Gordon Ryan has revolutionized the way athletes approach guard passing with his innovative “inside camping” technique. This strategy, which Ryan has refined and perfected, offers a methodical approach to breaking down an opponent’s guard while conserving energy.
Ryan credits the initial concept to his training with Roger Gracie, who demonstrated a “high head inside camping” technique in the gi. However, Ryan found the original approach didn’t translate well to no-gi competition. He explains,
“I took Roger’s kind of initial idea and high head inside camping from the gi and kind of modified it and made it my own for no-gi and it works great now.”
According to Ryan, there are two primary variations of inside camping:
- Low Head Inside Camping: This position involves keeping the hips higher than the head and is particularly effective against long-distance frames.
- High Head Inside Camping: Here, the head is positioned higher than the hips, making it ideal for closer-range engagement.
When to Use Low Head Inside Camping
Low head inside camping is the preferred approach when an opponent uses strong frames to create distance. Ryan explains this is the perfect technique
“when my partner’s using his knee to push me away strong like this and I can’t close the distance or specifically my partner takes double shoulder posts and goes to push me away.”
In this position, Ryan establishes three critical grips:
- A grip on the opponent’s knee to prevent them from placing their foot on his hip
- A V-grip on the ankle to prevent high leg movements and inversions
- Head placement against the far shoulder to prevent the opponent from coming forward
High Head Inside Camping
As the opponent tires from maintaining frames, they typically allow the frames to collapse. This is when Ryan transitions to high head inside camping. In this position, he maintains:
- A grip on the knee
- A pull on the shoulder
- Connection of his hip to the opponent’s tailbone to deny the butterfly hook
The Strategic Advantage
The genius of inside camping lies in its energy efficiency. While the opponent has the inside position, they exhaust themselves trying to off-balance Ryan, who simply “sets up camp” and waits.
“The goal is to allow my partner to try to offbalance me and fail long enough where he just gets so tired of carrying me on his frames that he overextends,”
Ryan explains. When this overextension happens, Ryan can force the opponent into half guard chest to chest.
Perfect for Certain Grapplers
Ryan emphasizes that this technique creates
“the biggest discrepancy in work rate in the entire sport of jiu-jitsu.”
While the opponent exhausts themselves maintaining frames, the top player does minimal work.
This makes inside camping particularly valuable for:
- Less athletic grapplers
- Older practitioners competing against younger opponents
Revolutionizing Guard Passing
Ryan believes inside camping will revolutionize no-gi guard passing, especially in longer format matches. By alternating between high and low head inside camping based on the distance created by the opponent, practitioners can systematically break down even the most resilient guards while conserving energy.
As Ryan puts it, this approach allows you to
“make them less athletic than you”
– a game-changing concept for competitors of all levels.
