Diversify Your Knee Shield With Lucas Valle's Coin Sweep!

It’s no secret that the ability to sweep or submit when you are on the bottom is crucial to your game and honestly just a fundamental part of Jiu Jitsu.  We start out learning the basics, the sit over sweep, the scissor sweep, maybe the flower sweep, and then we progress into more and more complex sweeps. Often times we hear the higher ranks make some comments about the basic, fundamental sweeps saying things like, that won't work, or that’s not a move for me… you get the point.  The reality is that the techniques work if you execute them properly. If your scissor sweep isn’t working the way you expect, try spending some time drilling it properly. The chances are good that you are simply missing a detail or two.  

While the fundamental sweeps are great and all, sometimes we just have to get fancy.  This Coin Sweep from Knee Shield by Lucas Valle is certainly flashy.  Anything with rolls automatically looks fancy, roll your opponent over your body and still come out on top, now that’s skill.  Let’s break it down step by step so you can add this to your game and get recruited for the next big competition (no promises on that front).  

 

As you likely imagined, this sweep starts from a bottom half guard knee shield position.   From here Lucas is looking to setup a standard scissor sweep by controlling the wrist on the opposite side as his knee shield and going as far as turning to his side and attempting the scissor sweep.  If the scissor sweep works, great, you have scored your points and accomplished the goal. However, for the purposes of this breakdown, let’s assume it does not work, now what do we do?

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Lucas wants to stay on his side after the failed scissor sweep, continuing to pressure into his opponent and looking for an opening to get his right hand under the opponent’s left leg and to get control of the opponent’s left wrist with his left hand.  From this position Lucas is using his under hook under his opponent’s left leg to pull his upper body closer to that leg while also lifting and pushing the opponent the opposite direction using their pressure to do most of the work and simply steering with the control he has on the left wrist.  

From this position it’s important that you do not stop and use the momentum to your advantage.  As you start to land in this position you are looking to push the opponent’s left leg and left arm away from you while also kicking your legs to help propel you over completing a back roll that completes your sweep and lands you in top side control ideally with his knees tight preventing the opponent from curling up and getting their knees into the mix and regaining some sort of guard.  Note that as Lucas rolls over he maintains his wrist control grip using it as an anchor point that he can push or pull from to help adjust his position as needed. 

If you like Lucas Valle’s teaching style and unique approach to some pretty standard problems then you definitely want to check out his video instructional titled “Mastering the Half Guard”.  Lucas shows a full comprehensive, easy to follow half guard game that anyone, even you can use to start winning, keep winning, or even add a level of surprise to their game.  Lucas is leading the way in the new generation of advanced half guard games. Master this common and popular position and start beating the bigger and stronger opponents immediately. 

Remember all of this is useless if you don’t train, and train properly.  Drilling is important and should be done to perfection, not to a repetition count, it’s very important that you first focus on doing the right thing, and then focus on doing that right thing over and over until it is second nature.  You never want to rely on a technique that “should work” rely on one you know works because you have drilled it enough times to know and understand exactly how it works. Train hard, train often, and train right. 

Let Lucas Valle’s Half Guard innovations work for YOU. Take your half guard up a notch by implementing multi layered tactics like the coin sweep! Mastering Half Guard By Lucas Valle is sure to give you a leg up on the competition.

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