Learn The Fundamentals & Concepts That Have Allowed Bernardo Faria To Become One Of The Greatest Champions Ever To Step On A Mat – While Having Less Athletic Ability Than Almost Any Elite Competitor He Faced
Bernardo Has Become World Renown For Teaching Older Guys Because His Moves Require Almost Zero Strength, Speed or Flexibility
At the end of the day, basics are what wins. If you are just starting in BJJ, your understanding and mastery of the basics are what will dictate your whole journey. If you are far down the road: blue belt or beyond, you may have missed a few steps and that could be what is causing you to struggle. You may need to relearn few things.
For Example, did you know there is one little detail that will make the difference between hitting a scissors sweep or not? A lot of people that learn some of these fundamental sweeps like the scissor sweep find them ineffective because as they progress and start rolling, they are not able to succeed with them. This is all due to the lack of subtleties in the details.
If you are trying to do a scissor sweep on your opponent, the difference could be inches. If you attempt this sweep and your partner’s butt is on their heels or near their heels, this means you will never be able to hit the sweep. We are talking inches. The simple trick to finishing the scissor sweep is to pull your partner on top of you so that their base is directly over you and their lower body is light. Take their butt off their heels. If you do this, you would be surprised to see how easy it is to sweep them.
These same principles of inches can be applied to numerous techniques that many people do wrong. Techniques like the arm bar, the bow & arrow choke, the hook sweep, escapes, and so much more. If you never master the basics, don’t even bother learning anything else, it probably won’t work. Just as a house sits on its foundation, your advanced BJJ moves sit on the foundation of its basics. If the foundation isn’t strong, the house will crumble and your BJJ is the same way.
Bernardo Faria probably has a lot more in common with you than he has with the athletic freaks that you picture winning the Jiu Jitsu World Championships. He is friendly to everyone, he snorts when he laughs and he is laughing almost all of the time, and he is really into using his computer; not exactly the typical picture of a “tough guy…”.
When he gets to the gym he isn’t very good at doing the warmups. He can’t really do a cartwheel and if you were watching him shrimp or roll you wouldn’t say “wow, I bet that guy is a killer!” He’s just not that fluid. But when it comes time to slap hands and start rolling or get on the mat at the World Championships – everything changes. Bernardo’s lack of elite athletic ability doesn’t really matter – because he has a much better system for sweeping than his opponents. While we will never say that his or anyone’s moves can’t be stopped, we can comfortably say that they haven’t been stopped!
We know he has an incredible understanding of the fundamentals because he has used the fundamentals to win 5 Black Belt World Championships including the adult Black Belt Open Class. Bernardo has beaten so many of Jiu Jitsu's household names including Xande Ribeiro, Leandro Lo, Rafael Lovato, Roberto Cyborg Abreu, Josh Hinger, Erberth Santos, Yuri Simoes, Luiz Panza, Braulio Estima and the list goes on and on...
