1.Quintet Style Tournament
If you are not familiar with this style of the tournament already, I highly recommend you to take a look at the last one!
The exciting model of the sub-only tournament with 4 teams of 5 grapplers features the survival of the best fighter and the team.
Each Fighter grapples along with a team of 5 with a max weight of 926 lb, 2 teams of five face each other.
One fighter on each team (regardless of weight) face each other, this is a”round” immediately after someone scores a submission, the winner faces the next opponent and the loser is eliminated.
The 2 best teams face each other in the finals and the last grappler standing wins the tournament for the team, If a Draw occurs, both fighters are eliminated!
Quintet Grappling was founded by BJJ Legend Kazushi Sakuraba, the rule set also includes:
– No-Gi Matches
– 10 minute sub-only
– If the weight difference between challengers is over 15 kg, the match will be 5 minutes only
– No heel hooks allowed
– Limited time allowed in closed guard
This rule set makes Quintet style a very entertaining tournament that will become popular for invitationals and possibly traveling tournaments in the future since it allows you to fight and win as a team.
2.Leg Locks Regulations
Since EBI and ADCC there has been a drastic change in the mindset for the implementation and regulation if leg lock submissions.
In the same fashion, EBI, and ADCC opened the pandora box for “new” sets of regulations and BJJ Tournament formats.
It should not be a surprise that we will start seeing more and more tournament modifying their rules to allow leg lock submissions.
Therefore, it’s better to start soon and include leg lock defense and attack in the white belt curriculum.
3.Overtime Implementation
There are many Sub-Only tournaments already implementing the overtime as an addition to their normal time regulations.
Overtimes offer a more fair solution to points that also resonates a lot better with the Sub-only tournaments. The most popular death zones for overtimes are:
-Back take
-Arm Bar/ Spider Web
-Standing, the first point/submission wins
Overtimes were made popular by EBI, however, more and more traveling tournaments are adopting this rules, make yourself familiar with the overtime rules and make sure to throw specific training sessions for these.
4.Combat Jiu-Jitsu
If you are into MMA but not quite sure if you want to go all the way in, CJJ is the perfect mix of MMA and BJJ.
CJJ is starting strong and there are a few emerging invitationals and tournaments trying to implement it!
CJJ rules are basically BJJ + open hand strikes. No kicks, no knees or elbows. It might seem like a bizarre sport, but believe me, it is though and you can definitely get a knock out from a good slap.
5. Crucifix, wrist locks, and the closed guard game for Sub-Only
With the trend of Sub-Only tournaments becoming popular, overtimes and the change in regulation, there is a big speculation going on about the new trend in techniques we will see in tournaments.
The fan predictions are that the new berimbolo and 50/50 game will be substituted with closed guard game featuring more high guard game as well as wrist locks and crucifix positions.
Closed Guard seems to be historically a boring game to play, however, we can see a trend in playing high guard games that can turn into very fast paced and interesting transitions with risky grapplers.
What new trends do you think will happen this year?
