The Bar Darce, Darce Tips With Jeff Glover

When you are learning new techniques that are similar to other techniques it’s easy to sometimes get them confused.  There are so many names for these techniques and sometimes it seems like it is one thing but in reality, because of a simple detail it is an entirely different technique.  Let’s play this out real quick… just for fun. 

Student: Did you see that darce choke coach?  

Coach: Ummm, nope, that was an arm triangle.  

Student: Oh, ok… (not really knowing why it was an arm triangle and not a darce choke)

**after the next round

Student:  I got the darce this time coach, I got it down.

Coach: Well, that was a nice anaconda choke, but you still have not hit the darce choke yet.

Student: Right, ok… (starting to wonder if they know anything at all and getting slightly frustrated)

We could play this out for many different techniques and go on and on about all the different names and why each one is different because there are so many similarities.  For right now, let’s start with these three and break out which one is which, as well as a fun way to learn the darce aka the “bar darce”

First let’s understand the difference and what makes each of these submissions what it is and then we will break down The Bar Darce by Jeff Glover and take a look at his interesting approach to teaching this choke.  

For starters, the arm triangle choke is when you have the opponent’s head and arm inside of your arms and you are facing the opponent.  As you can see in the video, Jeff breaks each of these techniques down briefly showing each.  

But before we dive into the technique, let’s first learn a little bit about who Jeff Glover is and why you need to pay attention when he gives advice.  Jeff, also known as “The Pipelayer” because of his previous career as a plumber, is a Jiu Jitsu black belt under Ricardo Miller. Jeff boasts several achievements including, but not limited to: 

1st Place IBJJF World Championship No Gi

2nd Place EBI Invitational

3rd Place ADCC World Championship

World Jiu Jitsu Expo Superfight Winner

Pan American Champion  - brown belt

1st Place IBJJF Pan Championship – brown belt

Jeff draws a crowd when he competes because of his high energy and entertaining approach to competition.  Make no mistake, just because he is entertaining does not mean he is not just as focused on the win. Jeff has beat some of the biggest names in the sport and continues to dominate.  

When looking to get the darce choke you want to think about the near side arm.  Jeff explains this well and in a simplistic way. Think about sitting at a bar, with a drink in front of you.  Imagine the person sitting next to you is also drinking something that is on the bar in front of them. Now let’s just say this friend of yours that is sitting next to you is starting to get a little out of hand and you determine that they have had too much to drink.  

 

You decide that it’s your job to handle this situation so you take your friends drink away from them and sit in on the bar in front of you.  Being the upset and likely intoxicated person that they are, they reach for the drink. As they reach for the drink they are reaching with their near side arm opening up space for you to attack.  Little do they know they just opened up a choke for you.

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From here, as your friend reaches you have access to the darce choke if things get out of hand.  Let’s just assume that they do so that we can break down this technique. As they reach for their drink it exposes under their arm allowing you to reach under their arm with your arm that is closest to them.  When reaching your arm under theirs you will need to go as deep as you can, with the goal being to get your hand exposed behind their neck which means your elbow will need to be in front of their neck.  

This is the key difference between the darce choke and the anaconda choke.  For the anaconda choke we would be reaching under the head first rather than the arm, putting our bicep against the opponent’s neck rather than pushing their own bicep into their neck, at least on this side of their body.  With the anaconda choke you will be reaching under the head and then under the arm, still securing a gable grip and finishing in a similar manner, the difference however is in which grip you decide works best for your situation.  

For example, in the bar scene described earlier, it would not make much sense to try to go for an arm triangle, or an anaconda choke in that situation because it would have been much more difficult and forced us to put ourselves in a position where we were more at risk of getting hurt.  

While there are certainly uses for all of the chokes we discuss here, you can see that in this situation the darce is the obvious choice.  There may be times when you want to switch from one to the other in order to get what you are looking for as well.  

Hopefully this breakdown, and ultimately the link to a real life situation like sitting at a bar made it easy to identify when you are hunting for a darce choke or an anaconda choke, and how those are both still very different from the arm triangle choke.  I think that Jeff is accurate in saying making this a fun and relatable story makes it easier for people to retain this information.  

There is no question Jeff has a unique teaching style, I mean, have you seen anyone else bring props onto the mats to show their techniques?  Me either. It’s important that you find someone to study technique from that you find enjoyable and easy to follow. It is obviously also important that that person also be good at whatever it is you are trying to study and learn from them.  

For many people, it will likely be easy to follow Jeff and his simple yet effective methods that are taught in such a way that it is easy to relate to and stay interested in the lessons.  If you are looking to step your game up with the help from Jeff Glover you need to check out “Jeff Glover’s Deep Half Guard” with 6 volumes, you read that right, SIX volumes covering everything you could imagine from Escapes to entrances, sweeps and more.  There is no doubt this video instructional will take your game to the next level and have your teammates wondering how you got so good, so quickly. 

Jeff Glover is an OG when it comes to Half Guard. While you wait for the latest and greatest from one of Jiu-Jitsu's most entertaining grapplers, check out Glover's original Deep Half Guard DVD! 

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