Gi vs. No Gi: The Neverending Debate

One topic that comes up quite often is the debate about gi vs no gi. One argument is about whether the gi helps people with their no gi or their no gi helps people with their gi. I'm going to take the stance that no gi helps the gi game MUCH MUCH MUCH more than the other way around. There are things that help each other obviously, but at the end of the day I don't care what Marcello Garcia or Demian Maia say, but it's like this: would you be running marathons in order to compete in the 100m? Sure you're running in both, but they're very different.

The first thing people need to realize is how different they are. To the untrained eye, it's still guardpassing, submissions, sweeps, etc... How you execute the techniques are extremely different. There is a plethora of moves you can't do without a gi on, and there are a bunch of techniques that wouldn't work if you have a gi on. Example: there is no real no gi version of the cross collar choke, on the other side, it's very difficult to rear naked choke people with a gi.

People have a misconception that no gi is not as technical, that you can get away with more because there are no grips, it can get slippery, and that speed can make up for a lot. I think it's important to note that no gi is incredibly technical BECAUSE you have very few grips (underhooks, headties, etc...), you need to learn how to use them. I have always believed in using speed and strength, but when it's appropriate. At the end of the day when all technique and cardio are equal, the faster/stronger opponent is going to win 9 times out of 10. Training without the gi needs to be treated like a different animal than gi training. You need to learn how to use the grips properly and you need to really learn how to use your weight and pressure your opponent. With a gi you can grab a handful of it and pin a part of your opponent down, with no gi you have to learn where to put your body, how to hold your opponent, and how and where to put your weight on your opponent to accomplish various techniques.

When debating about whether gi helps no gi or no gi helps gi more, I truly believe no gi helps gi much more. First off, like I said previously about the pressure you need to learn with no gi, you can translate that to gi, where if you only trained gi, you may not have had the opportunity or need to learn how to put that extra bit of pressure. Techniques translate from no gi to gi very regularly, but don't necessarily go the other way. It's not always the case, but it's true on a large scale. My game works very well for both gi and no gi, it translates well back and forth. I know for my guard game, I'm actually much more dangerous with a gi on because I have many more grips to play with, but that doesn't mean I don't find a good deal of success without the gi on. I feel that my gi game got much stronger because I spent nearly 2 years training no gi and mma rather than sport bjj. Obviously my no gi game excelled, but adding all those techniques also taught me how to use underhooks, overhooks, etc... and I also really learned how to put pressure on my opponents so they can't weasel out of positions. No gi has made my gi game MUCH tighter. I always say that my instructors weigh a metric ton when they pass my guard, I hope to gain that ability some day. When Keith or Kenny get mount, it feels like I'm drowning and there's nothing I can do about it. I'm eventually going to get submitted, if I try to escape, I get my back taken then choked. It's a very helpless feeling, he's so heavy there, and simply doesn't allow you any space to try and escape. While I can't measure it, I really believe their mount is so incredible due to training without a gi on.

I'm sure this debate will go on forever, but I've taken my stance on it. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, these are my opinions on the debate and I'm pretty sure I'll always believe that no gi improves the gi game much more than vice versa.