Low numbers tonight. I expect this'll probably continue up to Christmas as people slack off, funds are low, late night shopping is always on Thursdays etc.... Christmas is a time for joy but in the Bjj world it's also a time for excuses. And I won't lie, I'm kind of up there with the best of them for this. I have a wife and two present hungry kids and am already in debt up to my eyeballs. So I have to slack off of Bjj a little bit in the roll up to Christmas to save the bucks for whatever super expensive present the young lad wants. This means 1 lesson a week usually and the skill and fitness level also suffers a bit. I love Christmas but my Bjj Obsessed side doesn't. Still, I'll probably get some cool new Bjj kit or manuals on the big days so wahoooo.
Venue: Sweat FA
Instructor: Ian Rossiter. (SJJA)
Warm up: Laps of the mat, including ass kicks, knee ups, facing inward for a lap, facing out for a lap. Neck, Arm and Shoulder stretching. Push ups 15 x 2, Squats 15 x 2, Crunches 15 x 1. We then partnered off for Kimura sit up drills 15 each side. Then some leg stretches.
First technique of the night was the Kimura. We mixed up partnering all night so I can't even begin to remember who I partnered with for each individual drill. Starting in guard, opponent has his hands on your gi front. You bring your arms under his and hold your hands together as if praying. You then explode your hands up through the middle in between his two arms, pushing outwards, at the same time pulling his torso up towards you with your closed guard. The up and outwards pressure should cause him to base out on the ground to either side of you so his hands are flat on the ground. You then select one of his arms and grip his wrist with the hand that's on the same side (right for left, left for right) and, dropping the foot of the leg on the other side of your body to the floor and pushing down on it, throw your other arm over the top of his secured arm, reach down and grab the wrist of your arm that is still gripping his (if that makes any sense). Then, holding his arm tight to your body, fall back with your body weight pulling his arm with you and close your guard. Keeping the arm tight to you and at a forty five degree angle, push the arm around as if it were a clock hand, clockwise if it's his right, anti clockwise for left. Some guys weren't holding the opponents arm tight enough to themselves so the whole technique was too loose. Others weren't securing the guy by closing the guard back up after they'd falling back with the arm secure. Ian offered a couple of pointers then we moved on.
Ian's next technique was the option for the guillotine. From the position where your got the wrist secured at your side and leant over to grab for the Kimura, quickly reach back around the guys head and thread your wrist underneath his chin. Then let go of the secured wrist and use that hand to reach under his body and grab your other hand and pull on the arm to win the tap from a choke. Now then mistake I was making and this seems to be one of the most common mistakes, was that I was pulling up on the arm trying to choke my opponent across the throat. Now this might eventually earn the tap but Ian pointed out to me that the more effective way to execute the move is to try and pull the arm through. This tightens the hell out of the choke and gets the tap a lot quicker. It's worth mentioning that the bigger guys also have problems with threading their hand under the opponents head/neck due to a lack of space. It seems a bigger guys need a bit more fumbling about to secure the hand grip under the chin.
Next up was the guillotine defence. Ian showed us the defence from sitting first. The guys got the arm around your neck and is about to lean back to fully torque it in closed guard. You put your arm over his far side shoulder and try and reach down his back. This takes all the pressure off of the hold when he closes guard and leans back. Then reach up with your free hand to grab his arm and take more pressure off the choke, and push up on your feet so you can drive your shoulder into his throat. It is possible to submit an inexperienced guy with the shoulder drive alone but usually an opponent will drop the choke attempt and push you off leaving you in a good top position to start passing guard.
We then went on to the guillotine defence from standing. Starting in the guys guillotine you once again pass your nearside arm over his far side shoulder and at the the same time reach up with your other hand to his arm and pull down. All this relieves the pressure from your neck and even if he wants to try and blow himself out lifting your body up in the air to torque the choke, all he'll be doing is gassing himself out. With the elbow of the arm that is reaching up to relieve the pressure from your neck, push against the opponents leg then pass around to the other side of his body and push your nearside knee into the back of his knee. This will cause the opponent to easily drop backwards to the floor. If he has (stupidly) maintained his hold around your neck you can then drive your shoulder into his throat once again whilst looking up in the air and working on pulling his arm out to work the head free leaving you in side control. Little tip that Marcus gave me on this one that I'd missed in the demo was that when you drop the opponent to the floor and are driving the shoulder, have your legs facing towards his legs to apply more pressure on the neck and allow your full body movement strength to pull the grip off of your neck.
Rolling tonight was 3 minute rounds which absolutely flew by. I rolled with this new blue belt (new to the class, not to the belt) called Dan who'd just moved to the area. We had a good roll, I took him down to side control, went for a straight arm lock, he shirked it and recovered half guard. I then (copped out) went for the Ezekial and had it quite tight but he managed a panic jerk just about popping his head out (went an interesting colour though). I then worked on passing his guard and he shot the leg up and locked the legs around for a loose triangle. I got into position to block and escape to which he pushed my leg down with a wiley counter. He then pulled down on my head which, rather than choke me out, just smothered me out of breath for the tap. New guys pretty good. We restarted and I took him down to which he jumped into guard. I broke his guard and started to pass to which he threw up a weak arm bar attempt which I easily blocked and used to pass. Then unfortunately time was called. I hope Dan comes again, it was fun rolling against someone who provides me with a big test. It makes me raise my game more.
My second roll was against a guy named Chris whose a white belt that has come on and off for a while. Chris' main problem is he's basically totally rigid through his sparring which makes him exceptionally easy to sweep and takedown. I took him down and he was trying to arm drag me to get my back. I managed to jump straight on him to full mount and remembered my aims for the class. I was trying for the mounted triangle which I couldn't secure and ended up losing mount for side control. From here I secured Kesa Gatame and used my near side leg to hold his leg down, then passed my far leg over and under his head then pulled that leg into the crook of my other leg and locked up a fantastic (if I do say so myself) inverted triangle choke. Wahooo. One of my aims done.
Got a couple more taps from the sparring but nothing of note. I'm gonna have to try harder to achieve my goals here. 1 a week is pretty shit.
And I hope Gary Davies is back next week. His demon guard game is always a pleasure to roll against. \m/
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