Class 48...

A new year and a not-too-promising start thanks mainly to an ongoing hamstring injury. I still, however, braved a beginners class as I figured there was more control in this environment and therefore less chance of re-injuring myself.

We started with the usual warm-up but my new year campaign of doing press-ups in the morning is obviously helping my arm strength as this wasn’t too bad at all. We also did some movement drils to simulate passing the guard and avoiding the oponent re-establishing guard.

We then worked a guard break, which went something like this:

i) You are caught in your opponent’s closed guard so posture up and place your right hand on his chest and your left hand on his belt or trousers to frame. Note: keep elbow in tight to the inside of his thigh so he can’t collapse your frame by grabbing the back of your gi at the elbow.

ii) Then with your right hand, grab his right hand and pull it across his body and start to stand by placing your left foot on the floor.

iii) Fully stand up by standing on both feet and drawing your left leg back so it’s out of reach. Also change your grip by grabbing his trousers at the waist band. The opponent will grab your right leg as it’s now closest to him. Fully extend backwards using your arms against his thighs and his own waist line to break his guard as you step backwards.

iv) Use your right hand to break his final grip on your right leg then change your controlling grips on his waist to grabbing his gi at the knees and push back using his knees for leverage.

v) Then jump around his broken guard either side and drop down to establish side control.

We then worked on a variation of this technique where the man on the bottom rolls the would-be guard-breaker into an omoplata. This went something like this:

i-iv) Exactly the same.

v) Grab his other ankle and let him bring his hand down to break the grip. When he does the bottom man forgets about the leg and switches his grips to grabs the grabbing hand with both hand.

vi) The leg nearest his arm wraps around as the other foot goes his hip. The foot on the hip collapses the opponent’s posture while the other leg kicks over and drives the opponent’s head to the mat while locking his shoulder in an omoplata. It is key to move onto your hip to generate this momentum.

vii) To secure the position you grab his belt or drop your arm and your weight on his back so he cannot roll out. The bring the loose leg back and confirm the positon. The lean forward to over-rotate the rotator cup at the elbow for the tap.

Lesson from today: Basic drills on movement and hip movement are key. Keep working on them.