Class 12...

It’s a Thursday so instead of the gentler climes of the yoga warm-up on Wednesday there was a grueling physical workout of countless press-ups, leg triangle drills, neck exercises and leg raises.

On the plus side my press-ups are no longer the dire excuses they were. They’re still not great but there is definite progress there…

Onto the class proper we opened up with some Achilles locks and entries into these from standing or in your opponent’s closed guard. I’ve done these locks before in the other martial art I study so I was OK with the hand position and angle of the wrist bone but using my gi to secure the grip by grabbing the inside of my collar was something new.

In sparring I got tapped all over the place by two senior white belts although I managed to hang on in there when the going got tough for two lengthy spells.

I managed a few bridge and roll escapes against senior white belts and also improvised by grapping several opponents’ gis at the back of the neck to roll or pull them off-balance. I don’t know whether this is a good tactic or not but it caught a few people by surprise so I may continue to utilise it until I’m told otherwise.

I also managed to tap one of my fellow white belts using a kimura. He rapidly got his own back with an armbar, though. I was more pleased that I managed to keep him pinned for quite a while as he’s much bigger and stronger so either he was knackered or I’m learning to spread and base myself a little better. The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Hopefully…

LESSON FROM TODAY: Achilles locks can be used to attack an open guard; keep weight driving through opponent to keep him pinned; use gi grab at back of neck to move opponent.