WHAT IS INTEGRATED GROUND FIGHTING SYSTEMS?

Most fights don't start on the ground. But a lot of them end there.

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Whether you choose the takedown or your opponent chooses it for you, whether you trip, get pushed, get pulled, or get slammed — the grappling range is part of every serious physical confrontation. The question is not whether you will face it. The question is whether you will be prepared when you do.

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Integrated Ground Fighting Systems (IGFS) is the submission grappling and Combat JuJitsu curriculum at Cali Combat Systems — a no-holds-barred, reality-based ground fighting program built for the street, not the sport tournament. It is not a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu school with a different name. It is not a wrestling program wearing a martial arts uniform. It is the complete grappling system developed by Sifu Larry Hartsell — one of Bruce Lee's original personal students, bodyguard to the stars, and the founder of the Jun Fan JKD Grappling Association — integrating Judo, Russian Sambo, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Greco-Roman and Freestyle Wrestling, Japanese Shooto, Filipino Dumog, Indonesian Silat, and Catch-as-Catch-Can Wrestling into a unified, functional curriculum.

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Combined with the KinaMutai asymmetrical grappling system of Sifu Paul Vunak — the biting, eye gouging, and pressure point attacks that bridge the gap between sport grappling and street grappling — and the Combat JuJitsu and Shorinji Ryu JuJitsu curriculum of Professor David Tice (Black Belt under Gokor Chivichyan, Gene LeBell, and Ken Penland), the IGFS program at CCS is the most comprehensive grappling curriculum available in San Diego.

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At the center of it all: Sensei Jeramiah Giehl — who has been training grappling since high school, traveled to Pasadena multiple times a week for years to train under Professor David Tice, competed in no-rules Shooto-style events, used ground control in eight years of bouncing and professional security work, and holds formal rank and certification across six distinct grappling lineages.

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The floor does not care about your belt color. This program prepares you for the floor.

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THE LEGACY: SIFU LARRY HARTSELL AND JUN FAN JKD GRAPPLING

To understand Integrated Ground Fighting Systems, you have to understand the man who built it.

 

Sifu Larry Hartsell was one of Bruce Lee's original students — training with Lee personally in Oakland and Los Angeles during the years when Jeet Kune Do was still being forged. He was one of the few men in that inner circle who arrived already seasoned on the ground: a background in boxing, wrestling, and street fighting that made him uniquely suited to develop the grappling dimension of JKD that Lee himself had begun to explore.

 

After Bruce Lee's death, Hartsell devoted decades to building what became the most comprehensive JKD-based grappling system in the world. He trained without ego and without limitation — under Gene LeBell (the Godfather of Grappling, the last living repository of authentic Catch Wrestling tradition in America), under Gokor Chivichyan (the Armenian Assassin, one of the most feared submission grapplers on earth), in BJJ, in Russian Sambo, in Filipino Dumog, in Indonesian Silat, in Japanese Shooto. He took what worked from every system and built it into a unified curriculum with one organizing principle: no holds barred.

 

He founded the Jun Fan JKD Grappling Association to preserve and transmit that curriculum — and it is through this organization, under Sifu John Doty (a direct student of Hartsell), that Sensei Jeramiah Giehl holds his Associate Instructor certification.

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The JFJKDGA lineage at CCS: Bruce Lee → Sifu Larry Hartsell → Sifu John Doty, Sensei David tice → Sensei Jeramiah Giehl

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THE PHILOSOPHY: WHAT THE GROUND IS REALLY FOR

The IGFS philosophy at CCS begins with an honest answer to one question: why are you going to the ground?

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In sport BJJ, you go to the ground to submit. In wrestling, you go to the ground to pin. In street self-defense, you go to the ground because you have to — and you leave as fast as possible.

 

The distinction matters because it shapes every training decision.

 

The ground is the most dangerous place to be in a street fight. Multiple opponents. Stomps. Hard surfaces. Weapons in play. The referee that exists in sport does not exist on the street. Going to the ground voluntarily in a street situation without the tools to survive it is a serious tactical error.

 

But the ground is coming whether you want it or not. The person who has never trained on the ground is completely helpless once they are there. The person who has only trained sport BJJ has a well-developed game for a single opponent on a mat with a referee. The person who has trained IGFS has a complete ground fighting capability, the asymmetrical tools that work when sport technique doesn't, and the philosophical framework to know when to submit and when to stand back up.

 

This is the balance. And this is what every class at CCS IGFS develops.

THE ARTS: WHAT WE TEACH

COMBAT JUJITSU AND SHORINJI RYU JUJITSU — THE CORE

The Combat JuJitsu and Shorinji Ryu JuJitsu curriculum earned under Professor David Tice forms the technical spine of the IGFS program at CCS. These are not separate arts operating in parallel — they are two expressions of the same JuJitsu tradition, one classical and one modern, creating a curriculum that covers the complete ground fighting spectrum from foundational throws and joint locks to no-rules submission fighting.

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Shorinji Ryu JuJitsu — the classical Japanese art rooted in the principle that a smaller, weaker defender can overcome a larger, stronger attacker through leverage, positioning, and the intelligent application of force. Its vocabulary of throws (nage waza), joint locks (kansetsu waza), chokes (shime waza), and ground control forms the foundational grammar of the entire IGFS curriculum. When Sensei Jeramiah teaches an armbar entry or a choke defense, it traces to the Shorinji Ryu framework built under Professor Tice.

Combat JuJitsu — the street-applicable evolution of JuJitsu principles. Where Shorinji Ryu preserves the classical tradition, Combat JuJitsu asks the blunter question: what survives against a resisting, motivated opponent who is bigger than you, does not know the rules, and has no intention of tapping? The answer is the Combat JuJitsu curriculum: the submissions that work under pressure, the position escapes that matter when being held down is genuinely dangerous, and the strikes, gouges, and asymmetrical tools that create the openings classical sport grappling cannot access.

The Tice-LeBell-Chivichyan Legacy. What makes the Combat JuJitsu and Shorinji Ryu curriculum under Professor Tice distinctly valuable is the lineage behind it. Gokor Chivichyan trained under Gene LeBell for decades — absorbing the last authentic Catch Wrestling tradition in America while simultaneously becoming one of the most feared submission grapplers in the world. The curriculum that came through Professor Tice carries the DNA of that school: pain compliance, submission from dominant positions, the Catch Wrestling submissions that sport grappling has largely forgotten, and the Sambo leg lock and body lock entries that sit outside the BJJ game entirely.

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THE STAND-UP TO GROUND TRANSITION

The fight does not begin on the ground. IGFS training at CCS begins where real fights begin — standing — and teaches the complete transition to the ground:

Takedowns from Wrestling: Single leg, double leg, high crotch, ankle pick — the wrestling-based takedown repertoire that is the most reliable method of putting an opponent on the ground in both sport and street contexts.

Throws from Judo and Sambo: Osoto Gari (major outer reap), Ouchi Gari (major inner reap), Seoi Nage (shoulder throw), Harai Goshi (sweeping hip), Tai Otoshi (body drop), O Goshi (major hip), the sacrifice throws (Tomoe Nage, Sumi Gaeshi) — and the Sambo body lock and belt grip throws that complement the Judo repertoire with the Soviet wrestling tradition's approach to bringing the fight to the floor.

Clinch Entries: The transition between striking range and grappling runs through the clinch. IGFS trains the Muay Thai plum (double neck clinch), wrestling's pummeling game for the double-underhook, the Russian tie (two-on-one), and the JKD entry principles that bridge the gap from striking to clinch without giving up position or getting hit coming in.

Countering the Takedown: The sprawl, the whizzer, the hip check — and the standing submission entries that punish a committed shot. If your opponent goes for the double leg and you have the ground game to threaten an arm or a guillotine from the sprawl, the takedown attempt becomes the most dangerous thing they can do.

Filipino Dumog Entries: The pushing and pulling entries of Filipino Dumog — head and neck control, body lever manipulation, the merging game that collapses the opponent's structure from inside — integrate with the throwing repertoire to create a takedown game that draws from both the Western grappling tradition and the Southeast Asian weapons-and-grappling tradition simultaneously.

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POSITIONS AND TRANSITIONS

The positional hierarchy of IGFS prioritizes dominant position before submission pursuit — building the ground game from the top down:

Mount and High Mount:  The dominant top position. Strikes from mount, the transition to high mount and the submission entries that open from there — the armbar, the triangle, the americana — alongside the KinaMutai tools that create openings no sport grappler is trained to defend.

Side Control and Variations: North-south, twister side control, modified scarf hold (kesa gatame), the Judo-derived pin positions from Sensei Tice's curriculum. Strikes from side control. Transition chains to mount, back mount, and the submission entries available from each variation.

Back Mount and the Rear Naked Choke: The highest-percentage finishing position in real-world grappling. IGFS trains the back take from every position, harness and seatbelt control, and the rear naked choke finish — alongside the alternative terminations (neck cranks, KinaMutai biting entries) when the sport submission is defended.

Guard and Guard Recovery: The guard as a survival position, not a competition platform. Closed guard, open guard, half guard — and critically, the guard recovery and stand-up entries that return you to the upright fighting position where multiple opponent management and environmental awareness are possible.

Knee-on-Belly and Transitional Control: The high-pressure positions between side control and mount that create striking opportunities, submission threats, and the psychological pressure that breaks defensive shells.

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THE SUBMISSION GAME

The IGFS submission curriculum draws from every grappling tradition in the system — arms, legs, neck, and the asymmetrical tools that operate outside all of them:

Chokes and Strangles: Rear Naked Choke, Guillotine (standard, arm-in, high-elbow), Anaconda, D'Arce, Triangle (guard, mount, back), Arm Triangle (Kata Gatame), Japanese Strangle variants, Brabo, and the KinaMutai strangulation entries that integrate biting and pressure point attacks to force the submission or create space for the finish.

Armlocks: Armbar from guard, mount, side control, and standing. Kimura. Americana. Omoplata. Wristlocks and short armbar entries from the clinch and side control — the Kali joint manipulation tradition translated to the grappling context.

Leg Locks: Straight ankle lock, heel hook (inside and outside), kneebar, calf slicer, toe hold, and the Sambo-influenced leg lock entries under Professor Tice that reach submissions from positions where upper body control has not yet been established. The leg lock game makes the defensive bottom position genuinely dangerous — a dimension that guard-based BJJ training alone cannot develop.

Catch Wrestling Submissions: The double wrist lock (Catch Wrestling's term for what BJJ calls the Kimura — the Catch tradition predates BJJ nomenclature by decades), the cradle, the chicken wing, the arm hook, and the pain compliance submissions from Professor Tice's LeBell-Chivichyan lineage that work without the cooperative positioning sport BJJ often requires.

Neck Cranks and Cervical Locks: The Sambo and Catch Wrestling tradition of cervical manipulation that Hartsell retained from the no-holds-barred systems he drew from: the Can Opener, the Twister, crank variants from north-south. These are not sport submissions. They are real-world tools.

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KINAMUTAI — ASYMMETRICAL GRAPPLING

KinaMutai is the tool that most completely closes the gap between sport grappling and street grappling — and it is the curriculum that Sensei Jeramiah carries directly from his training under Sifu Paul Vunak as his Full Instructor in the PFS system.

The core principle: the tools that win fights on the street are the tools that are banned in sport. Biting. Eye gouging. Pressure point attacks. Fish hooks. These are not dirty tricks. They are the natural responses of a human being in genuine danger, refined into a systematic curriculum and trained with the same deliberate repetition as any submission.

Why KinaMutai matters in a grappling program: A trained grappler who resists chokes through neck strength can always be bitten. A man who has you in a rear naked choke can be bitten on the forearm with enough force to break the grip. A man in your closed guard can be eye-gouged before he completes his ground and pound. The teeth, the thumbs, the fingers — always available, impossible to train out of the opponent's blind spot.

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At CCS, KinaMutai is trained systematically:

Biting as a Grappling Tool — target selection (forearms, ears, nose, shoulders, neck), grip-breaking applications, and the positional contexts where biting creates the transition from defensive to offensive grappling.

Eye Attacks — thumb gouges, finger rakes, and palm-heel entries targeting the eyes from guard, mount, back mount, and clinch. The eye is the most universally vulnerable target on the human body. Size and strength provide no defense.

Pressure Point Integration — the nerve centers that Kali's defanging tradition identified in the weapon hand applied now to the grappling context: the ulnar nerve, the peroneal nerve, the brachial plexus, the radial nerve. Attacks to these points collapse grip strength and break position without requiring the cooperative compliance of sport submissions.

The Stand-Up from KinaMutai — the most important skill in the KinaMutai curriculum for street application: using asymmetrical tools to create space, break contact, and return to the upright fighting position where multiple opponent management is possible.

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TRAP FIGHTING, SHOOTO, AND NO-HOLDS-BARRED GRAPPLING

Shooto was one of the first organized no-holds-barred combat sports — predating the UFC's dominance, influencing the development of modern MMA, and asking the question that sport grappling rarely asks: what works when there are no rules at all?

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Sensei Jeramiah's early Trap Fighting and Shooto training in the early 1990s was formative in developing the no-rules grappling mindset that distinguishes IGFS from sport programs. He was not training for points. He was not training for a referee's decision. He was training for the question his Midnight Fight Club experience made concrete: what happens when the other man's friend gets involved?

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That question — and the asymmetrical, multiple-opponent, weapons-aware answers that IGFS develops — runs through every class at CCS.

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CATCH-AS-CATCH-CAN WRESTLING

Catch Wrestling is the ancestor of modern submission wrestling and the fighting tradition that most directly influenced Sifu Larry Hartsell's IGFS curriculum through the LeBell-Chivichyan school — itself one of the last living repositories of authentic Catch Wrestling in the United States.

 

What Catch Wrestling adds that sport BJJ cannot:

Submissions from Standing — submission threats from standing ties and clinch positions, without necessarily going to the ground, that create submission danger across the full range of the clinch game.

Pain Compliance and Cranks — the compression locks, crank submissions, and pain compliance holds that work against larger opponents without relying on the guard-based leverage that BJJ's positional hierarchy requires.

The Tough-Guy Mindset — Catch Wrestling's cultural inheritance: pain is a tool, not a deterrent. The goal of every grappling exchange is submission — not points, not position management, not time.

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REAL-WORLD CREDENTIALS: WHY THIS CURRICULUM IS PRESSURE-TESTED

Sensei Jeramiah does not teach from a textbook. He teaches from a life on the mat and off it.

The Pasadena Drives. Traveling to Pasadena multiple times per week — not because it was convenient, but because Professor David Tice was there and the training was worth it. That kind of commitment to a single instructor, sustained over years, is the difference between collecting certificates and actually building a grappling game.

Ten Years of Bouncing and Security Work. Nightclubs, hotels, corporate environments. The real-world application of takedown defense, standing control, ground restraint, and the management of non-cooperative subjects who have every reason to resist and no reason to follow sport rules. Grappling in a nightclub is not grappling on a mat. The surfaces are different. The stakes are different. The bystanders are different. And the training that prepares you for it has to account for all of that.

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WHO THIS PROGRAM IS FOR

The Martial Artist whose stand-up game is solid but whose ground game is a liability — who needs a comprehensive grappling curriculum that covers every range from clinch to submission without being locked into any one system's ruleset.

 

The BJJ Practitioner who wants to integrate sport ground skills with street-applicable asymmetrical tools, weapons-aware ground survival, and the KinaMutai system that makes the grappling game complete for real confrontations.

 

The Combat Sports Athlete who wants submission grappling training that draws from the widest possible range of traditions — Catch Wrestling, Sambo, Judo, BJJ, Shooto — not just the guard game.

 

The Self-Defense Student who needs to know what to do when they hit the ground — whether they chose it or were put there.

 

The Law Enforcement or Security Professional who needs ground control, takedowns, and restraint methods that work under stress against non-cooperative subjects who are not going to tap when you ask nicely.

 

The Stunt Performer or Action Actor who needs authentic ground fighting choreography — clinch entries, takedowns, submission attempts, reversals, escapes — that reads as real because it comes from a curriculum built on real systems, tested by a real practitioner.

 

The Complete Beginner who wants to start building ground competence from day one, in a structured environment, progressing through the CCS Phase Method curriculum at their own pace.

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READY TO HIT THE MAT?

The ground is coming. Whether you choose it or your opponent does — whether it is a takedown, a trip, a shove into a wall, or a pile-on from multiple people — the grappling range is part of every serious physical confrontation. The question is not whether you will face it. The question is whether you have trained for it.

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Sensei Jeramiah Giehl has been training grappling since high school. He drove to Pasadena multiple times a week to earn his black belts under Professor David Tice. He competed in no-rules events. He has used ground control on the job for eight years. He holds formal rank and certification across six grappling lineages. And he is here, in San Diego, teaching — in group classes, private sessions, and specialized workshops — to students at every level.

 

The intro class is $15. That is the only barrier between you and the most comprehensive grappling curriculum in San Diego.

 

Book your intro class today. The mat is waiting.

 

"The Integrated Ground Fighting Systems is not just a grappling system — it is a reality-based approach to fighting in the grappling range." — Sifu Larry Hartsell

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"Using no way as way, having no limitation as limitation." — Bruce Lee