Guillotine Playbook

Mat Manual companion guide to "The Guillotine: The First Choke Everyone Meets." Print it. The article teaches the choke, its defense chain, and its limits. This book keeps that order as law: defense cards come first, the tap is trained as a skill before any finish is taught, and every finish card (arm-out, arm-in, high-elbow) carries its tap-first gate printed on the card itself.

Name: ______________________________ Dojo: ______________________________ Belt: ______________ Start date: ______________ Coach sign-off (Part 27): ______________

BEFORE ANYTHING: TAP FIRST, CONTROL BEFORE ANY FINISH ☐ This is a fast blood choke. It can work in seconds. Tap early and clearly, by hand, voice, or any clear signal, the moment defense is lost and pressure is set. Tapping is a scored skill in this book, never a failure. ☐ Appliers: control before submission, always. Close slowly and steadily, leave time for a tap to arrive, and release in the same breath a tap lands, in drilling and in live rounds, with no checking whether it was real. ☐ Never crank. No finish in this book is rescued by twisting, wrenching, lifting the head, or bending the neck. Crank mechanics are knowledge-and-control-only: named in Part 14 so they can be recognized and refused, never taught or drilled. ☐ A forearm that slides off the side of the neck onto the jaw or the front of the throat ends the rep. Reset the position. Do not squeeze through a bad placement. ☐ Any dizziness, neck pain, or throat pain ends the rep and is told to the coach the same session. Hiding a symptom is the one true failure in this book. ☐ Defense is learned before finishes. Parts 2–9 pass before Part 11's first finish card is opened, for both partners in a pair.

Part 1: The Order of This Book, and How It Scores

The order is the curriculum. A student who finishes well and defends late is not advanced in this book. They are half trained, and the half they are missing is the half that keeps them safe in other people's rounds.