The Toreando pass is a fundamental move in passing the open guard in BJJ. It can be used in both Gi and Nogi and involves pinning and moving your opponent’s legs out the way of your own. This can be done by moving both legs forward whilst stepping to the side, or grabbing their hip and knee to pivot past the guard. The pass was popularised by World Champion Leandro Lo, who favors this style of passing. When done correctly it can quickly pass straight into side control. It is also known as the Bull Fighter pass as it resembles a matador using both arms to move the fabric.
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Establishing dominant grips
Grips are a large part of the Toreando pass and are essential to its success. To set up the Toreando pass you must first establish dominant grips against your opponent. To do this you can begin by getting pocket grips on the opponent’s pants in the Gi. This can either be done on their shins or on the inside of their legs, preferably on towards the bottom of their pants.
Similarly, pant grips can also be made at the opponent’s hips and knees. In short, the idea is to grip where the opponent has joints, such as ankles, knees or hips. This is because it’s easier to move limbs by attacking the weaker spots.
As a side note, this is why some competitors favor tight pants as it stops grips from being established as easily. Having said this, some organizations such as the IBJJF are quite strict on pant size to avoid cheating or using loopholes to your advantage.
Entry into the Toreando pass
Typically the Toreando pass is entered via the open guard position. This works when you can grip both of your opponent’s legs.
When the grips are created, the next step is to move your opponent’s legs forwards towards your body. The idea is to straighten the legs out so the opponent’s upper body can be accessed. This must be done in a quick and powerful movement as legs can be a strong body part to move.
When the legs have been thrown forwards the next step is to pick the left or right side of your opponent’s body and move into that position. From here you must keep the pant grips and then pin your opponents chest with your shoulder. After this, you can settle into top side control.
A variation of this is to direct your opponent’s legs in a certain direction instead of downwards. For instance, whilst you can push their legs down, you can put them left or right. Again, this depends on your passing style. If you want to pass to the left then you would throw their legs to the opposite side, for example.
Against experienced opponents, they will often see the Toreando being set up and will make adjustments to defend this. To counter this defense you can feint sides and pretend to attack left or right. This is similar to pretending to do a sweep and using it as a ploy to attack a submission. As always in BJJ, various chained threats are superior to creating effective attacks as opposed to only following one direction.
Nogi passing
As mentioned, the grips are a key part of passing whilst in the Gi. With this in mind, the Nogi Toreando uses different methods. These methods involve a different entry which uses a C-grip on the opponent’s ankle and a C-grip on their opposite knee. The idea is to push the ankle out the way and then put your palm on their hip. This should leave you with both hands on their knee and hip. Next, you can put your weight on the hip and push the knee towards the other side of their body. This creates an opening to pass their hips and gain side control.
It should be noted that when doing the Toreando pass, you should be on your toes pushing your weight into the opponent. This is good practice for most passing methods, including pressure passing. The reason for this is that it directs your weight into the opponent which makes it less comfortable for them and uses more energy to defend.
The same principle applies when doing the Toreando in the Gi but is more important in Nogi. Because you don’t have pant grips in the Gi, your weight needs to be applied even more so to make the pass as efficient as possible.
It’s also important to remember why the Toreando works. In short, your opponent wants their knees close to their body like a ball. This means they’re compact and harder to pass. If the opponent’s legs are stretched out then they can easily be passed as there’s nothing to defend their hips. This is why the Toreando is important because it removes the opponent’s legs away from their hips and allows access to the upper body.
Final Thoughts
The Toreando pass is a fundamental way to pass the opponent’s open guard. Sometimes it is good to keep a distance from an opponent who likes close guards such as half and closed guards. Because of this, you need to learn the Toreando to avoid being put in these positions. As well it benefits from constantly pulling and pushing your opponent which will often create errors and openings for passes to be completed as a result. Due to its versatility, the Toreando pass is an essential technique that should be taught as part of any fundamental BJJ curriculum.
