I like "notching" my arm on the achilles for control purposes because I find it very secure to establish position however once I get my leg entanglement configured how I want, I then use the talocrural (that's a new word for me, but I like it) joint hyperextension when going for the finish.

He's just referring to the classic slide to the end motion when attacking the joint vs the achilles. He doesn't mean change the grip entirely, although you can.

And yes an achilles compression works at even higher levels. Of course there are exceptions. Check Dean Lister's approach to it, it helped me a lot. The hand of the arm attacking the foot should be high up on your chest and when you expand your chest and pull your shoulders back without moving your hand from your chest, you can get the tap quickly (achilles).

The achilles compression grip is by far my favourite and I have no doubts that it can break the foot. When going for straight ancle locks I like to keep the hand that gripping the foot high on my stomach (not chest which I see many people teach, not at all saying it's wrong) and squeeze my elbow (on the arm that holds the foot) as tightly towards the side of my chest as I possibly can, causing a turning motion of the opponent's foot. First after doing this I start to extend and have gotten taps on several high belts with this.
The person that has the tightest footlock I know is Imanari, and this is the way he taught it to me. There is a lot of pain in the achilles which some people will tap to, but it also gives the same feeling a tight toe hold gives and will break the foot.

Turning into kinda toeholdish thing is most effective imo...

This brings back memories of Bas Rutten loudly proclaiming that achilles locks are just "pain holds".

Then I saw a bunch of lads getting their foot broken in half.

Bedankt, Bas!

True, I don't know how on point your technique has to be to break someones foot with it though. I've seen a 90kg+ black belt do it by accident on someone, but i have the preconception that you'd have to be doing it pretty well to achieve that. As opposed to say a RNC which you could put someone to sleep with doing a ~60% efficient choke.

I've very nearly had my foot broken by straight ancle locks, performed on me by somone 20-30 kilos lighter than me. But your technique has to be nearly perfect for it to break something, unless you're just freakishly strong and snap someone's shin in half.
I think straight ancle locks is the most difficult submission to get to work, but once you have the feeling for it, I feel like all the work pays off. It's definitely an underestimated technique and gets a bad rep, mostly because most people perform it badly.

I like that, there is a nice cue from Roli Delgado's legal leg lock DVD where you "put your shoulder in the dent in the mat where you elbow was" --- hard to visualize, easy to show.... Additionally, my friend likes the reverse figure 4 grip that is practically impossible to shake and intense pressure, I'd rather hand fight my way out of a heel hook.

Not to toot my own horn, but this elbow spike footlock I show in this vid will probably crack a foot. Around 15:00.

https://youtu.be/TZsX63Uq9Bo

Would that be classified as a toe hold in competition? I do like to sign up for NAGA Gi while i'm there which is the fucking IBJJF rules so no toe holds for blue belts

Doubtful because it doesn't really look like one, just feels like it. I thought NAGA was more or less "full on" blue & up... Although I've never competed it... my friend and I went to a NAGA once to compete and the comp was running 7 hours behind so we got an email for a refund and ended up going to a nearby pizza place instead.

In IBJJF if it's a footlock grip it's a footlock. Similar to guillotines - noone cares if it's ACTUALLY a neck crank that you tap to, if it was a guillotine grip, it's a guillotine choke.

NAGA actually runs on 2 entirely different rulesets (Gi and NoGi). The NoGi is the most permissive that you'll find and yes blue belts can heel hook. However the Gi divisions are run to the highly restrictive IBJJF rules.

It's a mistake in my opinion.

Their logic is that they are trying to appeal to the broadest audience possible, but in reality it doesn't work like that. They thought they could appeal to both the 10th planet types in NoGi and traditional schools for the Gi. In reality, the 10th planet clubs come for the NoGi and then go home, its dead when the Gi divisions run. The traditional schools stick to their IBJJF tournaments and aren't there. Bit of hyperbole but you get the point.

I found this video where he was actually saying to use the bony bit of your arm and not the wrist or fold of the arm, for maximum control. Is this the one you meant?

Yes, I like this approach, especially when you can get the tap by just expanding your chest like he shows.

I winced just watching the video, look at those deformed forearms!

https://youtu.be/BTRtUaKWCvc

I just hit the straight achilles lock this past weekend at NAGA. I used the radial bone in their achilles to bookmark the bite. Hid my elbow, bridged off his hip and extended my upper half while pulling his achilles up my chest with my elbows pinched.

sup... footlocks it is

hmm well there are like roughly 4 ways to do it and about a dozen variations of how to do those 4

-just extending
-cutting into achilles
-turning it into toehold-ish
-turning into sort of aoki lock type of thing

theres enough opinions and ways and setups n shit to argue over this for days
and it is cool and useful if you know those details well, oli geddes always comes to my mind when i think about the constelation around the attacked foot, hes got some sharp details there

but i noticed that the constelation of your legs makes a even bigger impact on effectiveness than the finishing grip regarding footlocks
of course if your grip is shit you will have no success whatsoever but once your grip is kinda decent it helps much more to refine your leg constelation than going all into crazy details with your grip

i did a little seminar on all kinds of footlocks a while ago, showing many different grips and alternate leg entanglements
you can check a little highlight of it out on my instagram and if you are a half way decent grappler those few peaks might help you get more creative with your footlocks, if you are a pure whitebelt it will probably just confuse you... sorry for that

anyway here check it out:

https://www.instagram.com[...]q9c2957t12

often during my rolls i had a basic footlock and my grip was just like okay but once i went for the finish it felt really hard and especially on flexible guys it felt like it will just not be enough
but if i completely switched my leg entanglements up i would sometimes have great success even with a half arsed grip around the attacked foot...

and now one more hint for the hardcore blackbelt adult roid level of competitors or the usually young ones who are ready to die on the mat:
its not even anymore so much about a sharp finish, they do have that for sure and once in a while someone does a little mistake and a sharp finish happens but most of the time they have profound defense knowledge and it ends up in a battle of draining strenght. your locking mechanic needs to be on point nevertheless but no matter how good it is things rarely are gonna end quick, you will gas out but the plan is to make the other guys leg gas out quicker

yeah that sounds weird but yeah make his leg gas out
nowadays my foot flexibility is a bit weaker cause my feet almost got broken several times over the years so they are kinda not as crazy flexible as they used to be when i was like 25.
man i remember times where i was always happy when people went for footlocks (as long as no heelhooks were allowed tho) i would just sit back and chill till they use up all their gas trying to footlock me

nowadays im more cautious with my defense since people are getting more skilled and creative with their footlocks,
but back then it seemed literally impossible for somebody to just footlock me (keep in mind im also heavy and tall and very flexible, all together making it generally hard to finish me with footlock)
but on a few ocassions somebody would attack one leg over and over again and even switch sides once he got tired of attacking with one side (like moving my foot across his chest sticking it in the other armpit) and over time my foot and calf got so tired that i barely could resist and 'put on the boot' anymore, and then its like trying to take the footlock with a relaxed foot, once you put someone in that state i believe you can pretty much finish anyone if your footlock is just half way correctly done

btw if you wonder now, i never tapped yet in comp to anything hyperextending my foot or cutting into my achilles so probably Bas Rutten is right... however theres one freak incident with a true freak, super strong heavy tough guy i fought a few times. he had once failed to footlock me although he footlocks everyone and then we fought again and he tried it again but i believe he purposely went for my shin as he guessed my foot is to flexible, i took it for a while but our match just started and he was fresh and went maximum retard on my leg and at some point i felt weird slight cracking noises in my shin and that was where i decided to rather tap... i felt pain in my bone for like a couple weeks so i guess it were micro fractures or something.

so all i can say is in jiu jitsu you can never be 100% sure of anything

lately tho in training i been tapping once in a while to footlocks cause like i said injuries make me slightly vulnerable again, end of last year at naga euros i got my foot almost broken by some big italian guy, i somehow took it but i was really on the verge of tapping cause he got me in that state of absolute tiredness unable to do much defense, though he didnt put me there it was because i decided to get to the competition over night by train and no sleep at all and compete right away and it was like my 10th match or so (i know im crazy but cheap fuck life... cant help it)

anyway here a little ending word
- dont go to comps like me
- tap late to footlocks, enjoy the pain, but tap in time ! the more your feet get stretched the better your natural defense will be however if you let anything rip once it will have the opposite effect
- the versatility of footlocks is highly neglected i believe, play around with it !