Eoghan O’Flanagan is a BJJ Athlete from Harlsedon, London and began training at age 14. However, he did have some previous grappling experience, training Judo at only 4 years old. Since then, he achieved his black belt in BJJ at around 21. He currently trains at New school BJJ and New Wave Academy – but mainly trains at open mats. Interestingly, he says YouTube, Flograppling and UFC fight pass are where he learns a lot about grappling which shows the impact of digital media on modern-day practitioners and their methods of learning. He also states Gordon Ryan, Ethan Crelinsten and for the leg entries Eddie Cummings and Garry Tonon as those who have the biggest influence on his game.
We asked O’Flanagan his favourite positions in BJJ and this was his response: “Open or Butterfly guard as it allows for loads of entries to legs, arms and the back in good combinations and opportunities to heist for front headlocks. My favourite sweep is the tornado sweep at the moment! I like float passing, it’s effortless if done correctly and looks like magic”. He also listed inside heelhooks and rear naked chokes as his best submissions.
Typically competing at around the 80KG mark, he mentions his worst injury saying “I got caught in a toe hold that hurt for a while, both knees have popped before and a QL strain as well. All equally terrible other than that I’ve bitten my tongue and lip and can’t enjoy food after that!”
“The hardest opponent I’ve fought is probably Tarik Hopstock. He caught me with a straight foot lock and I could feel he had the most developed guard out of everyone I’d fought up to then. Combined with great strength, cardio and mobility he’s a very dangerous opponent. Of course, he’s also very technical but that goes without saying”. The next stop on O’Flanagan’s competition wishlist is to win the upcoming ADCC trials.
It’s no secret that he’s primarily a nogi player and we asked him about that, and if nogi could eventually be viewed as more ‘boring’ like the gi often is due to people figuring out leglocks and new forms of meta. This was his response: “Actually I think it will only get more interesting and scrambly, similar to when you watch freestyle wrestling, all the moves will eventually be learnt and the combination of moves will be the decider between winner and loser. Slight nuances in moves will be discovered leading to more strategies based around them. I also think as the overall technical level increases the importance of strength and conditioning is going to increase – it will be difficult to force errors on a fresh opponent but given 7/8 minutes of tactical pressure it becomes much easier to force a mistake which will give you positional dominance etc.” He continues “I do think that leg locks are still evolving and we’re yet to find details, for example, the saddle and 50/50 have ways to expose heel with control of both legs and each time a new idea is implemented successfully in competition it’ll inevitably lead to counters. In the long run, I think that wrestling, leg locks and back takes are going to be the key”
We also spoke about the growth in European grappling with events such as Polaris and whether these tournaments were getting saturated compared to their earlier days, O’Flanagan answered “I don’t think it’s saturated I just think it was pretty underdeveloped before. The main problem is that we’re in the wake of the leg lock revolution so there is still a wide birth in skill levels with regards to leg locks but as attitudes change and it becomes more common to be taught leg locks from a lower belt and younger age, and as gi splits more and more from nogi, the nogi scene will become much more competitive and balanced until a whole new “leg locks” is found.”
Lastly, we asked about the emergence of nogi and whether it was now easier to earn money as a nogi specialist as opposed to being a gi specialist. O’Flanagan stated: “I actually think we have lots of nogi competitions, corona excluded, and it depends on how you plan to make money. I would argue that most “BJJ pros” don’t make their money from prize money and sponsorship particularly in the UK – most of them make their money from teaching in some way – which would be equally difficult in gi and nogi. One thing I’d say is maybe nogi is more marketable to the layman but gi is still more mainstream as it stands, however in the future I see a shift from gi to nogi permanently. The rise of MMA and the lack of equal gi counterparts means that nogi will simply gain more exposure and gi will eventually (hopefully haha) get swept under the rug. So to summarise, I think for now it’s equal in both but in the future it will be easier to make money as a nogi geezer”.
In terms of future plans, O’Flanagan quipped “Eventually when I’m too old to compete, open a dojo and let the students do the dirty work”. He would also like to mention his new sponsors Raine clothing ltd – “run by a couple who are really nice and chat to us personally which is a breath of fresh air, not to mention the clothes are ridiculously feng shui”
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