Gordon Ryan published a new instructional today all about strangle escapes, If you’re reading this now that means you’re just as excited about it as me. I obviously haven’t studied the whole thing thoroughly yet, but I’ll tell you what I like and dislike about it so far.
| Title | Pillars Of Defense: Strangle Escapes |
| Instructor | Gordon Ryan |
| Total duration | 6 hours and 17 minutes |
| Publication date | December 10th 2022 |
| Where to buy | Here on BJJ Fanatics |
Learn how to escape any strangle from Gordon Ryan
wizard escapes
The trailer for this instructional
Gordon Ryan and Bernardo Faria made a trailer for this instructional. They don’t give away too many technical details, Gordon only shows a common way to escape guillotine chokes. I think that’s because it’s hard to choose what to show from an instructional that covers so many different topics.
The Strangle escapes that Gordon Ryan covers
Gordon Ryan covers escapes to the following strangles and chokes in this instructional:
- Guillotine
- Arm in guillotine
- Darce choke
- Anaconda choke
- Triangle
- Hantai sankaku
- Side triangle
- Back triangle
- Arm triangle (kata gatame)
- North south choke
- Crucifix
- not rear naked choke (that’s covered in the back escapes instructional)
Also read: How to escape a guillotine like craig jones
3 Thing I (dis)like about Gordon Ryan’s strangle escapes instructional
1. It’s shorter than other Gordon Ryan instructionals
This is actually something I like. If you look at all Gordon Ryan’s instructionals, you see that they’re often very long (on average 8 hours, some are even 11 hours). Often they’re too long for me.
I appreciate that Gordon Ryan has so much value to give, but for me he can summarise it to the essence a bit more.
This instructional is a bit over 6 hours, which is the perfect length for me. It’s something I can watch over 1 weekend.
2. It covers a lot of different topics
I’m a little confused by the topic of this instructional: strangle escapes.
To me a guillotine escape is very different from a triangle escape or a north south choke escape. And someone who often gets caught in a guillotine isn’t necessarily the same person who often gets caught in triangles.
It makes more sense to me to cover these things per position. For example, Craig Jones has a 3 and a half hour instructional about front headlock escapes, in which he covers only the chokes from the front headlock. That’s more logical to me. (By comparison, Gordon has about 2 hours and 20 minutes about front headlock submissions in this instructional.)
And Gordon Ryan also covers rear naked choke escapes in his back escapes instructional, which again is more logical than putting all strangles together.
Also read: Front headlock escapes instructional by Craig Jones (review)
3. Early stage, late stage, end game
Gordon uses the same framework as in his joint lock escapes instructional. He covers early stage escapes. late stage escapes and the ‘end game’.
The end game is where you can’t escape anymore. You’re in too deep, you’re fully controlled and you just have to tap. I think it’s very helpful that Gordon says explicitly when this is. Otherwise you always have to wonder when you tap: could I still have tried another escape?
I really like this framework.
Alternatives to this instructional
The Craig Jones front headlock escapes instructional covers escapes to the guillotine, arm in guillotine, d’arce and anaconda choke, and the front headlock position in general. i really like that instructional and I think it’s nice that it focuses on one group of strangles, instead of all of them.
Other than that I don’t think there’s 1 instructional that covers all strangles, like this one by Gordon Ryan does.
Also read: Top 10 Best BJJ Instructionals Ranked (2022)
