BAD HABITS TO AVOID WHILE SPARRING
Bad Habits to Avoid While Sparring with John Lawrence
Fight 2 Win athlete and head coach of Hurricane Jiu Jitsu in Cleveland, John Lawrence, gives us the lowdown on bad habits to avoid while sparring.
A lot of people are guilty of these bad habits to avoid while sparring. Black belt, John Lawrence, has some great advice for novices and intermediate students alike, so that they can get more out of rolling.
At some point or other, you will notice that there is a disparity in the skill level between you and your partner. One of the first bad habits to avoid while sparring is always training to dominate your partner. Blue belts in particular can fall into this habit with white belts. While there is certainly a time and place for this, you don’t want to be doing it all the time. The second of the bad habits to avoid while sparring is the opposite end of the spectrum: training with lazy technique, allowing the lower level student to pass guard too easily for example. The solution to these bad habits to avoid while sparring is to scale down athleticism, strength and speed to accommodate the newer student.
John likes to pick an arbitrary number, say 30% and stick to that level when rolling with someone of lower ability. When you have a submission in, or someone is trying to pass your guard, and you find yourself going beyond that number, then scale it back and give them a chance, while not degrading your own technique.
For more techniques and advice stay tuned to Revgear Sports, the home of Revgear University online. Follow John on Instagram to stay up to date with his techniques and upcoming competitions and if you are in the Cleveland, OH area, check out Hurricane Jiu Jitsu and learn from the man himself.
