It’s been two weeks since the 2011 IBJJ Worlds Tournament, and I’ve sat down to write this article 4 or 5 times.  Every time, I get caught up in describing the beautiful submissions and well calculated strategies that were on display in all the belt classes over the course of four days.

We caught up with this month's expert World Champion Black Belt Emily Kwok on the job at Marcelo Garcia's NYC academy. This week, Emily shares a chained series of techniques from cross side control. She first gives us some details on tightening up the Americana arm lock, then transitioning to a straight arm lock, and finally to an arm bar.

Phil Migliarese continues his Yoga Hook series by showing a nice choke finish from the setup.

Marcio “Macarrao” Stambowsky practices old school Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. When you walk into his Gracie Sports Academy in Norwalk Connecticut you are immediately overwhelmed with the amount of BJJ history fighting for space on the walls. Pictures, magazine clippings, newspaper articles, diplomas and certificates. Marcio truly learned at the source.

Eddie Kone was awarded his black belt from none other than Royler Gracie and is head of the EKBJJ Association that has clubs in the UK, Ireland, Romania and Brazil; as a result of these clubs, Eddie spends a lot of his time travelling to deliver seminars to make sure that his students get the best tuition possible, which in turn sees Eddie travelling the world to hunt down the best teachers on the planet, year in year out.

I’ve always enjoyed looking at bonsai trees, they truly are an amazing art form. Bonsai has been practiced for over 1000 years in Japan, and before that a similar practice called Penjing thrived in China at least as early as 600AD. The Japanese brought their own unique perspective to the practice though.

Stabilization Training on the Stability Ball 

BJJ offers unique body movements that strengthen the core musculature such as the external obliques, rectus abdominis, and psoas. However, beneath the surface, there are muscles that stabilize and strengthen the lumbo-pelvic-hip complex ( the real core).

Rolles Gracie shares with some of the hidden details and concepts that he uses to improve the effectiveness of his side control game.

4x Olympian and US Olympic Judo team coach Jimmy Pedro shares a very nice body drop or Tai Otoshi technique with some potential modifications for the jiu jitsu game.