In a seminar discussion, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu champion Gordon Ryan opened up about the strategic development of his distinctive grappling approach—one that prioritizes control and positioning over explosive athleticism. His methodology challenges conventional wisdom in a sport often dominated by speed and power.
Ryan‘s philosophy centers on a fundamental distinction in grappling styles.
“There’s two kinds of games,” he explains. “There’s movement based games and there’s control based games where you negate movement.”
For Ryan, this choice wasn’t arbitrary — it was born from honest self-assessment and strategic thinking.
“If you if we did any kind of like generic sport athletic test, I would fail miserably,” Ryan admits candidly. “I don’t have a fast mile. I don’t have a fast 40. I can’t even cut back and forth because my ankles are so broken. I don’t have a crazy vertical jump. I’m just like a regular guy.”
Rather than viewing these limitations as disadvantages, Ryan transformed them into the foundation of his competitive edge.
The key insight that shaped his approach was understanding how to leverage his physical attributes effectively.
“The one thing I have that I have an advantage of is I’m bigger than average. I’m a small heavyweight, but I’m bigger than average, like 6’2, like 230. So I’m bigger than average person, and I’m pretty isometrically strong compared to most of the guys that I compete against.”
Instead of competing in areas where he was disadvantaged, Ryan chose to make his opponents less athletic than him.
“My instead of trying to make myself more athletic than the rest of the guys, I tried to make them less athletic than me by wedging them in place with body position and control based movements.”
This strategic approach extends beyond mere physical considerations to encompass long-term career planning. Ryan emphasizes that control-based games become increasingly valuable with age:
“The older you get, the more you’ll have to transition from a movement based game to a control-based game. When you’re 45 years old, you can’t expect yourself to be more athletic than the guys who’s 25 years old or 21 years old.”
A breakthrough moment came with Ryan‘s development of what he calls “inside camping” — a system that exemplifies his philosophy.
“I just basically discovered that I could just lay on top of someone and make them carry body weight and not really have to do much, which is great because I’m not super athletic. Also great because I’m also nauseous all the time. So like movement and like high heart rate usually makes it worse.”
The camping system demonstrates Ryan‘s core principle in action.
“When I can just make guys carry body weight and have their work rate be like four or five times as hard, then finally when they do get exhausted, they just end up chest to chest and half guard.”
This approach transforms traditional notions of conditioning in grappling.
Ryan‘s matches have evolved to reflect this philosophy:
“As I get better, like my matches tend to get like less and less exciting. I get more and more dominant, but the matches themselves are less exciting because there’s less movement because the further I go in jiu-jitsu, the better I get, the less movement my partner has the ability to move less because I’m controlling the movement.”
However, Ryan‘s approach isn’t rigidly one-dimensional. He adapts his strategy based on opponent characteristics:
“When I go with guys who are that much bigger, who I know I’m going to have an overall strength disadvantage, but a power to weight advantage, then I change my game back into a movement based game.”
This flexibility demonstrates sophisticated tactical thinking beyond simple stylistic preferences.
The development of this methodical approach required significant mental shifts, particularly regarding training philosophy. Rather than trying to dominate every training session, Ryan focuses on skill development and position work with less experienced partners while reserving intense competition for select training partners.
