If you are new to fighting, grappling or any type of mixed martial arts activity you must be use to the unwritten rules of rolling. In every dojo or gym there are people who don’t tap and people that hold the submission a little too long. There is a sort of fighting etiquette when it comes to grappling.

Today Stephan Kesting talks about the Pre-Fight Check Ins as well as the Two Meanings of the Tap. This is a great article for all new and aspiring grapplers as well as a reminder for the veterans in the club.

Enjoy

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The Pre-Fight Check Ins

A few days ago, in class, it was time to spar. I walked over to an older white belt, new to the club, who was standing by himself at the edge of the mat. I introduced myself and asked if he wanted to do some rolling.

His reply was perfect! He said "Hi, I'm Bill. This is my second class and I'm 51 years old. Please don't use leglocks on me". In about 10 seconds he made me aware of his skill level, his age, and his injury status. Needless to say we had a great little roll during which neither he nor I got hurt.

This type of pre-sparring check in is really useful, especially if you've never trained with someone before and you want to make sure that you're both playing by the same rules. This orientation can prevent some very unfortunate misunderstandings, like the one I discussed here:


http://www.grapplearts.com/2008/09/lets-get-groundrules-straight.htm

However, even if you've sparred with someone a hundred times it's still good to have a little pre-training pow wow. If your neck is sore you can ask him to stay away from it. Maybe he just wants to work a specific aspect of his game. Maybe you're just getting over the flu and would rather do some light flowing, rather than sparring all out - just be careful who you tell this to, because certain aggressive personality types will take advantage of this and attack you full bore, e.g:


http://www.grapplearts.com/2007/04/berserker.htm

If I'm injured I often warn my opponent that I may tap out for no apparent reason. I do this because, in the past, I've tapped out when an opponent put unknowingly pressure onto my injured body part, only to have my opponent be very slow to let go. It wasn't a malicious thing, it was just that he was surprised by my tapping out in the absence of any kind of obvious submission.

So I highly recommend a brief check in at the beginning of a sparring session - it can save you a lot of grief and make your training richer.

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The Two Meanings of the Tap

Tapping out is sending a message to your opponent. The most common message is "OK, you got me with that submission. Now let me go"

Many grapplers don't realize that tapping out can also be used to send a different message, namely: "I don't know what's going on here - I might be in danger of getting injured, so let's stop for a second"

Recently I was sparring and had my opponent pinned in side mount. He wrapped my head at an awkward angle and bridged. To relieve pressure on my neck I decided to go with the it and roll to the bottom.
Halfway during that roll we collided with some punching bags at the edge of the mat - I was now wedged into a corner, my neck at a strange angle, and my partner perched precariously on top of me.

It wasn't a submission per se - my neck didn't actually hurt - but I sure as hell didn't want to find out what would happen if either he or I tried to scramble from that position. I tapped out, he let go, and - for once - nothing went snap or pop.

As you become more experienced your knowledge of technique grows - that is a no-brainer. A less appreciated aspect of the grappling learning process is that your mental library of awkward positions also grows as you spend more time on the mats. You'll figure out when certain positions are merely uncomfortable, vs. actually being damaging. You might be willing to accept the discomfort of a guillotine choke for longer, because you'll know if it is going to damage your neck or your windpipe.

Even when you get to black belt level, however, you're still going to periodically end up in weird, contorted positions that might be uncomfortable but not be submissions per se. My advice is, that if you are unsure about the safety of a position, then swallow your pride, tap out and live to fight another day. The worst that will happen is that you will make the day of some junior guy at the club who just tapped out one of the big guns. Not such a big price to pay really, when you compare it to the alternative of not being able to train for many months due to some stupid, preventable injury!

A related article can be found here:


http://www.grapplearts.com/2004/06/dont-get-sick-dont-get-injured.htm

Remember that the tap can be used to send two different messages!

Stephan Kesting
www.grapplearts.com

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