As far as gi versus nogi, i know all of those chokes are supposed to be no gi oriented, i suppose because they are fairly easy to defend by grabbing your sleeves, but as long as you use them as a set and have something to switch to when they defend hard, they can work in gi.

That's a good way of looking at it. I can say this, that at the very least if I **** it up it's a decent control point.

Thanks.

worked on some of the details with a purple belt tonight, i think we both came away with a better understanding of how to make the choke work. pushing the shoulder into the "hole" past the neck not into the neck seemed to be key, and switching the hips between adjusting the hold and applying the pressure helps as well.

I noticed Aesopian made a reference to "smearing" which I originally heard from Tom Oberhue and co. in the cross side top dvd's. (not sure if that's where aesopian heard the term) towards the end of the disk set, they show a submission similar to this.

the reason i bring this up is the entry could be very valuable for this choke. in essence, they start the attack from N/S but they lift the head and slide the knee under to prop it up. the guy is resting on your knee. for me, this opens up the neck sometimes for me to get a really good grip.

another thing that i've found and i've seen clips of people doing is staying in side control, wrapping the head and sprawling hard into the face. i don't mean drop the hip to break the nose, but sprawl so that its really uncomfortable for him to turn into you. as soon as he turns away, you're ready to adjust to n/s for the choke. i've tried that and it works for me pretty regularly.

I find that the size of my opponents neck relative to my arm determines if I want to do it with the arm in or not. For guys with skinnier necks, I need the arm in, for those that have big arms and/or larger necks, I like to do it without the arm in so I can use more pressure.