Demonstrations
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Step by step
The whole movement in words, so no part of it depends on watching a video. Described in the standard right-handed form.
Left-handed: these steps are written right-handed, as the syllabuses write them. Read every left as a right and every right as a left, and the throw is yours.
- Your partner is on their back and you are at their right side, chest low over theirs.
- Pin their left wrist to the mat with your left hand, their arm bent at a right angle, knuckles pointing up past their head.
- Thread your right arm under their upper arm and grip your own left wrist: the figure-four that names the entanglement.
- Keep their elbow and wrist both pinned, your chest heavy on theirs.
- Apply by sliding their elbow down towards their body while your framed arms rotate the whole arm gently; the pressure turns the shoulder. Movements are small and slow, and everything releases the instant they tap.
Receiving it
Your bent arm is pinned and a second arm threads beneath it, locking into a frame; the rotation that follows loads your shoulder more than your elbow. Tap early and clearly at the FIRST feeling of pressure on the joint; an elbow or shoulder gives little warning between discomfort and damage. Never snatch out of a lock with a twist. Shoulders tolerate even less late tapping than elbows.
About this technique
The entangled armlock: uke's bent arm is wrapped in a figure-four of tori's arms and rotated against the shoulder and elbow. Applied with the hand up or down, which BJJ names as two techniques. Competition joint locks are restricted to the elbow and to senior age groups; learn and practise this only under instruction.
Key points
- Figure-four grip: your hands lock through each other around their bent arm
- Keep their elbow pinned; rotate the whole frame, do not push the wrist
- Slow, small movements; the shoulder gives little warning
joint locks
In combinations, counters and transitions
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