Kouchi Gari
Kouchi gari — inner reap hooking inside the near ankle, reaping backward. Weight must be on the reaped leg at contact.
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Kouchi gari — the minor inner reap — is a foot sweep technique in which the attacker uses the inside of their foot or heel to hook behind the opponent’s near ankle and reap the leg backward. The opponent, unable to step with the reaped leg and with their weight committed to it, falls backward and to the side.
The kouchi gari is mechanically simple — hook behind the ankle, reap backward — but requires precise timing. The leg is reaped at the moment the opponent’s weight is shifting onto it. A reap against an unweighted leg simply moves the leg away; a reap against a fully planted, static leg requires force to move. The skill is the timing — finding and acting on the weight transfer moment.
The kouchi gari is used both from standing clinch positions and from the seated guard. In the standing context, it is a direct takedown tool from the over-under clinch. In the seated guard context, the double kouchi gari from seated guard is a bilateral inner reap entry that transitions to leg entanglement positions.
INV-ST01Invariant "Destabilising the opponent requires controlling the secondary leg — the leg that is not the primary base. Moving the secondary leg removes the opponent's ability to rebalance."
Why it works hereKouchi catches a leg in the instant it is becoming primary — committed weight has just landed but the new base is not yet braced. The previous support leg has already unloaded to lift, so it cannot be reweighted in time, and the leg under the reap cannot step because it carries the opponent's mass. Reaping a fully planted leg fails because the previously secondary leg is now available again as a base; reaping mid-transfer means there is no reusable secondary leg left to recover with.
See full invariant page → The kouchi gari targets the leg the opponent is stepping onto — making it simultaneously the primary support leg and the reaped leg. At the moment of the reap, the opponent cannot use the secondary leg (the non-reaped leg) to rebalance because their weight has already transferred to the reaped leg. control the secondary leg applies: the reaped leg, once removed, is the leg the opponent needed to rebalance with. The fall is unavoidable when the timing is correct.
INV-06Invariant "Base is a function of weight distribution over a support point. Disrupting the support point disrupts the base regardless of the size of what sits on it."