exams over :-)

Another week has passed. There is a load off my shoulders... uni exams are finished. The last few weeks have been crazy and it's nice to have that behind me. In the middle of that, two of my mares foaled down (all trouble free, like good girls!), and I had two lots of visitors. Really, I'd just like a quiet week now, thank you :-)

I've decided not to go to the Pan Pacs next weekend. I was going will I? / won't I? / will I? for weeks, but to be honest, I really can't be bothered. I guess it's a case of needing a mental rest. I also haven't particularly prepared for a comp. On the one hand, I'm wrestling well and I'm probably quite fit enough, but on the other hand, I don't have my head around it. I've competed three times this year and while I don't think that means I ought to sit on my laurels, I just don't have the fire for it at present. I'd rather set my sights on the Vics in March next year and do that properly.

The week just gone was mainly devoted to the guys who will be grading in a fortnight. Lots and lots of basic armbars, figure fours, lapel chokes and drills, drills and more basic drills. We've had a fair influx of new guys recently, so most classes there has been at least one guy who needed to be shown the essential stuff. I don't really mind, as I continue to pick up a small thing here and there which will make techniques work better for me. Sometimes, by helping someone troubleshoot a technique, I also get a better understanding of it, like was the case with armbars from mount the other day.

One of the guys is being groomed for blue belt, so he's under the master's eye (and the hammer) a bit lately. But it's good to see he's making real progress at the moment, there is more and more good technique and less reliance on strength. I had a couple of good rolls with him during the week.

Aside from that, I went to an enjoyable open mat on Thursday. Had a long roll with one of the purple belts. I thwarted his attempts to attack me from rubber guard and escaped an omoplata. Also got out of a triangle. So I was pretty happy about that. I attacked him with a D'Arce at some stage but didn't succeed. In the end, we did some complicated rolling maneuver which resulted in a perfect armbar (my arm of course!). Good fun.

I had another chance to work on flow rolling with a couple of the two stripe white belts. That's really starting to work now. Interestingly, these guys lasted the whole hour and a half of rolling, whilst a couple of other white belts wore themselves out in less than an hour. I'm not saying that's all my doing :-) And it's not like I was any different when I started. But I intend to keep pushing for going easy and rolling for position only, especially during the warm up part of rolls. And I certainly am quite prepared to pull the guys up mid roll and point out that tight muscles and held breath and bad for rolling light.

For myself, I want training partners who can dose their strength and who will rely on technique rather than muscle to get position and submission. When we do competition style rounds, then we can go hard, and I'll go hard with any of them. But not all the time. And I'll continue to do my best to help the newer guys roll like that. For their AND my benefit :-)