We kept matters quite gentle but he was curious as to why I readily accepted entering somebody's closed guard rather than fighting for position or passing the guard at the start by controlling the opponent's legs or posture. I explained to him that it was something of an intentional tactic at the moment because I wasn't yet good enough to avoid the guard of anyone who was more experienced than me and because it also forced me to work on stabilising my base while under attack, which meant I had to get used to breaking guard. I demonstrated my two quite poor guard escapes (posture up, move back and break then posture up and commit both arms under the opponent's legs) then he very helpfully showed me two guard escapes.
These went something like this:
Guard escape from in closed guard of opponent: hands get wrist control on opponent and arms and elbows cage the hips with head on chest/stomach of opponent; up onto your toes and sprawl out and push backward to break the guard; then pin one knee and move to side control.
Guard escape from half guard:
Guard escape from half guard on top: hands getting wrist control on opponent and arms and elbows caging the hips and head on chest/stomach of opponent; up onto your toes and sprawl out and push backwards; then wrap your arms around the opponent's legs and squeeze them together and use one hand to push his knee down and break his half guard; then pin one knee and move to side control.
I then rolled with a blue belt I've never met before and I held my own for some time while in his guard. At one point I even managed to sweep him and secure side control but his movement was very slick. I did manage to recover half-guard from a mounted position on a few occasions, too.
I then rolled with a blue belt I know quite well who's very good and he tapped me a few times, but I managed to hold on and defend myself against a choke and an armbar when I was in real trouble. His movement and knowledge is far superior to mine, though, so holding on and defending for any length of time is something I consider a minor victory. We also worked on a few sweeps, which was very helpful.
Last up was a roll with a purple belt who's very good. On the plus side I managed to defend myself against his chokes for a good while and this is something I'm usually quite weak on. But I couldn't break his guard and every time I tried to use both hands to get some control on him I was under threat from something yet again. I managed to hold on for what seemed like a long time and defend myself but it was always inevitable that at some point I'd move somewhere bad or do something that exposed me to an attack I couldn't defend and that's pretty much what happened. Very sweetly he did take me to one side at the end of the class and showed me how to do the guard break I'd been unsuccessfully trying against him during our roll.
But a good class and lots learnt. I feel like a few things are starting to sink in and I'm now doing some of the basic stuff (keeping both arms together and not allowing one arm to get isolated, connecting knees and elbows to form a defensive wall when I'm on the bottom, hip escaping to at least try to recover guard, etc) at least some of the time.
LESSON FROM TODAY: Remember to use your knee and arm to create a defensive frame against an opponent on top; practise, practise and practise again basic guard breaks and basic guard passes.
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