Guard Theory

No-Gi Systems Foundational · No-gi first

The underhook steers and the overhook traps

The underhook puts your arm inside theirs to lift and turn them, the overhook wraps their arm from outside to trap it, and each is the right arm for a different job.

Position and problem

You are chest to chest with someone, standing, on the knees or in half guard, and both of you have one arm under the other's and one arm over. Nobody has a grip, because there is nothing to grip, and yet within a few seconds one of you is being turned and the other is doing the turning. The difference is which arms are where. Without a gi, much of the upper-body control in grappling comes from these two wraps, the underhook and the overhook, rather than from the hands.

Objective

Get your arm inside theirs when you can, use it to lift the shoulder and take an angle, and when you are left with the outside arm, clamp it and use it to trap the arm rather than to steer.

Core concept

The two wraps control different things. An underhook is your arm passed under their armpit from the inside, with the hand on their back or shoulder blade. It connects to their body beneath the shoulder, so lifting it raises their shoulder, turns their chest away and opens their back, and the arm doing it is between their body and their arm. An overhook is your arm wrapped around theirs from the outside, pinned to your side by your own elbow. It holds their arm against your body and stops it moving freely, but it is outside their arm and connects to their body only through that arm. So when both players are trying to move each other, the underhook usually decides it. The overhook is still the right wrap in several situations, because trapping an arm is sometimes the point. Clamped tight, it keeps that arm from posting, framing or reaching for your legs. It sets up throws across the hip, it is the arm used in a whizzer against an underhook, and it can hold the arm in place for a kimura grip. Having an arm on each side, one under and one over, is a common state of a tie, and the contest over the inside is called pummelling: each player swims an arm down and through to replace an overhook with an underhook, and the other swims back. Win both insides and you have double underhooks, which usually lead to a body lock with the hands joined behind their back. Both wraps hold through the angle of your arm and its contact along their arm and body rather than a hand squeezed shut, which is why they last in no-gi where a wrist grip fades.

Key mechanics

  1. Get the underhook deep, with your hand past their shoulder blade rather than on their ribs. A shallow underhook lifts only the arm; a deep one lifts the shoulder and moves the body.
  2. Lift and turn with the underhook, not just hold it. Raising their elbow as you step to that side is what turns their chest away and gives you the angle.
  3. Close the overhook high on their upper arm and pin it with your own elbow against your side. The higher the wrap sits, the less of their arm is left free to bend and withdraw.
  4. Use the overhook to trap, not to steer. Pressing down and holding the arm to your body keeps it out of the exchange; trying to lift or turn them with it leaves you pulling on a limb.
  5. Swim back inside as soon as they settle an underhook. The inside is easier to recover before their weight is behind it.
  6. Match your hips to your arms. An underhook with your hips square and back does little; step your hips to the side of the underhook so the lift has a body behind it.

Common errors

  • Holding an underhook with the hand on their ribs, which lets them drop the elbow and swim back inside.
  • Trying to turn them with the overhook, which spends effort on their arm while their underhook keeps moving the body.
  • Letting the overhook sit loose around the arm, so it neither traps the arm nor stops the underhook lifting.
  • Pummelling with the arm alone while the hips stay behind, which wins the inside briefly and then loses it to their weight.
  • Settling for one underhook and ignoring their free arm, which reaches for your leg or takes the other inside while you hold.

Safety

A tightly clamped overhook holds the trapped elbow and shoulder against your body, and if the other player turns away or spins out hard, that arm can be bent the wrong way or twisted at the shoulder while the clamp stays shut. Loosen the overhook when your partner turns away from it, and do not squeeze it into an arm lock on someone who has not been told one is coming. Pummelling puts hands and fingers between two moving arms, where a finger can catch on an elbow and be bent sideways, so swim with the hands open and flat and the fingers together rather than hooked.

Training progression

  1. Static: stand chest to chest with one underhook and one overhook each. Take turns lifting the underhook and clamping the overhook, and say what each one moved.
  2. Pummelling: swim the overhook arm inside at a slow, steady rhythm, one side at a time, with your partner swimming back, and keep the hands open throughout.
  3. Underhook game: one partner starts with a deep underhook and tries to step to their side; the other may only use the overhook to stop it.
  4. Knees version: the same game kneeling side by side, where the underhook player tries to come up and the overhook player tries to flatten them.
  5. Constrained: pummel-to-body-lock, where the round ends when one partner has both insides and joins their hands behind the other's back.
  6. Live rounds: each time you are left with the overhook, clamp it high and pummel once for the inside before you settle for the trap.

Written material cannot correct your positioning, feel your pressure or stop a submission in time. Everything here is intended to make training with a qualified coach more useful, never to replace it.

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