It's been three busy weeks at work and I'm also nursing a recurring knee injury, so I've only made it to a couple of open-mat sessions.
The somewhat limited goal at these sessions was essentially to keep remind my body what it was like to roll so I didn't feel too out of it when I got back proper. I did pick up a few good pointers as well, though.
In the first session, I seemed to do a lot of no-gi and I rolled with a very good purple belt. I was much better at not surrendering the underhook but in focusing on that, I ended up giving up a lot of leg locks.Leg locks still escape me a bit. I have a rough idea how to enter into them, I have a rough idea of how to apply them and I'm getting at defending them, but I need to spend some serious time on them.
In the second session, I did some drilling and worked on some gi submissions and moving for position. A senior belt then did some work on showing the lateral drop, which is a technique I'm going to spend proper time on.
Things to remember: Do not surrender underhook; work leg locks; work lateral drop.
Sunday, 15 November 2015
Saturday, 17 October 2015
Grappling Talk…
I’m currently injured so I’m out of regular training for a
while, apart from a few open mat sessions, where I’m essentially turning up to
do light rolling or drilling.
It’s not my first injury lay-off and it probably won’t be
my last, so I try to remain stoical and philosophical. But injuries remain
annoying, especially when it’s put the kibosh on all my competition plans for
this year.
I was reading an article online a few days ago, though, about
an American black belt called Chris Haueter. He’s one of the so-called ‘Dirty
Dozen’, which is a group of BJJ practitioners who were among the first 12
Americans to be awarded their black belts in the US. And he said the following
line:
‘It’s not about who’s good, it’s about who’s left.’
I loved that and it chimed with me a lot. In my other
martial art, Hapkido, I was a terrible white belt and not much better in my
other early belts for the first three or four years. I also saw younger, more
skilled and more graceful students join and leave me in their slipstream as
they progressed up the ranks.
I wasn’t good, but when they didn’t stick around I was
left. And because I’d not stopped, I did slowly get better. Even at the giddy
heights of black belt, I still wouldn’t claim to be a good black belt,
especially when I look around the do-jang and see other students who are
faster, more technically proficient, more graceful, more balanced, etc.
But I will be left and that means I will continue to improve. It’s a
good lesson and one thought that keeps me sane when injury prevents me from
training.
I can’t give any advice on BJJ because I’m still not a
very good white belt. But I can give advice on training and, like Chris Haueter,
that advice would be: ‘Don’t be good, be left…’
Classes 184 & 185...
My knee injury is back with a vengeance so it's only gentle rolling at a couple of open mat classes for me.
I rolled with a couple of newish white belts and did OK, then rolled no-gi with a good purple belt. I don't really roll no-gi but he seemed keen, so I agreed to have a go and told him not to expect too much. He then got slightly annoyed that I wasn't very good at it and kept emphasising the importance of not giving away the underhook as I was making it too easy for him.
I genuinely appreciated the underhook advice. But I thought it was quite funny that he was a little annoyed about the fact that I wasn't very good at something that I told him I wasn't very good at.
Any enjoyable couple of classes, though.
Things to remember: The importance of the underhook at no-gi.
I rolled with a couple of newish white belts and did OK, then rolled no-gi with a good purple belt. I don't really roll no-gi but he seemed keen, so I agreed to have a go and told him not to expect too much. He then got slightly annoyed that I wasn't very good at it and kept emphasising the importance of not giving away the underhook as I was making it too easy for him.
I genuinely appreciated the underhook advice. But I thought it was quite funny that he was a little annoyed about the fact that I wasn't very good at something that I told him I wasn't very good at.
Any enjoyable couple of classes, though.
Things to remember: The importance of the underhook at no-gi.
Monday, 21 September 2015
Class 183...
An early-morning class and some work on the omaplata from full guard.
The detail emphasised here was to secure sleeve control on the opponent in your guard, then put a foot on the hip and knee to trap the arm, so the opponent can't base out when you attack with the omaplata. Keeping control of the opponent by grabbing the belt or the waist was also emphasised to stop the opponent from rolling out. The other details emphasised was to pull away from the opponent to flatten him out and further restrict his mobility.
There were a couple of variations added to this attack. The first to apply an armlock from the position by figure 4 crossing the legs and putting the furthest away leg through so it goes under the opponent's neck and out under his armpit. Then stretch the through leg out and drop the curled leg down.
The other variation was a counter to when the opponent rolls out. To counter this, base on you knee and spin out to secure mount.
Sparring was pretty good and I did OK against a very tall blue belt with long legs, then I moved well and threatened much against two fellow white belts. A fab class.
Things to remember: Use the omaplata as a base to launch other attacks.
The detail emphasised here was to secure sleeve control on the opponent in your guard, then put a foot on the hip and knee to trap the arm, so the opponent can't base out when you attack with the omaplata. Keeping control of the opponent by grabbing the belt or the waist was also emphasised to stop the opponent from rolling out. The other details emphasised was to pull away from the opponent to flatten him out and further restrict his mobility.
There were a couple of variations added to this attack. The first to apply an armlock from the position by figure 4 crossing the legs and putting the furthest away leg through so it goes under the opponent's neck and out under his armpit. Then stretch the through leg out and drop the curled leg down.
The other variation was a counter to when the opponent rolls out. To counter this, base on you knee and spin out to secure mount.
Sparring was pretty good and I did OK against a very tall blue belt with long legs, then I moved well and threatened much against two fellow white belts. A fab class.
Things to remember: Use the omaplata as a base to launch other attacks.
Friday, 18 September 2015
Classes 181 & 182…
First up, an early-morning session and a class
focusing on the Toreador Pass from standing. The key details taught in this
class were the thumbs facing each other as the standing man grabs the gi pants
at the knee of the opponent on the floor, then swapping hands on
the changeover so the hand driving the top leg down is the moved hand and the other hand is driving for head control.
The choke that then follows involves securing side control with the head control arm under the neck. The other hand then feeds the tip of the gi jacket flap from one hand to the other, before moving to north-south and dropping both elbows to the mat and using the elbow pressure and the movement to choke the opponent out.
Sparring was fab and I did well against a few fellow white belts at about my level, and I survived against a decent blue belt, too.
Second up was an open mat session. This was pretty continuous sparring for about an hour and I did better against a white belt colleague who's a good wrestler, then I got to roll with a very light and very mobile blue belt, before finishing off with a very muscular and big purple belt. I got pretty comprehensively ruined against all three in the end, but my defense was OK and I did pick up a few key pointers.
I also felt like my engine was up and running. This was my fifth martial arts class of the week.
Things to remember: Don't cross your arm over your middle line. I did this a lot today then had to fight like crazy to get it back. Keep your knee up when somebody is trying to close guard around you. It makes it very hard to close the legs. It also gives you escape options.
The choke that then follows involves securing side control with the head control arm under the neck. The other hand then feeds the tip of the gi jacket flap from one hand to the other, before moving to north-south and dropping both elbows to the mat and using the elbow pressure and the movement to choke the opponent out.
Sparring was fab and I did well against a few fellow white belts at about my level, and I survived against a decent blue belt, too.
Second up was an open mat session. This was pretty continuous sparring for about an hour and I did better against a white belt colleague who's a good wrestler, then I got to roll with a very light and very mobile blue belt, before finishing off with a very muscular and big purple belt. I got pretty comprehensively ruined against all three in the end, but my defense was OK and I did pick up a few key pointers.
I also felt like my engine was up and running. This was my fifth martial arts class of the week.
Things to remember: Don't cross your arm over your middle line. I did this a lot today then had to fight like crazy to get it back. Keep your knee up when somebody is trying to close guard around you. It makes it very hard to close the legs. It also gives you escape options.
Sunday, 13 September 2015
Classes 179 & 180...
First up was an open mat session. I got pretty comprehensively ruined by a couple of blue belts and a very good white belt.
I did, however, pick up one very good additional method of breaking an opponent's closed guard. This involved the usual hands on hips, stepping back and creating space to put your knee in their bum, but then bringing you knee up and sitting back to prise the legs open. From here, it was into passing stance of one knee up, one knee down and elbows connected to knees.
The second class was also an open-mat session. I sparred with a couple of good white belts, one small and agile and the other muscular and strong, and a good blue belt, who was strong and has excellent leg locks, and I got ruined.
On the plus side, my movement is feeling much better and I did escape a leg triangle at one point by posturing up then doing a judo escape, which involved putting my feet on the hips of my opponent and prising him off. I also had some success with spinning out of turtle and catching an opponent in my guard.
Things to remember: Keep working on movement; play with spinning and rolling into guard from turtle.
I did, however, pick up one very good additional method of breaking an opponent's closed guard. This involved the usual hands on hips, stepping back and creating space to put your knee in their bum, but then bringing you knee up and sitting back to prise the legs open. From here, it was into passing stance of one knee up, one knee down and elbows connected to knees.
The second class was also an open-mat session. I sparred with a couple of good white belts, one small and agile and the other muscular and strong, and a good blue belt, who was strong and has excellent leg locks, and I got ruined.
On the plus side, my movement is feeling much better and I did escape a leg triangle at one point by posturing up then doing a judo escape, which involved putting my feet on the hips of my opponent and prising him off. I also had some success with spinning out of turtle and catching an opponent in my guard.
Things to remember: Keep working on movement; play with spinning and rolling into guard from turtle.
Sunday, 6 September 2015
Private Class No.8...
My first private class after a lengthy lay-off following a few injuries.
First up, we went through the three-attack combination: armbar, omaplata and triangle. This was OK, but the main advice was to tighten up the mechanics and maximise the pressure, particularly between the switch over from left to right when drilling.
We then did some work on chokes, which seemed to be OK. I also learnt two new chokes.
The first of these relied on the same initial collar grab, but saw the thumb of the other hand go in at the back of the gi collar, then swoop over to the other side and tighten as normal to close the choke. It seems to rely on timing your opponent's escape to make it truly effective.
The second new choke involved grabbing the flap of the opponent's gi jacket from guard, then passing it over the shoulder of the opponent onto the other side and securing it as one side of a choke. The hand grips like an uppercut. Then the other hand goes in as normal and secures the choke and tightens it.
We did some work on breaking and opening guard. The main adjustments here involved having the hooking leg tight and the escaping leg flat on the floor to block the hips.
Finally, we did some work on pulling guard. The key advice here was to use the foot on the hip to apply tension between you and the opponent.
Things to remember: Tighten the mechanics, the new choke options.
First up, we went through the three-attack combination: armbar, omaplata and triangle. This was OK, but the main advice was to tighten up the mechanics and maximise the pressure, particularly between the switch over from left to right when drilling.
We then did some work on chokes, which seemed to be OK. I also learnt two new chokes.
The first of these relied on the same initial collar grab, but saw the thumb of the other hand go in at the back of the gi collar, then swoop over to the other side and tighten as normal to close the choke. It seems to rely on timing your opponent's escape to make it truly effective.
The second new choke involved grabbing the flap of the opponent's gi jacket from guard, then passing it over the shoulder of the opponent onto the other side and securing it as one side of a choke. The hand grips like an uppercut. Then the other hand goes in as normal and secures the choke and tightens it.
We did some work on breaking and opening guard. The main adjustments here involved having the hooking leg tight and the escaping leg flat on the floor to block the hips.
Finally, we did some work on pulling guard. The key advice here was to use the foot on the hip to apply tension between you and the opponent.
Things to remember: Tighten the mechanics, the new choke options.
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