Core Jiu Jitsu Concept #9:

THE OPEN ELBOW

One of the core principles we talked about earlier in this series was the egg. The idea behind the egg was to keep all you limbs super tight to your side and close off any space your opponent could fill.

The Open Elbow concept is basically the opposite of this. By forcing your opponents Elbow away from their side you will open up all kinds of submissions, plus you’ll improve you positional control.

This is why one of my main goals, whenever I’m attacking, is to open my opponents elbows away from their side. You can do this by physically forcing the elbow open, capitalising on their escape attempts, or using the lapel.

The short video that illustrates this concept better than I can with my words.

The first person I heard call this concept was Ryan Hall. He filmed an entire instructional series about the concept, but you can get the important details of the concept from this video.