The Triangle Choke

[Jon Helton]

The dude that is in the instruction with Ryan is the guy who beat me on points back in July. Ryan was coaching him through the match. They are studs. I bought the DVD set 3 days after I lost. I want a rematch dammit!!

[Brandon Mccaghren]

Ryan is a fantastic teacher. Did any of ya'll see that Ryangle University that he did several years back when he was under Irving? I think he was still a Purple Belt at that time. It was in a power point presentation. Totally dorky, but I loved it.

[watty31]

I don't think we should shun ryan's opinion on the rubber guard straight away. Instead of instantly dismissing it, maybe he does have a point somewhere. I haven't heard what he was saying about it but from what i gather he is a pretty open minded guy and probably has some valid statements, which may help improve the rubber guard in the future, who Knows.

The way i see the rubber guard is it is built for MMA. You can get away playing a more open guard in no gi grapplig tournamnets but as soon as someones punching you in the face lots of techniques get chucked out the window. Try doing tornando guard in mma, hamerfist to your head will soon put you off being upside down.

[Brent Smith]

Yeah, but his criticism was that it encouraged people to play guard off of a flattened back. I don't know what rubber guard videos he was watching but that critique is just nutty and irrelevant. So I can easily disregard his opinion on that matter. If he actually had a criticism that had weight I might actually shun the DVD set in fear of it making me realize that my whole rubber guard game is a farce.

I agree that his opinion on the rg is nutty and irrelevant. It seems as though people are still pretty ignorant on the rubber guard. Everytime he says something about the rg I just shake my head cause its not even true what he's saying. But if you look at what he's presenting as far as the triangle choke goes its pretty damn good. Like switching your angles and squeezing with big muscles instead of small weak muscles. I was taught completely wrong as far as that goes.

[Brent Smith]

I don't think we should shun ryan's opinion on the rubber guard straight away. Instead of instantly dismissing it, maybe he does have a point somewhere. I haven't heard what he was saying about it but from what i gather he is a pretty open minded guy and probably has some valid statements, which may help improve the rubber guard in the future, who Knows.

The way i see the rubber guard is it is built for MMA. You can get away playing a more open guard in no gi grapplig tournamnets but as soon as someones punching you in the face lots of techniques get chucked out the window. Try doing tornando guard in mma, hamerfist to your head will soon put you off being upside down.

No what he's saying about rubber guard is its pointless because you're stuck flat on your back. If you play any guard flat on your back it decreases the effectiveness drastically. I'm never flat on my back when I'm playing guard even rubber guard. And I don't remember his exact quote but I think he says grabbing your leg is silly. So I'm gonna disregard his opinion on the rubber guard cause it has no validity.
If you do the tornado guard right very few punches are going to get through in MMA. Your legs will block any straight punches, the leg that you're grabbing that's underneath your opponent will block any looping punches and your grip on the tricep with your free arm will control that arm from using any effective strikes. IMHO its a much safer position than deep half which guys are using very effectively in MMA.

[Eddie Bravo]

Ryan is showing the perfect triangle when it comes to leg positioning. Everything he is saying about angles is correct. But unfortunately you can't always rely on getting to that perfect perpendicular angle. If you have a strong head pull then your legs can just be used to hold his body in place so that you can pull on his head for the tap. The head will always be there, the perfect angles won't be. If the head pull isn't working because you're tired or he's just relentless then work to get the perfect angles that Ryan is talking about, after all he is a triangle master. Watch the Royler match, I didn't have the perfect angles at all, just a serious head pull is all I needed

[Brandon Mccaghren]

The thing I like most about hitting those angles is that:

1. It stresses good habits and efficient jiu jitsu.

2. If you hit that angle and crawl in deep, it doesn't matter where his trapped arm is.

[Matthias Sieber]

Btw... I'm pretty much laying flat on my back when using double bagger... am I doing it wrong?

[Brent Smith]

Btw... I'm pretty much laying flat on my back when using double bagger... am I doing it wrong?

Really? I find double bagger easier when im on my hip. Not drastically like in half guard but on my hip regardless

[Brandon Palmer]

A'men to this, Hall seems to be a real werido, BUT his triangle techniques are top shelf stuff. I'm with McCaghren, when i started working hard to get that angle, hooking the leg, leg pressing/curling, its like night and day on the finish %. Its nice to not have to worry where the hell their arm is and that kind of thing. Another thing i saw that helped is a tiny detail from Renzo, where if someone is big or trying to stack & pass, framing your legs to get that angle. I'd have to find the vid, but he's talking about pulling in on your knee, and pushing out on your ankle to both create that perfect angle, and to straight arm "frame" your opponent & keep him from stacking. He creates this frame and then kinda shimmy's his hips back to kill the stack.

Something else i love, and is very high percentage for me is locking the triangle, then getting off my butt and up on both hands, then walking backwards until their base totally collapses and they're on their stomach, easy finish from there, very. And it's not terribly hard to pull off.