By Josh Hinger | This is a rant that I have been holding on to for quite some time. It’s about larger, stronger people with some comprehension of basic jiu-jitsu who use their size and technical skills to mount and repeatedly submit smaller-sized people who have an equal or lesser technical understanding of jiu-jitsu. 

This isn’t your typical size versus technique argument in which we talk about lightweight black belts handling with ease much stronger heavyweight white and blue belts. I generally agree with the argument that “technique conquers all,” but I believe it has limitations.   

The technique vs. size ratio

I believe that jiu-jitsu and grappling abilities are limited by a size vs. technique ratio. This means that a certain amount of technical knowledge and jiu-jitsu competence will make up for a certain amount of size and power difference in a match. 

For example, one year of jiu-jitsu experience and practice will help a grappler control an opponent who is up to 20 pounds heavier and has less than six months of training (these numbers are 100 percent arbitrary). The more experience one person has the more size and power differential they are capable of dealing with on the mat. Someone with five years of jiu-jitsu experience could probably control a person with one year of jiu-jitsu experience and a 50-pound size and power advantage. 

Photo by Hetaher Raftery

As we move more toward the extreme, the argument becomes a bit more complicated and philosophical. Could a veteran black belt who weighs 160 pounds handle a 450-pound juice monkey who wrestled in high school and is raging on PCP? I don’t know, and I don’t care. 

Personally, I am more concerned with the opposite end of the spectrum where people with 0-12 months of jiu-jitsu experience are training with people who are 15-30 pounds heavier than them but who ALSO have a relatively equal amount of jiu-jitsu experience. 

What really irks me is when I see a 160-190-pound guy mounted on a guy or girl who is 40 pounds smaller than them and has less mat experience than them. Of course, mounting someone in jiu-jitsu is generally fine; however, sitting on them for half the round and doing nothing productive is not fine. Holding mount for more than a minute is not fine. Holding mount with the sole purpose of not allowing the other person to escape is not fine. Staring down at your smaller training partner while holding their wrists is not fine. These are prime examples of jiu-jitsu douchebaggery. I believe proper jiu-jitsu etiquette is to submit them or get the heck off of them. 

Josh mercilessly smashes a much lighter training partner (not really). Photo by Heather Raftery

I can understand mounting your training partner and catching your breath for a few seconds before you try to submit them. But if you are out of breath, this means your partner is giving you a good match and is not a helpless beginner. The point I am trying to make is to just be a productive training partner. Make the training round beneficial for both of you. I firmly believe that if you are the bigger and/or more experienced grappler, you should play guard and maybe not submit the other person more than twice in a training round. 

I have this conversation with children on our kids competition team all the time. I have to explain to them that when there is a size or skill mismatch while we are sparring that it is not cool to just smash the smaller kid or to hold mount for the entire round. Sometimes I give specific instructions to the larger kid that they are only to play guard and they can’t hold one dominant position for more than 30 seconds. I can understand why this is not common sense for kids. I just wish it was more apparent to adults as well. 

This is not a critique of any single specific group or team. This is an observation that I have made over the past decade having trained and taught classes at dozens and dozens of different academies around the world, in addition to the hundreds of visitors with whom I have crossed paths at Atos. No academy or training center is immune to this situation. While I do agree that it is the job of the instructor to mitigate the most extreme mismatches between beginners, it would be nice to rely on the presence of common sense when the instructor cannot micromanage every matchup in the training room. 

Assessing training partners as individuals

There is no matchmaking formula that can be applied to an entire training room. People come in all shapes and sizes and skill levels. Some people are natural smashers, and some are naturally flexible guard players. It is impossible to dictate how much pressure or strength any single individual should use against their training partner. There is a time and a place for everything. 

There are partners you should smash mercilessly, and there are partners that you should never smash. The idea to embrace is that the training session needs to be productive for both people. Holding mount for more than half the round with the sole purpose of not allowing them to escape the mount is not productive or useful for anyone. Sure, it’s an easy excuse to say that someone should learn how to escape the mount, even against a larger and stronger opponent, but after a minute of them not escaping it’s time to either submit them or dismount. 

Josh teaches a class at Atos HQ. Photo by Heather Raftery

Additionally, submitting someone as many times as possible in one round is not OK. If you want to play that game, you need to get a partner who is similar in size and skill. It’s not productive to submit a person with jiu-jitsu that they do not understand. It’s like shooting fish in barrel. 

As I explained to one of my pre-teen students: jiu-jitsu knowledge is power, and with great power comes great responsibility. By training with someone you are in control of their physical safety as well as their mental well being. So as a bigger, stronger, and more experienced practitioner of jiu-jitsu, use your power to build and uplift people.  

Josh Hinger is an IBJJF black belt no-gi world champion representing Atos Jiu-Jitsu. Follow him on Instagram and Facebook.