There’s a habit that we have in jiu-jitsu that becomes a bit of training scar, and without purposefully addressing it, the frustration that it costs in the long run will be massive. The scar we’ll be addressing here comes from working from our knees.
It starts as the safest position to work from as a new student. The new student isn’t ready to work from standing, so being on the knees is used to mitigate injury risks from falling body weight (the thing that leads to the most catastrophic injuries in grappling), and they’re not ready to spend too much time working from supine positions where they’re still completely lost as to what to do when down there.
Side Note – Guard work is grossly overemphasized in beginner level jiu-jitsu practice. Maybe another post?
My understanding of the beginnings of practicing from the knees comes from an attempt to solve a couple problems. One being the early days of neoprene, and tatami before that, which predate the really nice mats that we are currently blessed to be able to work on, and two being Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu’s popularity boom, which meant overcrowded schools. So, working from the knees became a simple solution to a couple safety issues. Makes sense to me.
So, now that we’ve looked at why we practice from our knees, the question becomes – Why are we staying there?
My take is that it’s simply out of habit. There’s not a grappling coach worth his salt that would suggest fighting from your knees or from seated (another topic). That it is typically the safest thing tends to lead to it becoming a default position, and most folks tend never to really question if it’s best practice.
I think it just doesn’t get addressed as fervently as it should. While I’m not making an argument against there being a time to work from the knees, we coaches need to make sure it’s announced as being a situational outlier. Obviously, there’ll be times during certain transitional periods when a knee may touch the floor. That’s not what’s being addressed here, and even then, running a check as to whether that’s the best thing to be doing in that moment would be worth some consideration.
Let’s go back and examine it from our philosophical lens – Jiu-jitsu = Results with as little effort as possible.
The single largest detriment to being on your knees in a grappling scenario means that your weight is primarily on your knees instead of your opponent. Why not let them hold you up? Why not let them carry your weight, and in doing so, cause them to expend energy at a greater rate than you are?
If we can make them work at 75% effort while we work at 15%, I feel pretty good about our odds of success over time.
If you’ll remember that one of the ultimate expressions of jiu-jitsu is at least survival with no time limits, making them carry your weight for an undetermined amount of time would be a highly valuable ingredient in the recipe for success.
Another problem is that when working from your knees, your mobility is severely limited. If your opponent starts escaping the position, which would’ve been far more difficult had your weight been on them, waddling on our knees to keep up with them is what we’re typically left with. Not the most effective means of human locomotion. Be on your toes. Now your weight is on them, and you can move with them or make postural adjustments far more efficiently and effectively.
Something you may find yourself having to deal with if you ever practice against more sport-oriented practitioners is leg attacks. If these folks can get one of their arms around one of your legs, you may be in trouble. That gets significantly harder to pull off if, by having your knees off the mat, 1) Your weight is on them, limiting their mobility 2) Your legs are further away from their arms because your legs aren’t under you providing support and 3) You’ll have the mobility to adjust your position that we talked about earlier.
We’ll be examining this in other posts as well.
Passing a seated open guard? Not on your knees, but not quite standing, either. Again, maybe another post.
Take a look at it. Watch some matches. Either in person at your next training session or online. If the person on top is having success, watch what happens when their knees hit the ground. Pretty much every time it happens, problems start. Guard recovery, escapes, attacks…all happen from knees on the mat.
Take care of yourself.
