Class 40...

After a break of four weeks owing to other commitments and a two-week holiday, it was back into a mixed class today.

The warm-up was tough and I struggled a little but I put that down to general fatigue and me needing to get my body back up to speed.

I started waking up in the technique section, however, as we started doing armbar, sweep and hip escape drills. I'm very aware that these are the type of beginner techniques I need to work on and it was a nice welcome back after a one-month lay-off.

The armbar drill was essentially about setting the armbar up using one hand under the opponent's leg to hip escape onto one then swapping over sides and repeating the movement on the other side. I wasn't too slick at this but it's fine as I was sort of feeling my way back.

The sweep drill was essentially a scissor sweep with the opponent's base arm (left in this case) trapped with your right and you confirming a collar grip on the same side collar you are sweeping towards with your left hand. You then move you left leg under the opponent's armpit and across his chest then chop away with you flat leg while toppling the opponent as you drag them towards you. You then end up in full mount. We went backwards and forwards with this for a while.

We then ran a hip escape drill from the mount position. This entailed the person on the bottom framing his hands to push the opponent's right leg back. Using this space you then hip escape onto your left hip while using your right leg to fish for the opponent's foot and catch it. You then pull back his leg using the foot hook and use your framed hand to push his right knee back so you get your left leg out and secure half guard. You then hip escape onto your right hip and push the opponent's left knee back so you can thread your right leg through and recover guard. Then sweep...

This is such bread and butter stuff but it's so vital I drill particularly the last technique over and over again.

In sparring I was paired with white belts and, apart from falling for a rookie guillotine choke early on, I held my own against one very technical player and one smaller but incredibly explosive player. I even escaped one big white belt when he had me in trouble on the bottom and I reversed the position into side mount thanks to adapting a nifty overhead throw before I ran out of time.

But it was a good class and great to be back.

LESSON FROM TODAY: Drill the hip escape and the sweep.