The choke from side-control / Photo by Junior Samurai/GRACIEMAG

When you’ve made it past guard and are chest to chest with your opponent, you’ve reached side-control. What now?

The key to stabilizing the position is to latch on to the collar behind the neck and get a solid grip on the back of the pants. From there the next step is to go to the classic knee-on-belly and then on to mount.

But you can cut straight to the chase with an attack. Tom Oberhue, a GMA of ours in Portland, Oregon and Saulo Ribeiro black belt , teaches us the following choke from side-control:

Guilherme Caju teaches a half-guard sweep in Fortaleza. Photo by Junior Samurai/GRACIEMAG.com

Stuck on bottom playing half-guard? Well, what you need to do now is make sure your opponent doesn’t hug your head and weigh on you.

The trick to avoiding that is to always keep positioned on your side and with an underhook. In the following video, Guilherme Caju, a black belt on Ribeiro JJ team, teaches an exclusive reversal for GRACIEMAG.com.

He warns not to let the opponent get his head inside on you, and then advises to grab the opponent’s wrist as though sinking a keylock. The other hand goes to the belt, and that’s where the main detail comes in: the sideward bridge, simultaneous leverage using the arm and the belt.

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