busy, busy... but have progress to report

My holidays are over. I'm back at uni and I'll be starting part time work as well. I still have some 28 horses at home and of course, I also train BJJ - about six times per week! That aside I'm trying to get a bit more painting done on the house, too. But I keep getting interrupted by bad weather anyway...

I feel a bit like a juggler at the moment, trying to keep everything up and not dropping anything :-)

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After realising that I was going too hard and for the wrong reasons last Monday, I made an effort to ease off. I think that bore fruit. For me, it meant that I moved better, which showed up a lot during open mat, but really, any time I rolled. For my partners it was probably also better :-)

The week was a bit shorter than usual, as there was no class on Saturday.

One evening, I was partnered with a guy who was having one of those days when you think you are useless, and he really looked discouraged and upset. I didn't coddle him, but I ensured that I didn't smash him, either. Also, every time he made a good attempt, I told him so. Yes, I let him get sweeps, but only if he set them up right. I was hyper aware of not going hard to keep the upper hand. Instead, I let him work to good positions and then I defended and reversed. That way, we both benefitted. And when we finished up, I think his confidence had been restored a little.

During the week, the white belts worked on figure fours from side control, the rest of use started from half guard top and then we looked at a roll to finish the submission. One day, we went over a sequence from mount escape to half guard to lockdown and then how to sweep from there (three different ways).

I used some time during open mat to try out some of the back control transistions and subs from the Ryan Hall DVD set. Hey, that was fun, I finally got to try out the crutch lock and roll :-) That is so cool! The young guy I conscripted for the purpose thought so, too. Anyway, for his troubles I showed him two gi chokes which really lit his eyes up. Some of the other guys started hovering but I told them no, they have to wait (the young guy I did show is smaller and lighter than all of them, so I figure it's fair to give him a couple of extra "tools". Plus, us lighter people have to stick together ;-) ).

And it's not like I don't show everyone stuff anyway...

Another positive thing.. also during open mat: I started rolling with a fairly new guy and managed to get him to roll slowly, flowly and controlled. Had ro remind him a few times, but it did work. And he was amazed, because all of a sudden, he had time to notice opportunities, had time to try new moves and all that sort of stuff. A few times we stopped when he had questions. It was really good.

For me, that was way better than what I did to him ealier in the week....

of turtles and silly fools with egos...

I got lucky. My cold didn't pan out to be a bad one and I felt quite good by Monday evening, so I went to training. I didn't even feel out of breath or tired. Good stuff!


We had a pretty large class. One guy had returned from a broken thumb and it was good to see him back again.

We briefly revisited the turtle attacks from last week: clock choke and crucifix. I got myself a purple belt to drill with. He hadn't seen the alternate roll to crucifix and I had trouble explaining it from the bottom :-) Sensei to the rescue!

We then looked at transitioning from the front to the side to the dovetail position and how to unturtle the turtle by cupping the far knee while loading the near hip and pulling him to 5 o'clock. Having pulled him off base and so exposed him to attacks, we looked at a figure four, or if he defends and turtles, start over again. All in a sort of drill, sort of see-what-happens scenario.

I discovered a way to go back to turtle if he threatens my arm. To begin with, I felt pinned and exposed when he turned me over from turtle and hunted for my arm. But I found if I stretched out the leg nearest him and dropped that hip to the floor, I could easily re-turtle. That was my genius moment for the evening.

Us blue belts got sent out and the rest was instructed to roll, which they did with relish. As people were tapped out, we went in. There was a guy I had had problems with in the past, because though he is new, he is fast, strong and goes hard as nails. So if I could have picked one I didn't fancy rolling with, it was him. I'm such a chicken at times.... I've really struggled with him in the past. So guess what, he tapped out this other white belt and it was my turn with him next.

What ensued lasted the whole time until the end of class. I tried for a snap down but failed, and then it wasn't hard to pull guard after that. From sheer strength, he avoided my high guard armbar attemps. But of course it means my technique wasn't good enough, too. I looked for other attacks but I will admit that I was too concerned keeping my guard closed to control him and not enough to hunt for submissions. Finally, I had opened up to attack his arm and he passed to half guard. I tried for deep half but didn't quite succeed  and he eventually got my back. I managed to turtle and so he had time to try out the new stuff from the class. However, I easily defended all of that. Finally, I got back to bottom half and lockdown. And there I got stuck. I tried to sweep, I tried to get out. But the bottom line was this: I was too cowardly to open my lockdown and look for opportunites. I was so concerned about not getting into a worse spot that I mucked around and hung in and wasted my and his time. Then time was called.

On the one hand, I was happy that I can defend well and even threaten a guy bigger, faster and stonger than myself. On the other hand, I was pissed that I couldn't do better. And there lies the crux of the matter. Instead of saying "who cares" and go all out for something interesting, I was worried about "losing". Dammit!! I was worried about getting squashed and tapped out. And I'm not talking about getting hurt, at no time did I feel I needed to protect myself from a spazzy uncontrolled white belt. Yes, he was going too hard. Yes, he was frantically hunting for stuff. But hey, I'm big and old and ugly enough to not expose my precious limbs. The honest truth in hindsight is that I was too chicken to play and experiment because I didn't want to risk getting into inferior positions, or "losing". Bah!

My first response after was to ask Sensei about a bottom halfguard escape. As he began to show me one, I couldn't help but say: I've just answered my own question: I should have opened lockdown and gone for something. And it turned out, the two escapes he showed me, I already knew. AAARRGGHHH!

I am such an idiot.

We then had a brief talk about me needing to stop worrying about things, and if need be, deliberately letting things go and tap. Ain't the ego such a fantastic thing??

And here is little old me bitching about the guys going too hard and needing to learn to roll slow. Time to eat my own words and choke on them!

I have a drive home that takes about a half hour. Plenty of time to reflect on things. Boy, did I do some reflecting.

choking turtles and other funny business

I didn't go to class last Thursday. When I turned up for open mat on Friday, I was told that the guys missed me... AAAAWWWW!

:-)

I also heard that the Wednesday night class was well received. Obviously it was talked about and given the seal of approval by the participants as well as our instructor. How good is that??

The joint mobility warm up I gave them also had chins wagging. I heard I made them do such terribly(!) complicated arm movements and other weird stuff. It was soooo hard. Sensei asked if I made them do my favourite weird and complicated arm movments, but when I explained that all I expected were figure eights, we both had a good laugh. But I got talking to one of the Karate BBs who has done some FlowFit and wanted to know if I knew of it. As it happens, I do have that DVD, as well as some others. So we might get our heads together some day. From there we started talking about kettlebells etc.

Ha, it's funny how one experimental evening class has led on to so many other things.

Anyway, I took open mat easy because I didn't feel so fantabulously fit and well. I suspected the beginnings of a cold, and that prediction has in fact come true :-(

So I started by slow rolling with the nemesis, and I think we did some really good stuff. He is very controlled and we got a great flow going, with loads of good transitions. Terrific warm up. We laughed, as after 10 minutes, we had warmed up and learned something in the process. The other guys were heaving and panting. I'm not saying they didn't learn anything... Anyway, we proceeded to a normal speed roll with submissions, and I promptly fell victim to his methodical crushing annihilations. Sorry, I have bright moments, but overall he still kills me. That's why I gave him that nickname. But pssst! don't tell him ;-) And when I grow up, I'll crush him!

I had a couple of rolls with another white belt. Similar size, a bit less experience. He rolls more open, and by being more aggessive, he opens stuff up. So with him, I tend to have much more luck, not just escaping, but everything else. I often catch him in subs, too. Mind, he will give me hell's own trouble once his escapes get better and he learns to be tighter. He had a few question regarding (you guessed it) escapes, so at the end, I showed him a few things to help escape mount and side control, emphasizing that he should start escaping before his opponent settles. He did very passable hip elbow escapes at the end.

On Saturday, Sensei asked me to take the warm up, and just do joint mobility stuff. Haha, more figure eights for the guys... More frowns. I also asked for figure eights using the hips. Oh dear. Haha. And then, to annoy them, I said that with a bit of practice, they would make reasonable belly dancers. Sensei thought that was funny, and pointed out that the other lady who used to come and grapple teaches that in her spare time. Foolishly, I replied that I, too, used to bellydance. That brough a chorus of "oh No!" from the ranks. :-)

Then, in the spirit of the era of experimentation and crazy stuff, we were told to wrestle (lightly), but with a twist. We had to start by lying belly down on the floor, facing each other and gripping hands. Then, imagining we had to stay low like in a commando crawl, we had to try to submit each other. As there were "imaginary machine guns" at about Sensei's eye level (sitting down), it was imperative NOT to sit up. In fact, any body part sticking up was "shot".  At one point I lifted my partner's leg with a hook from guard bottom, just so it would be shot at. :-) Mean. Ha. And then was just getting around to choking him when we had to stop.

After all that folly, we were paired up and worked on attacking turtles with clock chokes and crucifixes. I think I have this clock choke business pretty worked out. And I even managed to roll over well to get the crucifix. The only thing that went wrong was an elbow I got to the side of the head. But it was purely accidental, and I forgave him immediately.

For the last few minutes, we wrestled. Though I wasn't feeling totally fantastic, feeling the advancing cold, I made a thoroughly good job of dominating my poor partner. It is soooo nice to be paired with someone about my size. Sweeps work! At one point I got some overhook on his arm from guard bottom, with my hand in the opposite collar. But somehow I couldn' finish the choke. So I swept him and finished it from mount. I probably couldn't keep the dumb grin off my face. I'm just not used to actually stringing stuff together, let alone plan ahead. And a similar thing happened again. Lots of time to think. My partner fell into white belt habits again, straining hard. But for a change, I didn't just strain against him, instead I worked around it. So that felt really good and made for a nice finish to the week.

And now it's Sunday night, my nose is running, my eyes watering and I'm hoping that by tomrrow night I'll be ok. But probably it'll take another day. Meanwhile, I'm working my way through watching the Ryan Hall DVDs. Really good stuff, can't wait to try it all out.

turtles, deep half and slow rolling

I didn't head to Geelong this week, and I missed out on training tonight. So it's just been three classes so far this week. Booooh!

I just wasn't up to the double session at G'town, followed by the Wednesday double. It's hard slog for me and I've learned to listen to my body a little these days. The last thing I want to do is burn myself out, this is a marathon, not a sprint. With the high humidity, all classes are tough anyway. So, with a bleeding heart, I gave it a miss....

Anyway, Monday night we did some more work on entries to the deep half guard. I drilled with one of the guys who missed all the deep half sessions so far, so I helped him with things. And unlike last week, my rollover to a single leg worked fine this time. So I was happy with that. I guess I just needed to get some more reps in.

We rolled for a fair while. Interestingly, I got people's backs a couple of times, at least the seat belt grip. I experimented with the stuff I learned on the Ryan Hall Back Attacks dvds, trying to pin myself to their back. Through I can't say it was great, I definitely felt like I had more control, and both guys had to work very hard to escape, even though I wasn't positioned very well and didn't have hooks in. Goody. That aside, one of the guys was hunting for leg locks and caught me several times. This needs work! Much better were several of my escapes out of his armbar attempts. And I got high closed guard on him, controlled his far arm and got very close to taking his back or doing a figure four. He commented later that he had great trouble and he thinks I'm very strong.

That was meant as a compliment, however, I don't really want to hear that I'm using strength. On the other hand, if I can manage to continue to improve my technique, then decent arm strength will be an attribute I can throw into the mix when skills are more even.

On Wednesday, we worked on attacking the turtle. Transitions from head to head to the side, clock choke and crucifix. It was a very intensive session. I finally figured the correct way for that transition. I had been circling out and around in an attempt to get to the side and drive my knee between his elbow and thigh. Turned out I need to drive the knee straight forward against his thigh, then angle off. That angling off and driving the knee in gives the necessary penetration. The pushing and twisting motion does the trick. Also, by going straight, I'm not telegraphing the move and take less time. So he has too little time to block me with the arm on that side. Big light bulb went on!! That aside, it felt a lot neater, tighter and faster. And on the way through, my hip lands on the back of his head, keeping him busy...

The clock choke I had learned before, but I was very glad to review it. A few more little things dropped into place in my head. And my first choke attempt resulted in a very fast and strong tap, and someone with red eyes (momentarily, thank goodness). Main thing to remember there is to slide down before switching the hips out. I certainly didn't need to walk very far around the clock to get the tap..

Finally, we looked at the crucifix. How to set up the trapped arm and switch it so that his hand points to his feet (because once rolled over, it gives me far better control over his upper body). It took me a bit of brain pain to work out how to move the legs to get that switch, but once I sorted my brain and my limbs, it was obvious and easy. We looked at two possibilities for chokes from the crucifix position and drilled both.

As I said, it was an intense session. So many aha moments, and not a new technique learned :-)

Wednesday night, it fell to me to take class. My instructions were to get the white belt guys to drill their respective syllabus stuff and roll the rest of the time.

I felt it was the perfect opportunity for an experiment. I had read Christian Graugart's blog post about slow rolling, and the drills he uses to teach people how to do it. So when we started class, I told the guys that I was going to use them for an experiment.

We did a very light warm up with just joint rotations, then I explained the chess drill and we all had a go, swapping partners a couple of times. Everyone was a bit tentative at first, but soon got the idea. Participants varied from experienced blue belts through to relatively new white belts. It wasn't long before everyone was experimenting...

We put in 20 minutes or so of drilling the basics as instructed, then went back to the slow rolling drills. The monkey drill was next. I was so busy experimenting with this crazy stuff that I didn't spend much time watching the others, but I did hear some laughing. We ended up with another round of the chess drill.

All in all it seemed well received and I think I've given them something to think about and to play with. They seemed interested to follow it up another time also. So I'm having great hopes that this will be a useful tool to get our group to understand and employ slow rolling.

Here is Christian's excellent instructional video on slow rolling:

grappling technique vs strength/size

I recomment reading this excellent post by Liam:

BJJ Tips: Using BJJ / Grappling Technique to Beat Strength / Size?

 

a determined sack of potatoes

I've had a week of ups and downs. Some days I felt I did great, other days, I felt like I'm the world's greatest klutz.

My open mat was fantastic. I moved well, I rolled methodical, controlled and had fun. I hit sweeps, a couple of subs and had some great aha! moments when we tried out stuff on one another. I actually went home that evening, thinking how great it is that some distant and hitherto unrelated techniques and positions suddenly all start to knit together. I even felt like I'm onto something resembling a deadly game plan which will make me a force to be reckoned with in the next comp. I didn't go as far as thinking I'm fantastic, but I really felt great about my wrestling.

Comes Saturday... Working on deep half entries and sweeps. Stuff that worked for me earlier in the week is suddenly not working any more. And new stuff had a hard time fitering into my head. I thought I got it, but when I tried to drill it, I was just a bundle of awkwardness. A klutz.

In horserideing, someone who sits on a horse looking shitty and awkward, we say that he/she sits like a sack of potatoes. Think bulging, lumpy sack with no balance. Ugly and ungraceful.

Well, I felt like a sack of potatoes on the mat.

And then I wrestled. I was destroyed by my fellow blue belt. I'm sure a sack of potoatoes would have put up a better show than what I did!! It was horrible. I was truly disgusted with myself. There were no sweeps (except the several he did to me!), there weren't even any decent escapes. There was only awkwardness and missed opportunities. He went a little harder than what I expected. But hey, THAT should not be an issue. And it sure isn't an excuse for me.

I certainly wasn't happy with myself. But at least I didn't get all pissy with myself about it, I managed to shrug it off.

As we sat in the line up after finishing, Sensei said a few things. He said he was happy with the wrestling he'd seen from everyone. He also said a few things about his expectations of people. He reminded the white belts that it's a journey. That to get their fourth stripe, they need to be able to demonstrate correct techniques, but they also have to show 20 different techniques while wrestling. Not necessarily succeed, but make a valid try which shows they know when and how to use it. Then he went on to say that to get a coloured belt, we are expected to show not only correct techniques, and the ability to apply them, but also a certain mindset and the ability to persevere. Finally, he added that he compares his BJJ blue belts with his Karate black belts. Not so much in terms of technical knowledge (the Karate students to have to know a lot more stuff), but certainly in terms of dedication and determination.

That blew me away.

four days... six classes

Ok, ok. I've already admitted to being an addict. What else can I say??

In Monday night's class we worked on half guard and lockdown escapes.

Tuesday evening I went to Geelong. I took two of our three stripe guys with me who wanted to try the intermediate class. And another one of ours met us down there.

First up was the advanced class. John showed us some variations of a sweep from hooks in (in USA known as butterfly guard). We drilled first the movement pattern, then worked on positioning and locking ourselves to our opponent using the hook, the knee and the grip on the belt on his back. Finally, we looked at several possibilities for blocking his free arm from posting. There was the overhook, underhook with grip on the sleeve near the tricep. Another possibility is to grab the sleeve, push down hard and scoot our butt next to it. Finally, if we can't get the arm, we can push the neck away with the forearm, reach over his back to grab cloth and sweep him over his head.

The intermediate class was about side control escape to knees, controlling the top, changing position and finally attacking with a rolling lapel half nelson choke.

Of course, there was much wrestling during the classes. I was caught in a knee bar once, in some chokes, too. Tried hard to get the hooks in sweep we did in class, but just couldn't set it up/get to the starting position. But I did manage some other sweeps, caught a front choke, and an armbar on the hugest guy in the intermediate class. This guy is huge :-) 

I found though that I was going too hard, too fast. One guy actually remarked on that. Shame on me, I should know better. And because I'm not taking the time, I'm rushing instead of thinking and my wrestling is worse. That aside, I suspect I'm muscling stuff. Not good. I was hoping that by doing so many sessions and being tired as a result, I would stop doing it, but it's not yet working.

Wednesday, back on the mat at the home dojo by lunchtime, I was fatigued. And still going hard. I must have too much bloody energy. Didn't help with much with one of the tall, strong white belts. Made a mistake and he got my back. Guys with super long legs are hard to get off my back!! So I tapped to a back choke. Second round went much more my way, but it was time out before I could do something nasty to him. Another guy I caught in an armbar after totally frustrating him with high closed guard. Yet another, newer guy, I shamelessly dominated and submitted several times. That led to some funny remarks from our sensei about my aggressiveness. Hrrmpf. It's one thing being called troublesome, but I feel that warning guys that I'm mean, that just isn't fair ;-)

Aside from a lot of wrestling, we did some deep half guard entries and a rolling sweep to a single leg. After that class, I felt totally wasted. And I noticed that if I get tired, I don't slow down (much), but I do revert to "safe" stuff, which in my case is closed guard and my favourite attacks from there.

Wednesday night's class was taken by one of the blue belts and we drilled four complimentary attacks from north/south: the N/S choke, anaconda choke, d'Arce choke and figure four/kimura. I was kind of glad there was no wrestling, as I was just about dead on my feet :-)

Thursday was about escapes from switch base side control and headlock control. Both involved getting my near hip close, bridge up, get under his hip and roll him over. We also did a little drill where we used that escape from headlock control, but just as we bridge our partner onto his head, he lightens his feet and jumps over to get headlock control on the other side.

Oh, and we wrestled some more. To my shame I have to admit I was rushing again. This led to being taken apart by one of the purple belts. Just wasn't thinking straight, to the point of launching a half-assed attack on his neck while he's busy passing to side control. Where I should have just concentrated on escaping side control, even before he arrived there. Doh. Only good thing I can say about those rolls is that I was very successful in defending back attacks. However, it would have been better if I hadn't given up my back in the first place...

What was nice is that I avoided several triangle attempts from our resident master of triangles. I managed to pass his horrible guard without getting triangled or swept. However, then I proceeded to waste my time trying to peel one of his arms out from side control when I should have just done something else. I get so stuck on one thing, I fail to see other possibilities. Result: he escaped. I can be such a meat-head...

We finished off by doing some drills to maintain back control. I find I'm a lot more successful in maintaining a good seat belt grip nowadays, and that makes things so much easier.

I guess I'll have plenty of stuff to work in in open mat tonight :-) And top of the list: slow down and use technique!

where are all the grappling women?

I was hoping to compete in a small grappling comp last weekend. I recently joined the Victorian Wrestling Association because they run several grappling tourneys per year in the Melbourne area. There was a comp on Sunday and I put my name down for it. Sadly, no other women entered. :-(

I'm hoping there will be some female competitors at future events. On April 10, they are running the Australia Cup, which will include grappling and pankration matches. This will be run under FILA rules. More details are on the AusPankration Website.

Ok, girls, pull your fingers out and enter!!!

I've been in touch with Jack from VWA. He suggested something else of interest. On March 5, there will be refereeing clinics in Melbourne for grappling and combat grappling. His argument is that a female referee may have a positive effect in drawing more women into the sport. Well, the question is whethere I have the necessary experience to be useful as a potential ref. But it certainly sounds interesting.

That aside, there is a More Grappling Round Robin Grappling tourney coming up at Dominance MMA in Melbourne, also on the 5th March.

The Victorian BJJ Championships are scheduled for March 18-20. Also in Melbourne. That will be gi and no gi.

And looking further down the track, the date has already been set for The Gathering, which are the Will Machado Championships:

 

P.S.: the lack of female competitors does of course raise the question whether mixed matches should be allowed. This is just being discussed over at Georgette's blog. I personally don't have an issue with it. In fact, the no gi More Grappling RR in 2010 which I competed in was mixed.

great escapes

We spent two days last week on side control escapes. It was mostly about escaping from short base side control when your opponent has a nice tight gable grip under your far shoulder, and your far arm is exposed.

In all cases, the first job was to get the near elbow back. If they have good, tight control, they will have it blocked between the back of their elbow and their hip. Essentially, what it takes is a little hip escape towards their hip, with the aim of pivoting my body around my bellybutton. This will move my head and right shoulder away from their near hip a fraction. If, at the same time, I suck in my elbow, I'm nearly always able to get it back in so that I can put my forearm against their near hip. That in itself was a bit aha! moment for me, because I always have struggled with getting my elbow back in.

One of the escapes involved bridging and getting the head free so I can pivot around their far arm and end up head to head. The other one was if I can't get the head free. In that case, I trap a leg. I need to get the arm that was wedged against their hip between their legs. Then I grab the pant leg of the far leg until I can hook my far leg over it and effectively go to half guard. The rest is a hip escape or two under them, grab the near pant leg and sweep. That seemed so very hard at first, until I realised that the more they try to hug you tight to hang on, the easier it is!

Later on, I learned another version which works if they are so tight I can't get the bridge to make any space for my head or arm to move. I wriggle up until I can get my butt between their legs. So instead of having their one knee against my shoulder and the lower one against my hip, the lower one is now more near my upper thigh. From that position, I can fish for his lower leg with my closest leg. As soon as I can, I get my heel over his leg. I use that control to also get my other leg over his. Next step needs a bit of wriggling until I can step my nearer leg between my far one and his trapped one so that the toes are under his leg. This hook now pushes up to control while I insert my far foot also below his thigh. So now I have two hooks under his leg. I can lift with both and get him into my hooks in (aka butterfly) guard. That sounds dreadfully complicated, and I was very confused when I first saw it. But it made perfect sense once I tried. It's just a case of getting the opponent low enough that I can systematically step my feet across until I have two hooks under his leg.

So most of the first part of the week was mount escapes and side control escapes. Drills and positional rolling. I know I always say it sucks (especially when it's hot - and it was!). But escapes are SO important, and there were several new concepts for me to absorb.

I took one class during the week. I made everyone work on their syllabus stuff and helped where needed. Aside from that, we rolled a fair bit. It was good to see one of the blue belts back on the mat who had been away for several months. He beat my arse, but so what :-)

I used open mat to go over some of the side control escapes again with Ben. Also, I showed him the kimura control from the back which I'd seen on Ryan Hall's DVD (more about that in another post when I've seen the whole set). I wanted to have a feel of how effective this is, and we were both surprised how much of a difference it makes.

Saturday class had a new theme: knee ride. We did a couple of drills to work on transitions to knee ride from side control. It also gave me a chance to get in reps of the near armbar from knee ride. Another thing which I could never do properly in the past. For some weird reason (and somewhat unexpectedly), on Saturday my armbars were neat and tight. Not only that, I was able to help my partner a lot with it as well.

Knee ride is a position I never used, because I didn't feel I had enough balance or control. But I'm working my way in from the edges. Every time we do knee ride stuff in class, it feels better. So I welcome every opportunity to learn more about it. One of the drills we did really fits in with my game. We went from knee ride to a slide across with the knee, then knee to the far armpit for high mount while taking the near arm across. We block that arm with our chest and have a lovely high mount with possibilities for armwrap to choke, armwrap to armbar or just plain armbar or head/arm choke.

Rolling-wise it was a mixed week. On the one hand, I had a lot of success in stringing together high guard to sweeps to mount to armbar attempts, or high guard to armbar attempts or take the back and get chokes. But in open mat I was choked three times in a row. Two front chokes and a rear choke. Seems like I need to sharpen my choke defense.... What else? My nemesis walked all over me in open mat as well, yet, another day we rolled for a long time. No, I couldn't submit him, but I made several attempts which threatened him, and I succcessfully used open guard to keep him at bay. Also, my escapes worked a treat, which I needed because he swept me several times. We called it a draw after quite some time. For me, that's a big win. That was in many ways more satisfying than the way I manhandled a couple of the lighter guys during the week.

It is funny how at the moment, I don't have a gameplan like I seemed to have until recently. In a way, so many other avenues are opening up. I never needed to worry what to do from mount, because I never got there, or couldn't hold it for more than two seconds. All I had were attacks from closed guard and the rear choke if I managed to do an armdrag to get to the back. Suddenly, I'm finding myself in top positions. And strangely, I usually can think of a thing or two to do from there :-) So I feel like I'm spoilt for choice.

Time to go and sit down with my written game plans again. With a comp coming up in two months, I better get my head around some sort of game plan!

But I do want to work on back control more, and that's the reason I bought the Ryan Hall Back Attacks set. Already, I'm using bits and pieces here and there. Anyway, I'll write about that another time.

boxing gloves and mouth guards

It was hot in class last night. It had been stinking hot all day until the clouds came over. Then the temperature dropped from about 40 degrees C to just over thirty. But the sprinkle of rain sent the humidity through the roof, so it wasn't exactly a relief. I assume that training in Rio would feel similar :-) It was horrible in the dojo, and wile we took of the gi tops straight away, it was a sweat-fest. The joys of summer...

I was paired with my nemesis (hope he never reads this blog ;-) ). My job was to help him with his third and fourth stripe syllabus stuff. Armbars, armlocks and headlock escapes. As always, I found it harder to explain than to do it myself. However, thinking about it to help me explain a technique probably makes me understand it better in the long run. But I did manage to help him with several things and he got a lot of reps in.

That took up most of the class, everyobody working in pairs and groups on stuff they needed. Towards the end, we were sent to get the boxing gloves and mouthguards and do a bit more striking mixed in during rolling.

After going through the guys smaller than me like a dose of salts last week, and feeling (only very mildly) guilty about it, I sort of half expected the system to take revenge on me by sending me someone bigger. And as I pulled into the parking lot I had a fleeting thought of how horrible it would be to be under the nemesis while he's trying to hit me, too. I dropped that thought in horror.

So of course I ended up trading blows with him. Can the instructor read my mind? I think he can, sometimes...

In the end it wasn't so bad. I managed to hit him a few times, and locked him up in my guard. Funny how the threat of being hit curtails some techniques. For the first time in ages, I managed to threaten him with an armbar from guard. Didn't get it, but had him worried. Had more luck keeping him off with open guard, and managed to stand up and back away once. So all in all, more success than I expected. But a far cry from beating up the smaller guys. Ha.

Interestingly, I'm not bothered by the mouthguard. I used to wear one when I did stand up sparring during Karate and PFS classes, but haven't worn one in BJJ, not even in comps. Don't know, always figured it would annoy the hell out of me while rolling. But having worn it on and off for the last week, and grappled fairly hard while wearing it, I've come to the conclusion it's no big deal. So maybe I should make a habit of wearing it at least some of the time so that I'm ok with it in comps. Wouldn't be a bad idea, I suppose.

women rolling

Stephanie has posted a great video about women in BJJ on her Jujitsunista blog. Check it out:



Sure looks like plenty of women enjoy the art, doesn't it? Maybe some of the folks who gave their opinion on this Sherdog thread should watch it :-).

I don't usually go on about women in BJJ. I'm the only one at my school. I very rarely think of being different, and I certainly don't feel awkward. There are funny moments, for sure, but the guys at my school and the other schools I visit are totally cool. I couldn't care less for women only classes for me personally. I just think that more women should take up BJJ, and if women only classes get them started, then I'm all for it. I think the video gives a glimpse of how much BJJ means to those women who not only give it a go, but stick with it. Despite the hardships. Or maybe because?

As for me, BJJ is one of the best things I've ever discovered. I couldn't imagine my life without it.

wouldn't it be nice...

...if there was a place on the web where people can look up accurate gi sizes?

Something like a table or spreadsheet where for every gi brand, every model and every size on offer, there are jacket and pants measurements? Maybe a google spreadsheet or some such thing...? Preferably it would have before and after shrinking measurements. Something like the way Seymour does in his reviews, for example see the RDA gi review. If the gi manufacturers were so kind, they could provide this information. Otherwise, it could be added by people who buy gis. Eventually, it could end up being quite a complete collection of sizing info.

I'd also love to see a collection of links to all gi reviews made for every gi type. Again, to help people decide on what they require. 

It would make gi buying so much easier! 


It bugs me that there is such a vast difference in sizing. Every new gi purchase is a guessing game. I have bought A3s that fit, A3s that were too big, A2s that fit, A2s that were too small and A2s with sleeves too long and pant legs too short :-(

If the makers can't decide on a sizing standard, then at least it would be a very good start to have a central place where all the measurements are kept.

hit and miss

The hardest, yet most fun part of this blog is to think up titles. Sometimes I can't think of something clever to say, other times it's easy :-)

Another whole week has passed. It was a shorter week than usual (from a training point of view) as we missed the two Wednesday classes because that was the Australia Day holiday. I also didn't make it to Geelong this week, because one of my cats hurt it's leg. So it was off to the vets with the furry critter. Poor sod has a broken toe, but the leg is ok.

Monday night's class was yet again on back contol escapes. Again, we did a bit of drilling the escape from back control, from mount and then from half guard, then sweeping to side control, go to north/south and do the boatramp to get back control. Rinse and repeat. Then we did positional rolling, starting from the back with hooks in but hands on shoulders. Everyone had a turn with everyone else. Good news is that I had a lot more success with this than last week, both holding the back and doing chokes and getting out. Even the bigger guys were more "manageable". Most memorable part of the night (for me) was when I started the last roll with one of the beast men, my nemesis. He'd waved me over with that look of "step here, I will end your suffering quickly" :-). As I sat down to take his back, I showed him my hands and said: "See these? They are KILLER hands". Beware!". So we start. And I was going to have that choke. One way or another. It took some doing, but I choked him. Yeah! Killer hands! :-)

Thursday and Saturday morning we did something a bit different. We were paired up. One partner put on boxing gloves. Then we practiced mount escapes with a few variations. First just a bridge and roll, then a frame and push on his hip while hip escaping. The latter works well if they sit back to take a good swing. Aim for both scenarios was to get to our feet and back away. So it was either pass guard and back away or shrimp out and then do a technical standup.

Today we also had a play with the scenario where someone punches while in our closed guard, and then in our open guard. We drilled that for a bit and eventually went to rolling from open guard where the person with gloves on can strike, the other must wrestle only.

It is just amazing how much the game changes when we need to watch out for punches. A lot of stuff came flooding back to me. It's over a year now since I've done any standup/punching but I seem to remember how to cover up :-) Mixing punching with wrestling is highly interesting, and I think it gives you much greater awareness of where your opponents hands are. From a self defence point of view, this is a reality check for sure.

Friday night's open mat was good fun. I had my arse kicked big time by a senior blue and a purple belt. I got out of a bit of stuff but I really, really need to think of my legs!! They are constantly under attack now and I still don't see it coming early enough. I did some interesting thing where I nearly ended up getting back control after I had my guard passed when my partner had his back towards my head. I was pushing on his head, shrimping backwards and then grabbed hold of his top arm. It nearly worked, and he commented on it later. Something I will investigate further..

I'm pleased that I'm feeling opportunities to sweep, and consciously make the necessary adjustment to get them. That is a vast step forward for me. The other thing which is finally happening is that look ahead for submissions. An example: after several rear chokes I wanted to chase something else. Got to mount and decided on a triangle, so I set up for getting a leg over one arm and then went straight for the triangle. Another: while rolling with one partner wearing gloves and punching, I decided on armbars, one each side. Did the first one from guard, the second one from mount. And I was the one wearing the gloves :-) 

I'm in the fortunate position to have two white belt guys (good three stripers) who are my size and a bit smaller. Both are nice and quick, so they can be quite a threat, and both have caught me on occasion. What is great about rolling with them is that I can work on sweeps. And because I get top control relatively often, I feel my top game developing. On the one hand, I feel a bit of a bastard because I've smashed and choked and armbarred my way through them all week. On the other hand, I certainly have paid my dues in that respect for quite a long time. I need to work on attacking, sweeping, smashing. So why should I feel bad about it, when I'm not unduly rough or arrogant about it? I miss no opportunity to tell them when they have done something well or when they have really threatened me. And if one of them legitimately gets a sub, I won't thrash out of it, I will tap. For their sake and mine.


We all have ups and downs. Sometimes we think we have a down when in fact all is well, but people around us have an up. I was trying to explain that to someone the other day. Just because some technique worked for us for a while, doesn't mean it will work forever or on everyone. For starters, our partners in the dojo learn which our fave moves are and they learn how to avoid or get out of them. Then we have to get better, more cunning in the set up or move on to a new technique to catch them out. It's a constant evolution. And that's how we have to see it. That constant pressure evolves our game. And that is why tapping is part of the learning curve. We pressure test our technique in live rolls. We must try and we must fail until we find what works. And then we have to keep on evolving our game to stay ahead. Everyone around us on the mat also evolves. Everyone has their own direction and speed though. So at times we come up against seemingly insurmountable difficulties (like me with my nemesis!). Well, we just have to keep trying new stuff and learn from our mistakes until eventually, the previously inconquerable becomes merely another step in our evolution.

As we grow our trickbag of techniques, or balance, strength, resilience and general knowledge, we also grow as a person. This growth can't happen while we are motivated by the number of taps we get. It can only happen if we look at everything that happens as a learning opportunity. So what if I haven't tapped anyone all night, or even all week? It's totally irrelevant. I don't need to hang my head in shame if I spent all week improving myself.

Oh, and next time I'll feel down in the dumps, I will come back and read that :-)

But for now, I'm looking back on another fun week, where the world was in order because some of the time I had my arse kicked and some of the time, I kicked arse. Beware the killer hands, you big brutes!!

more back control

We spent the rest of the week on back control escapes. Also on mount and half guard escapes. So by the end of the week, we were doing drills where we were stringing it all together.

The idea being that if we manage to escape back control, chances are the other guy will go for mount. Although we try and block him from doing that, he may succeed. At the point of realising he is going for mount, we should start escaping mount, rather than wait for him to settle.

So the drill was that we escape back control and our partner starts to mount. Right away, we connect our bottom elbow and knee and start the mount escape. Hopefully, he won't even get mount that way, but end up in half guard. Next step, again without waiting for him to settle in, we go for the half guard escape we covered last week. From there, we transition to side control. Or, if  he exposed his back during the half guard escape, we can take his back.

The point was to learn to string escapes together to maintain the initiative, rather than letting our opponent settle. This requires the ability to figure out where his next move might go or at least recognise his next move in the early stages. Of course, it was also great to really rep out these escapes lots of times. I certainly found that I was getting quicker and smoother with all of them.

But the thing that most stuck in my mind is the concept that stringing things together works on the defense side of the roll as much as on the attack side. Ceasing the initiative and keeping it can this way can soon turn a bad position into an attack.

We had a look another technique called the boat ramp. It tied in with our back control oriented week. The boat ramp allows us to turn a north/south position into back control. We looked at the grips for no gi as well as how to use the lapels for grips.

During the week I had a few frustrations during rolls. We did a lot of situational rolling from back controls. As before, I had a lot of trouble with the bigger stronger guys. They simply shut me down. I described the feeling of having one of them on my back as "being strapped to a post". Not good if you can't move to even start an escape... Hmmm, there's a lot more work for me yet. It was a bit of a reality check. In days gone by, I wasn't too worried about giving up my back, I could hang out there, defend and eventually escape. As the guys are all getting better, it's no longer a safe place to hang out!

I was a bit disheartened in how I fared against some of the bigger guys on Wednesday night. But truth be told, it was during a class which was my fourth hour of BJJ within a 24 hour period, the evening after the Geelong visit. I had a big guy to drill with all evening before we started rolling. He's a fantastic partner, but it is more hard work than being paired with someone smaller. I was actually very fatigued by the time we started rolling. That in addition to always struggling with the big boys anyway, made it a tough session. But I did stay positive.

I will just have to keep working and get better :-)

to Geelong in style

On Tuesday, I went to Geelong with Warrick. He decided to take his Trans Am for a spin :-) Ha, that rides a bit different to the cars I'm used to (both the Landcruiser and the Starlet!!).

We did the advanced class taught by John Will. Theme of the night were armbar escapes, both the running one and another which is good when the opponent does not have the leg across the belly. We did drills using both escapes. We looked at attacking the trapped arm with an omoplata if our opponent does the running escape.

We had a good amount of rolling. The advantage (for me) in going against higher belts is that they have a tendency to play more open guard, instead of smash and crush and smother... This gives me opportunities and I find I can work both my escapes and my top game and attacks. It's much more fun! I threatened both blue and purple belts with all sorts of things. Of course I didn't get all those things :-) But I got some. And I got caught in loads of things. The most memorable being three twisters by two different guys. A purple belt sprung the first one on me. Having never had it done to me, it was a surprise. Mind, I knew what it was when I was.. well... twisted.

Second time though I saw it coming, but not early enough. And by the time I realised, it was too late. Then, several rolls later, I was lucky to be paired with a black belt. We went here and there and then he starts the set up from half guard. I was wiser to it by this stage, but no matter where I went, and although I half escaped a couple of times, eventually he got me. I need to learn from this, one of my defensive positions gives an opening to lock my legs in. And I am fond of half guard bottom, which is another dangerous place to hang out.

After that, we stayed on for the intermediate class. The Bear had a car breakdown and couldn't make it, so a purple belt took the class. We started off with rolling with the fresh white belts. It is nice to see a young woman in this class. She is lighter than everyone but she has the best attitude and seems scared of nobody. And believe me, there are some big fellas i this class! I had a couple of rolls with her but mainly I helped her with things and played very lightly. I had mixed success with the guys. It's hard(er) when I'm already a bit tired and they come in fresh. After all, they are stronger at the best of times :-)

The class was about two guard passes, one standing one from closed guard and another from open (hooks in guard). We drilled those a fair bit which was great. They were very different passes, and I had a few problems getting my hips low enough to control his leg on the open guard pass. But eventually, I figured it out. It is exactly the thing I need to work on.

Then we played the pit game, with four in the pit whose guard had to be passed. They could choose open or closed guard. As with the rolling, I had mixed success. I got swept a few times, but when my turn came in, I also swept some people. Ditto with the passing. But by this stage of the class, I really was quite tired.

And then, right at the end, we had to do 20/10 tabata intervals with burpees, pushups, situps, lunges. Oh oh. Not fun, I must admit. It was only six minutes all up, but it sure felt longer than that!

And then we went home. By the time Warrick dropped me off, I really, really had trouble getting my aching and stiff body out of that infernal deep Trans Am seat. Oh man!

back control

Monday night we worked on back control.

There were some fairly new guys in the class, so we started with the basics of back control: the seat belt grip and the hooks. Then everyone had a go at keeping back control when their partner started rolling around a bit.

Next thing covered were the two most common chokes form the back, the rear choke and the collar choke. Not from the point of view of applying the choke, but from the point of view of defending it and escaping back control. With a grip on the collar, we drilled escaping from back control. First, grab the choking arm with both hands, then fall to the side where he has our collar (or if you like: to the side where his choking hand points) so we can get our shoulder to the floor. Now we kick our bottom leg straight to dislodge his hook on that side and put weight on his bottom leg. Next step is to use our bottom hand and grab the pant leg on his top let. This is to ensure he can't come over the top and go to mount. Now it's a case of turning into him and we are in his guard.

I've used this escape plenty of times. Yet I didn't know about the hand to block his top leg. Which probably explains why more often than not, I ended up in mount as I scrambled to try and turn and end up in guard. So, a valuable lesson for me. Did I mention before that I pick up something every time we revisit 'basic' techniques??

We also looked at why it's unwise to cross feet when we have back control. It was just my luck that I happened to be the demo dummy for that part of the evening's proceedings. Ouch.

After that, we had a few rounds of rolling starting in back control. We were allowed hooks in, but hands only on shoulders. Just so our partners had a chance :-)

In my first roll, I started on someone's back. Ha, I snaked my right arm around his neck so fast it was scary, choke, bang! That elicited a giggle from the instructor who was walking past. I'm sure it will just make him say I'm mean ;-) After that, there were several other rolls. I was annihilated by a blue belt. He started on my back, and somehow I ended up in a scarf hold. From there, he pulled off his favourite, the armchair (I think that is what it is called). That is nasty. Do not like.

Then I ended up with a brandspanking new white belt. Big guy. On my back... I escaped but as I turned into him, I made the mistake of not blocking the top leg and he ended up in mount. I escaped that and got guard. He strained and pushed and tried to stack me, all the while attempting a figure four. That didn't work of course and when I tried to collar choke him, he started to grab my collar. If he had been my size, I would have just laughed, but a big boy like that, using all his strength is a different matter. So I went for feet on hips to keep him away. Somehow he realised I had gone to open guard and he grabbed my ankle and shoved it over, landing in side control. I didn't feel dreadfully threatened, but he was heavy. He smiled and told me it's good to be big and heavy. I nodded sagely (how could I argue?) and started escaping :-) . Some place in that roll I also ended up turtled and once I was in mount, but he just tossed me off...

Still, it is good to be reminded what new guys do. I'm pleased to say that while the big new guys still give me loads of trouble, they no longer freak me out. If they do muscle a submission it means I was careless and I need to work on that. But mostly, they get nothing, and I use the opportunity to hone my escapes and my open guard techniques.

Last couple of rolls were fun. Someone more my size. Less experienced, but explosive and squirmy. I caught him in a cross lapel choke from guard. Don't know how I got there. Next round was lively, but time was called. Great fun and we had a good laugh, too.

rolling, lots of great rolling

Yes, that about sums up the rest of last week!

We had classes on Thursday and Saturday and open mat on Friday. The classes were split so that the guys worked on stuff as needed. Two totally new guys were going through their first couple of basic drills, and some of the three stripers were practising their fourth stripe stuff, like knee ride escape and headlock escapes.

So I spent some time teaching/helping with those things, some time getting one on one help with stuff I needed to work on and a lot of time rolling inbetween.

The thing I worked on on Saturday was the hip bump rollover sweep. That's one of the things which I occasionally manage to pull off, without ever quite knowing why it worked, because generally it does NOT work for me. Haha, very little escapes our instructor, so I wasn't suprised he picked that one out for me :-) It seems like most of it came down to hand placement. The hand that braces and pushes off. We did some tweaks and I spent some time practising and eventually I got the hang of it.

As before, I came up against the issue of self-destruction. What do I mean by that? Well, sometimes when I've learned a new technique, I try it out and it doesn't work so well (wow, now ain't that a strange and unusual thing!!). I have a fantastic habit of finding an explanation, be it that it's hard against big people or whatever. But the main problem is that I tell myself that I can't do it. And that is the real problem. I set myself up for failure for every other time I happen to try again. I have the expectation it won't work, so I'm half-assed when I do try and then lo and behold, I fail - which yet again reinforces that belief. I know I do it. I know it's stupid. And I still do it. GGRRR!

So at one point when I became frustrated, I actually stopped and said that the biggest problem is that I'm defeating myself. BUT that I wasn't willing to be defeated. Deep breath. Tried again with focus. And... made visible progress.

The main difference is that I now understand the technique better and the additional information will help me to tweak it further to make it work better. It's no longer a black box. But the revisiting of the technique has restored my confidence. I now believe that I can do it, even to the bigger guys. So watch my sweeps!!

Alright, but aside from all that, I had loads of time on the mat to "just" roll :-)

Gustavo joined us again for a class and for open mat. More rolling time with a black belt. Whoohoo!! He also showed me two of his lapel chokes from mount. Using his lapels. Both so simple, so tight. I prefer chokes over armbars/armlocks, so I'm sure I'll find some use for these. The caveat is that I need to get mount first :-)

But as luck has it, I'm actually getting mount these days. Gone are the days when I'd last all of .5 of a second mounted on someone (once every three weeks on average!) before getting rolled off. In fact, several rolls I had with some of our white belts, I got mount and maintained it well, even getting subs from there. For me, that is relatively new territory, but a nice place to be :-) In fact, one of the guys said that it felt very tight and controlling when I had mount on him, comparing it to one of the purple belts. Well, I must be doing something right :-)

Ok, so I can get good positions, I'm getting better at keeping them and I'm able to actually do some damage from there. So now I hit subs which I learned ages ago but could never get because of lack of good positions or lack of time there. So for example, I got the head/arm choke twice. And nearly a third time on one of the purple belts (he told me I was close, but I thought it wasn't working and let it go).

I'm getting sweeps, and I'm starting to be less proned to being swept. I think that I'm paying much more attention to posture and hip pressure. Some of it is conscious, ie: I'm thinking of positioning, I'm deliberately adjusting. But some of it is just happening on auto pilot. Then I go: oh, I just managed to base out, how did that happen?

But oh yeah, I still get swept plenty, and I still have ample time to practice my defences and escapes. Got a big compliment from a purple belt about making him string together a whole bunch of attacks before he finally succeeded in ripping my arm off. Ha, soon I'll be escaping and ripping HIS arm off ;-)

Another thing I did for the first time: I volunteered to start off in a bottom position for a roll with one of the white belts. I let him choose. We did some from half guard bottom, some from side control bottom. I figure I will benefit from the opportunity to work more escapes. Oh, and a couple of times I didn't succeed and I had to tap. Well, that gave him the the chance to work his top game.

So rolling went exactly how it should be: I worked my top game and assorted attacks on the white belts and worked my defence and escapes with the higher ranks. I had enourmous fun, whether I was hammering people or getting nailed.

I said to our instructor that I have the feeling that I'm starting to connect some of the dots. Stuff is starting to fit together in my head. Learning isn't just a case of adding new stuff, but to broaden the existing knowledge base and to find relationships, which help to deepen the understanding.

Wednesday with a surpise visitor

I was fortunate to make it to two classes yesterday.

We are continuing to have the big wet. With the exception of yesterday afternoon, it's been raining more or less solidly since Monday morning. It is nowhere near as wet as it is in Queensland, but it's record rains for Victoria for this time of year. Thankfully the place I call home is not in a floodprone area...


With the big wet, humidity is near 100%. It's pleasantly warm. Last night, when the sun came out for a while, it soon warmed up some more and it felt much like being in the tropics. So much for the famous cold Ballarat weather :-). Anyway, as expected, the dojo was like a steambath, especially for the evening class. I took the warm up for the lunchtime class and we didn't need much warming up before starting to drip.

Then we had a surprise visitor. A guy walked in and asked if he could join in. Turns out Gustavo is a Brazilian BB, second degree. Do fish swim? Sure he could join in! We only had a small class with four white belts, a blue and myself and he looked like he wanted to roll.



Firstly, we did a few more reps of the arm drag techniques we did on Monday, and our instructor had a few rolls with Gustavo. Didn't get to see much of that as I had some issues with the technique we were practising  until I finally figured out where all my limbs had to go. We were interrupted to watch a cool technique demonstrated by Gustavo. It started with a feint armbar, then the arms (both) were trapped with a gi lapel and then there was a forearm choke for the submission.


Then it was my turn to entertain Gustavo ;-) Honestly, I cnn't remember many details. He allowed me to get some good positions, only to sweep me at will. He seems to like chokes. He also likes to use his gi lapels to either choke people or to hold them or tie them down. So many of my usual escapes didn't work simply because there was always a hand, foot or gi lapel blocking my path.

He showed me a technique that beat one of my usual defences, which means that I'll have to think of something else now. Hm. As expected, I was doing all the work. In all, I had the impression that he sort of surfed on me :-) His control was either flowing or tight, and he was always several steps ahead of me. All roads led to being choked! What a learning experience. And what a nice guy.

The rest of the class, I helped some of the guys with their basics, while our other blue belt had a few rolls with Gustavo.

Best news of all: he will be back because he lives in Ballarat at the moment. So we will have further opportunities to roll with him. YEAH!!

happiness

Happiness is... being back to normal BJJ classes. What bliss!

We had a very large class last night and it was great to see everyone again after the holidays.

The weather was warm and very humid after it rained most of the day. So, back in gi for the first time in about five weeks, we were all suffering a little bit. The mats were covered in small wet patches at the end of the night :-)

We paired up and did hip escapes. Our partner's job was to push forward and our job was to stiff arm his shoulder to keep distance, and hip escape away. After some laps of this, we turned this into an attack. As he pushes forward, I do a little escape, then I go for an underhook with the arm that has been used as a frame. I cup his shoulder from behind and pushing down on it, pull my leg out from between his to come to my knees. Finally, this became a half guard escape. My outside leg is over his trapped leg, and I use my shin against his thigh for control as I push down on his shoulder and get my other leg out.

At that point in time, I have a choice, either I can duck under his arm and take his back or I can attack his arm. The control is very good as I can exert a lot of pressure on his shoulder and I restrict his movement by having my shin on his thigh. It is not hard to just push into him and flatten him out, giving me side control or even mount.

We tried one more adjustment. Using the outside foot near his ankle, we wing out his lower leg to his outside. This turns his foot away from him and his knee towards his other knee. Now add the shin on the thigh and the underhook to get the shoulder to the floor, and you nearly have a submission. But certainly, it gives much more control over our opponent's body. With his near leg locked up in this fashion, it's impossible for him to try and push back into us, but I still have the option of going for side control, mount or back control.

After that, we wrestled. I worked with a small white belt first. We played for a bit with grips, trying to get the hang of sleeves and collars again. I made a point of going for open guard, managed a nice sweep. He is small, fast and aggressive (in a non-spazzy way), and fun to wrestle with. At one point he threatened me with a triangle/armbar when I did a standing guardpass (which was a bit sloppy...), but a shin on his forearm and small adjustments saw that I passed his guard. As I still had his arm pinned, I went for a kimura from north/south. Second round we didn't finish because we all had to swap partners.

This time around I had one of the very new white belts. He is a lot heavier than I. Again, I worked on open guard, but also on guard transitions. I let him work a fair bit and concentrated on using my hooks and doing sweeps. I talked him through some stuff, and tried to get him to start using his feet, by showing him how to push and pull with hooks, push with feet and shins. Also, after a scramble, to come back pushing in to flatten me. I know I'll regret that later ;-)

I had a really great time, and it was fun to grapple in the gi again, even though I had sweat rolling off me. I sure wasn't gassed or tired (I've adapted to 2+ hours of far harder training..), but the high humidity ensured I was sodden. We all were. But happy face all around!

summer has arrived

We are due to resume BJJ classes next Monday. I'm really looking forward to that, though I've been sneaking in some training this week.

The summer so far has been pretty cool and pleasant, but I think the hot weather has finally arrived. That's perfect timing for training, haha. But I shouldn't complain, our last summer was so hot and started early and lasted seemingly forever.

I was just thinking this morning that it's been about a month of not training in the gi. That's the longest ever since I started BJJ. It's been good, and yet I'm also looking forward to do a bit of gi training. I like both!

I managed to catch up with a few of our local guys for a Monday and Wednesday session. It was really mostly open mat, but we were shown some deep half guard sweeps and we went over the Japanes Necktie and d'Arce choke (which sort of go together). Also, we looked at a lockdown escape and a variation leading into a cartwheel pass. Wheee! But mostly, lots of wrestling. Fairly easy, as people were coming back from time off.

On Tuesday I went to Geelong where one of John's BBs took the advanced class. It was a much smaller class than usual, and there, too, we took it a bit easy.

We worked on takedowns, mainly single legs, and variations on how to get the opponent to the ground once we have hold of his leg. The most interesting was a duck under and roll takedown while we have his leg trapped between ours. We literally duck under and roll over taking him with us. Looked easy, but the first few tries felt awkward. But after a few reps it made good sense and it felt easy.

Then we looked at how to achieve a takedown if we step both legs around the front of his trapped one, or to the back. Repped these out until they felt pretty consistent. We also looked briefly at entries, and what to do to off balance our opponent and get near that leg. Finally, we did single leg takedowns in a bit more of a live scenario, with our partners resisting so we could feel for which was the most appropriate way to get him down. I saw some very interesting variations, and came up with a couple myself ;-)

Aside from that, we had some rolling. I really don't remember too many details. I do recall getting choked by one of the BBs though.

Then it was the intermediate class. The guys came in for a warm up roll. I scored a very big boy, resplendant with mohawk and Tapout shirt...  Clearly, he thought he'd have an easy time ;-) I wish I could say I kicked his butt, but that didn't happen. And I will say to his credit, he didn't muscle too much and didn't spazz at all. I had plenty of opportunity to switch from one guard to another and I managed to mostly stay out from under him. I attempted armbars from closed guard even. He finally pinned me after passing my guard and got a figure four. By this time, he was nicely warmed up for his class, and he said that I hadn't made it easy for him. Ah - that was as close to a compliment as I was likely to get. :-) I had him for a drilling partner later and found him to be good to work with.

What we worked on were a half guard escape and and escape from lockdown/grapevine.

Then more rolling, where again, I can't remember most details. I know I still spend too much time using closed guard. I did get the back a couple of times, as usual, from closed guard. My submissions tend to be front or back chokes. Time to get working on armbars and armlocks!

Oh yeah, funny moment of the night. I ended up with the huge guy for the last few rounds. My goal with him is NOT get on the bottom. Closed guard on him ends in disaster. Firstly I only just get my legs locked around him, so he can usually bust out, but worse of all is when he leans forward. You do not want to get stacked up under a mountain! So it's open guard and move, move, move! That was reasonably successful, as the fear of getting squashed sharpened my response times. We had to restart a couple of times because we were rolling into other people. From a kneeling start I managed a (sort-of) armdrag and scuttle to his back. Yeah, I thought, I'm in - a choke coming your way right now! Then he just sat back, leaning into me and laughed (!) as he pushed over the top of me. I will say that I converted my stanglehold to a push and my hooks went from around him to underneath him. Not fair, not fair!!!

As we both rolled on the floor laughing, it was time to line up.

So I managed some six hours of training the week before we go back to BJJ classes. Good stuff!