How Do You Stop Bigger Opponents From Passing Your Guard?

Okay, first order of business – I wanted to quickly talk about how I’m having good luck with Saulo’s running side escape. I’ve been practicing this side escape for two classes now and I’m telling you, it works. I can’t believe I took so long to put this in my bag of goodies.

Here, watch a video to see what I’m talking about.

Saulo Ribeiro Jiu-Jitsu Revolution 2 Running Escape

Just one thing though – really focus on protecting your top (exposed) arm or else your opponent will give you a quick armbar or will take your back. I learned that the hard way. But, if you do learn how to do this correctly, you’ll love it. It’s a great escape.

Now, if you want to get fancy like I do, check out Marcelo Garcia’s side control escape. This is very slick.

Marcelo Garcia Side Control Escape

On to tonight’s topic – the problem I’m having with bigger guys passing my guard. First off, I don’t want to say that it’s easy for them to do this, but I will tell you that there is something that’s unique to stronger players. And that’s slow, methodical, piece by piece disassembling strength. I’ve always had a problem with this, pretty much from day one, because I’m a loose player. I open things up and try to beat my opponent to the punch. If I can get my feet on the hips, pull guard and finish with an omoplata or a triangle, I’m in good shape. By the way, I worked two unsuccessful omoplatas tonight. Like I said, they were unsuccessful, but I got the setup right. My opponent’s escape was just too strong though. They’ve been taught well.

Anyway, since I’m mainly an open and closed guard player, I have tremendous difficulty with people who’ve discovered what I like to do and then take my legs out of the equation. Once this happens, I feel like a fish out of water and once my guard is passed, I find myself relying on Saulo’s escape I talked about above.

I do try various techniques though, but they’re usually to no avail. Tonight, I pulled half guard, only to have that passed as well. I don’t even remember how that happened, but once he got side control, I was pretty much out of gas.

But here’s the real problem. The way I think of it is that I need to be super aggressive and not let these guys get in position to start passing my guard in the first place. It seems rather logical, so I try out my lasso guard or perhaps a little spider guard or even some sort of a high guard in hopes of pulling off a triangle. Nothing seems to work though. Every guard I pull on these guys gets broken. I’m simply not strong enough.

So I’m at a loss and this issue has been plaguing me since my early days. I’m hoping to figure it out and any advice from my higher belt friends out there would be much appreciated. The question is, how do you stop a bigger, stronger opponent from passing your guard?