Let The Great Gordon Ryan Fix Your Butterfly Hook Sweep!

 Butterfly Hook Sweep Blocking The Arm by Gordon Ryan

Who is Gordon Ryan? He is arguably the best grappler on the planet.  This New Jersey born grappler is a four time Eddie Bravo Invitational Champion.  A few of his accomplishment are being the 2017 ADCC Champion, 2018 IBJJF Pans No-Gi Champion and Quintet 3 Champion. He has beaten some of the world’s best grapplers including Dillon Danis, Romulo Barral, Xande Ribeiro and Keenan Cornelius. Perhaps the most profound thing about this prolific grappler is that he is only 23.  The future certainly holds many wonderful things for this grappler.

At the age of 15, Ryan was introduced to Jiu Jitsu. Three people had a profound impact Gordon’s Jiu Jitsu education. Ryan’s tutelage started under the incomparable Tom DeBlass in New Jersey. Tom is renowned for his grappling abilities, high level mixed martial arts competition and teaching abilities. Garry Tonon also played an important impact on Ryan. Tonon was a brown belt of DeBlass at the time. Alongside Tom, Tonon played a key impact in Ryan’s instruction. Tonon is a legendary grappler with wins at EBI, Polaris, Metamoris and many other high level tournaments. Garry also influenced Gordon to train with another one of his instructors, the legendary John Danaher. Danaher has coached former UFC Champions Georges St. Pierre and Chris Weidman. He also has been responsible for the education of many renowned grapplers. After 6 months as a brown belt and victories at IBJJF World No-Gi Champion and Newaza Challenge Champion Ryan was awarded his black belt by Garry Tonon. Tom DeBlass, John Danaher, Ricardo Almeida all supported the promotion.

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Ryan’s grappling accomplishments are nothing short of spectacular. He won the IBJJF Nogi World Championship at Brown Belt. In 2016, Ryan defeated Yuri Simoes and Rustam Chsiev to win the Eddie Bravo Invitational Championship.  Gordon’s next notable accomplishment was a super fight with Keenan Cornelius.  In this no time limit submission only event, Gordon taped Keenan with a heel hook. In 2017 Ryan competed in the ADCC World Championship.  He claimed gold in the -88kg weight category by defeating Dillon Danis, Romulo Barral, Xande Ribeiro and Keenan Cornelius. He placed 2^nd in the absolute division.  He submitted all of his opponents but lost to Felipe Pena in the final. In 2018, Gordon won gold in his weight class and the absolute division and the IBJJF Pan Nogi. He also took gold at the No Gi Worlds in his weight class and the absolute division. Ryan led Team Alpha Male's to a victory in Quintet's 2018 Tournament where he had submission victories over Josh Barnett, Marcos Souza, Craig Jones and Vitor Ribeiro. Ryan’s other accomplishments include an unprecedented four time EBI Champion and Grappling Industries Champion.

Gordon is also an exception teacher. His guard passing instructional video promises to be one of the bestselling videos of all time. Danaher has also given him high praise saying, “Gordon Ryan is much more than an incredible athlete - he is one of the best teachers I have seen - people will be amazed when they see this video”.

In this video Gordon Ryan shows some nice details of the butterfly sweep.  Ryan starts the sequence by stating a common approach is to take the under hook as the first step in passing the guards. In no gi, Gordon will counter the under hook with an over hook and then look for a sweep. He states that the grip in the gi is a bit different. Instead of the over hook he can grab his opponents belt.  The belt affords him the opportunity to lift his opponent.  With this other hand he grabs his opponent’s wrist.  It is an important details that Ryan notes that the weakness of this grip is the area between his thumb and other fingers. Ryan pushes his opponent’s wrist into their body to close this weak area.  Gordon notes a common issue with this sweep is when grapplers fall to their hip. Ryan notes that the end product should be for us to drive off our foot so we can be on our shoulder.  The hip is only a midway point.  It is another key detail that Ryan notes is that we should use a high elbow to throw our opponent.  While this is a common sweep, mistakes are often made with it. Gordon does an excellent job detailing the steps necessary for the sweep and also correcting these common issues. Well done Gordon Ryan.

This video is a wonderful example of Gordon’s ability to communicate technique to even novice grapplers.  Like all of Ryan’s instructional videos, there is a lot of detail. I know that I often gain new insights every time I re-watch one of his videos. Beyond technique, his instructional videos also serve as an education on the principals of grappling and thinking in systems. These elements have a powerful impact on anyone who makes a careful study of them. Gordon Ryan’s education, grappling success and systematic approach to Jiu Jitsu are testaments to his exceptional abilities as an instructor. Certainly the Jiu Jitsu community is lucky to have him.

In under just 18 months Gordon Ryan went from an "in shape" grappler weighing 163 lbs to a 232lb monster and then DOWN to 194 lb and looking JACKED. Gordon tore through ADCC and is now considered one of the best grapplers in the world. He just released a new DVD / On Demand Series called "Getting Swole As a Grappler". It gives you his exact program, tips, diet advice and more on how to achieved jackedness and be a complete bad ass on the mats.

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