Clamp Guard 🗜️ Fundamentals

How to use the Clamp: Mechanics and Control

I’ve been playing around with this guard for the past month… And I now understand why there are so many Clamp fanatics out there.

Here are the main details you need to understand to start playing with it. Enjoy, and let me know what you think about the Clamp if you’re already using it.

Why use The Clamp:

• It provides excellent defensive and offensive possibilities

• It gives you a sense of control and connection that allows you to control distance and retain and recover your guard

• You can have a fully successful BJJ game around it

• It creates situations where you can easily transition from defense to high-percentage offense

Mechanics of The Clamp

This is The Position:

Here are some details:

• We control the inside position between our opponent’s arms with our legs

• Inside Knee is the most important because it keeps them from smashing you:

• Outside Knee pushes their shoulder down towards their head, our outside arm covers the trapped arm, and we can use our hand to reinforce the outside knee:

  

• The Outside Knee pushes their shoulder down towards their head, our outside arm covers the trapped arm, and we can use our hand to reinforce the outside knee:

  

• Second hand can be used in many ways:

  • In the classic Clamp, we can grab the triceps like so:

    

  • We can also control the wrist. or hand as another option:

    

  • We need to control their posture

  • We need to prevent them from moving their head over our head

  • Closing the circuit is fundamental to prevent them from escaping:

    

  • In order to be successful at the Clamp you CANNOT be flat on your back. You need to be on your hip and move your hips out to create the needed space.

The steps from the closed guard are:

1. Establish inside position

2. Move hips out and get on a hip (never flat on your back)

3. Inside control with our inside knee and control of the second arm with the inside hand

4. The outside leg pushes the opponent’s shoulder, and the leg comes up

5. Close the circuit with a leg-knee connection

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I’ll share more details in the future, but I don’t want to overwhelm you. You can start playing the position if you apply these details, and I think you should experiment with it before diving into more details.

I’m sure you can now see the many attacks that can be unleashed from this position. I personally love threatening the Omoplata to get the Triangle.

Play with it, and let me know how it goes!

Thanks for reading.