Checkmat - Bristol Combat Legion 26/6/12

I didn't have any lunchtime training sessions with Marcus this week as he's had a virus so I was really looking forward to Tuesday night's class at Bristol Combat Legion. And it was another blazing hot session under Chico Mendes on the top floor of the LA Gym. I'm thinking that my alcohol binge last week has taken a bit out of my cardio and my ability to cool myself down. I kid you not I was sweating my life away during the second half of Tuesday night's class and I felt so weak I think even my dear old Nan could've tapped me out (she throws up a mean triangle choke does Nanny :oD). Even so we worked on something that I haven't really worked much on before so it was still a rockin' experience.

Venue: Bristol Combat Legion, LA Gym, Bristol, Uk
Instructor: Chico Mendes - Checkmat (Grade 2 Black Belt)


Warm Up:
For the Warm up we did laps of the with knee ups, butt kicks, facing in for a couple of laps, facing out for a couple of laps, two steps facing in/two steps facing out for a couple of laps, touching the mat for a couple of laps.

After that Chico had us practice our stand up stances for a Bjj competition match. Chico says it is best to concentrate most of your weight on your back as this with defending takedowns as well as with your manoeuvrability. He also advises that you should use the same side arm as your forward leg for your collar/head/shoulder gripping arm to avoid any disastrous counters from the opponent. So we practised moving about in stance, forward - backward, side to side, all the while offering the correct hands and legs with weight distributed correctly.

Once done with that Chico ran us through some Spider Guard tactics and a couple of sweeps. Chico says the key to a good Spider Guard is to have you feet in the opponents elbow crooks with a good grip on his cuffs. Try no to start or default to legs extended, try to have your legs bent with feet pushing out into the elbow crooks so the opponent is relatively close to you and under your control. When the guy tries to pass to one side, extend you leg on the other side. Don't be to tempted to extend the leg on the side he's trying to pass as he then knows the full extent of your range and can also just pull the leg up and spin past. With the other leg extended you're dragging half his body back to position, you just need to shift your hips and re-angle your body to return to your starting position.

Chico also showed us a few sweeps from Spider Guard. One I remember was where the opponent is trying to pass and you've extended the opposite side leg. You then bring your unextended leg and push it against the opponent's opposite side leg (so you've now got a leg in his elbow crook and a leg on his lower leg, all on the same side) and with your spare hand you reach under his free leg and us a combination of the holds to sweep the opponents over you and over on to his back. This was the sweep that I found the easiest.


Another was where the opponent has raised one leg against your rear to try and make space. You extend your leg that is pushing out the other side of his body and lean forward and grab the back of the leg he has pushed against you. You can then lean forward into him while pulling the leg to tip him over and come up into top control.

There was also another sweep but I cannot remember the details. I've been trawling footage on YouTube but nothing seems to ring any bells.

The next part of the session involved us situationally sparring with a partner from Spider Guard. We were first off just trying out our Spider Guard positioning but were progressed on to sweeping and passing.  I was already pretty hanging by this point in the session.

I rolled this section with many opponents. The ones I can remember are Justin, Kamil, Andy and Sam. We then went on to practising turtle-ing up from from this position. Chico made a rule that if anyone gets their guard passed to side control, the whole class does 20 push ups.

The logic behind this is that if someone is passing your guard in competition but you give up the back into turtle (make sure they don't get hooks in!!) the opponent will get and advantage. If you then try to regain your position and accidentally give up side control, they don't get the points for it as they haven't passed your guard. I never knew that. Great bit of knowledge there. Anyway, it was at this point that I ended up with Ronan (the Man Mountain) Fleming in front of me. I was already totalling shagged and I had to try and resist this giant. I failed. Quickly and impressively. I was the reason that everyone had to do 20 push ups (except Ronan who was exempt being the passer). I would've been embarrassed if not for the fact that I'd managed to sweat ever emotion out of my body by this point.

We were then moved on to a situational roll starting from stand up and going for takedowns. I was against Tom "Egg" Kocur for this and it must've been the easiest thing he'd done that night. My most effective weapon at that point was the ability to fall on Tom. I think he impressively took me down 3 times and for that I can only apologise to Tom for not supplying him with a very tough challenge.

I finished up with a light situational roll against Judo Andy but as both of us were dying we didn't really achieve anything. The whole night was a very unimpressive performance from me really. I am going to have to take away some hard learnt lessons here. These are:

1/. Bristol Combat Legion Gym is Hot, Hot, Hot and unless I'm prepared for grappling in high heat I am not going to get anywhere.

2/. A whole week on the lager (on school nights too, thanks Euro 2012) has wreaked havoc on my cardio.

3/. My body really gases out very badly when the above combination come together leaving me about as much use as a grappling dummy.

4/. Chico finds this funny.

I am seriously gonna have to work on the main two problem, firstly, my cardio - back to running nightly and hitting the interval training in the gym- and secondly I need to drink more water or preferably Performance Sports Drinks during the day as my body is seriously overheating and I could also do with regularly working out at higher temperature to acclimatise my body to the heat. Doing all this will help me out with training at Bristol Combat Legion and possibly stop Chico from taking the piss out of me while I'm trying to die in the corner. Now that's gotta be worth any kind of hardship.

On the plus side, Big Justin, whose been training loads with us at Ian's and Chico's recently is improving loads and even tried his hands with a couple of rolls No-Gi toward the end of the sesh as there were a couple of guys without opponents so Justin was more than willing to step up to the plate. He didn't do badly either. Fair play to him, it's always good to see newer guys kindling their own Bjj Obsessions.

Now I've got to wait for Monday (hopefully, if Marcus is better by then) for my next does of Bjj-ness. I hate long gaps in training. ¬m/

DV8 Academia de Jiu Jitsu 21/6/12

Great numbers again for Ian's class. This is becoming quite common place now (touches wood) as we seem to have quite a committed group of guys coming along. Great times for this club really.

Venue: Sweat FA, Weston Super Mare, Uk.

Instructor: Ian Rossiter

Ian wasn't feeling his best Thursday as he'd been a bit under the weather for the previous two days so I stepped in to take the warm up.

Warm Up:

I didn't really deviate (no pun intended) from Ian's usual warm up model too much. We started with   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 10x4, Squats 10x 4,  Crunches 10 x 4. I did add in some hip escaping and triangles and then we did some leg stretching.


Ian's first technique was a closed guard transition to back (not the same one Marcus and I did Tuesday though). Start with the opponent in your closed guard then you reach under one of his arms and pull the guy in toward you with your legs whilst reaching around the other side of him with your other arm (but over the shoulder) and locking your handsto pull him in close and break his posture down. Keeping this hold you hip escape out to the over hooked side and then release your arms and pressure his neck with your nearside forearm. You can now angle yourself up putting his nearside (trapped) arm at an uncomfortable position, then swim your arm under that arm and shrug hard to duck under it and come up around to take the back.
I drilled this with Marcus.


Next move was a Butterfly Sweep. From sitting up Butterfly Guard you secure one of the opponents arms under your same side arm and hold it in close. You can then under hook the other arm or even just hold him on the outside of that arm using the gi. From there you just lean off and to the side (on the trapped arm side) and kick up with your other side leg, flipping the guy over onto his back with you coming over into mount.
This is a very cool sweep that I used to have a hell of a time with (during my early white belt years I just couldn't understand it). The reason was that as I white belt I used to do all my guard work flat on my back. As soon as you realise you should be sitting up for this it becomes obvious and easy. I started the drilling of this move with Chris Hardaway, a guy who is considerably lighter than me, but we changed around to try using the move against different sized guys and I ended up with Big Steve (who outweighs me by about 3 stone). And amazingly the move was still just as easy. With the right technique you should be able to hit it against anyone (within reason).



Then next move of the session was an Arm Bar from Butterfly Guard. Which I can't seem to remember the mechanics of. D'oh. That'll teach me for doing a half assed notes session afterward in favour of getting pissed with the missus. I shall discuss this with Ian and edit after.


The final move was a Buttefly Guard Pass. The opponent has his Butterfly Hooks in and is going for the sweep above. You resist this by bringing your leg on the side he would be kicking out with up so your foot is flat to the ground and pressing your knee into the opponents outside leg. From there you just need to grab the guy around the back with your hand on the side you're passing and use the other to hold his leg so he can't move away to reset position. You can then bring your other leg out and around while pushing down with the knee that's holding his leg at bay and you easily pass to side control.
I was drilling this move with Steve too.


Rolling:

I rolled first against Steve who I have been able to gain position on well recently. No I've stopped just sitting back from the start and trying to sweep him I've found myself gaining top control quite frequently. This time I went for the arm drag but Steve resisted so I pulled him off to one side, brought a leg under and reached under his leg and swept him pretty quickly. I then spent a while in mount, attacking him with various different chokes and arm bar attempts. I was eventually able to get an Arm Bar on him.


Next up was Rich Presley who I pulled guard on then managed to tap quite early using an Achilles Lock. After a restart we had a bit more of a back and forth guard play game. Trading sweeps.


I then had a pretty high paced roll with Dan Foster who I pulled guard on then got a sweep on and then spent the rest of the round trying to pass his guard whilst avoiding his Triangle attempts. I managed to pass to half guard at one point to which he recovered and he got a near miss sweep on me which I recovered. Other than that there was a lot grip fighting and jostling for position.


Next up was new guy Cameron so I spent some time trying to show him some stuff. Can't remember what. I just don't want to spar hard with him at the moment as he's not got enough of the basics down yet so I feel the time would be better spent showing him a few things.


Last up was Marcus which was another good back and forth affair with neither of us really gaining an upper hand. We know each others favoured moves so well by now that I find myself chuckling every time he goes for something like a wrist lock or one of his trusty cross chokes as I know it's coming and am already blocking it straight from the off. I like rolling with Marcus the most as it encourages me to try stuff outside of my usual comfort zone as he knows and counters my usual bag of tricks.

Another good week of Bjj done and now I'm left waiting for Monday to start all over again. I don't think I've ever had a hobby/obsession I've ever been more committed too and excited about in my life. Times are good. ¬m/

2 Man Training - No Gi - 19-6-12

I am way behind with these entries at the mo' as I've had one busy week. It's Saturday night and I'm relaxing with a few lagers after a long day travelling and seeing relatives so I'm going to take this opportunity to write up what I did lunch time Tuesday with Marcus at our No Gi session on that mats at Sweat FA.

Marcus did the techniques for this session and we started with a closed guard move shown to him by Chico Mendes at the Checkmat class the Friday before. He was shown this move in the gi but realised it translates well to no gi. Start with the opponent in you closed guard and overhook one of his arms with your same side arm. Then reach down with your other hand and underhook his knee (on the other side of the body to the trapped arm) and pull on it while you lean to the trapped arm side. This pulls off a nifty sweep that you don't even have to open your guard for until the very last moment. Once on top in mount, you still have the secured arm so you can easily switch angles to hit a very tight arm bar.


The next move was a counter to the knee up ass guard break and pass that is heavily favoured by a lot of guys. You have your closed guard on. The opponent drives the knee against your butt for pressure and brings his other leg out to the side to start the sit back for the guard break. What you need to do is shrimp your hips away from from the leg that he has raised off to the side to relieve the pressure, then grab his near side arm, reach down with your other hand and under hook at his leg and swing your legs over away from his based out leg (once again you do not need to open your guard for this until the last moment). You should land nicely in mount for the attack.


Next up was a over head flip sweep from butterfly guard and as I managed to find a perfectly good video of this there is no need for me to explain it. Video is from YouTube courtesy of TheMDBJJ. (Many thanks).

It's a perfectly good sweep and doesn't require the use of a gi to hit as long as you have good underhooks.


For the next bit we recapped the Jason Scully Half Guard stuff from the day before (see previous day blog) which are also perfectly good to use in No Gi.


Marcus was also keen to show me another trick Chico had shown at Friday's class. The technique is a pretty slick way of getting to back from closed guard. Your opponent is in your closed guard trying to break your guard with using the cheap elbow to the inside thigh method. You use both hands to grab one of his arms around the back and yank it out and over, trapping it in position with one of your hands while you shrimp out to the side where the arm now isn't. Then, maintaining closed guard, you shrimp away by shifting your hips which pulls the opponent out a bit flatter allowing you to easily come out around and take the back. Nice simple technique.


The last few things we tried involved the set up we use for the first technique with the closed guard and overhook. All we did was work on options from here to hit a Triangle, an Omoplata and a Gogoplata. The Gogo was particularly slick. These are all pretty straight forward to hit so there isn't really a need for me to explain.


We finished up with a load of rolling as usual. Marcus is still being stubborn about not let me hit a Gogoplata on him. I think I must have had about 3 near misses. One day it will be mine, MWAHAHAHAHA.

Anyway, I've now gotta write up Thursday's lesson so I can't hang around here being weird. Laters. ¬m/

Two Man Gi Training - 18/6/12

One again Me and Marcus hit the mats for a bit of training Monday lunchtime. We hit up a bit more of the Jason Scully Half Guard Bottom vid. I have really been ranting on a bit about his videos but I think he's really hit onto something by pouring as many techniques from a single position into a 7 minute-ish vid and letting the watcher work out the rest themselves. It's like have a specialised book in video form. If you take the time you can catalogue the moves he's doing and work out a small session using just 30 seconds of his vid. I cannot recommend these films enough.

Here is the video just to refresh you on what I'm ranting on about.

We started off this time at about 2:34 on the clip doing a Half Guard to Rolling Triangle. The guy is attack your half guard trying to pass. You've ended up bringing your free leg up to block him against his torso whilst your trapping leg is still between his legs. He makes the mistake of bringing his arm to overhook your top leg then drive the arm up between your upper legs. You then secure that arm in position between your legs and bring your trapping leg up and out (effectively releasing half guard). You bring that leg out the side where your butt is pointing and do a sort of forward/sideways roll bringing that freed leg over his head and around his neck to close the triangle on him. This technique lends itself to getting a near perfect position for the triangle. I found myself not actually having to work too hard as the position was naturally there.

The second one, at 2:42, was the Hallf Guard to Rolling Omoplata. Exactly the same setup as above but instead of rolling forwards/sideways you just roll forward, bringing you up in an amazing and super sweet looking Omoplata finish. These are two super disco looking moves that I'm fairly sure I will be trying to attain for some time.

The third and final technique we tried from the Jason Scully vid was another Omoplata. Once again from the above setup with the arm between you legs but this time you overhook the arm (he has stuffed up between your legs) right at the arm pit and pull while you drive your leg forward and through. Now all you need to do is pull the leg over and tuck it under the opponent's chin and then move around into Omoplata position. This is by fair the simpler variant of the three and we also found it lends itself to a fantastic tight Gogoplata. Nice move.

We moved on from Half Guard for a bit of variety and stole a move from Ciao Terra.

I really enjoyed this little variation on the Side Control/S Mount Armlock. I am always finding myself in this position so to find a little gem like this was a pretty good.

The last move I can remember from the Monday sesh was a Ricardo Almeida Gogoplata/Armlock from Mount. 

This is a lovely little move and if I can ever pull it off I will be over the moon. In fact I'm on a bit of a major crusade to pull off a Gogoplata against a resisting opponent at the moment. I've had so many near misses but still not actually got there. It'll come one day. I've just got to remember that I need one of my opponents arms very securely wrapped up before I can even attempt the Gogaplata or it's too easy for him to move.

We chucked a bit of rolling in at the end but were constrained for time so only had about 25 minutes. I'm still pretty impressed with how my rolling cardio is coming along.

In all a great (if quite short) little session Monday. I'll post the Tuesday No- Gi session as soon as I can type it up. I seem to have a recurring alcohol indulgence problem at the moment as there has just been an enormous development in my Wife's life that has given us reason to celebrate so typing up these blog entries has come a bit late. The alternative is to do it a bit pissed which is not a good idea.

Catcha later ¬m/ 

Lucas Leite

We've just heard the news today from our fantastic instructor, Chico Mendes, that he has managed to convince multi time World Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Champion, Lucas Leite to come and do a seminar for us out here in the West Country. I cannot emphasize how massive this is. Lucas Leite is phenomenal. Your Bjj game will instantly improve just by being in the same room as him. I fully expect to be amazing after one session under his awesome tutelage.

Lucas Leite's credentials include:

2x World Champion (2007, 2005)
2x World Nogi Champion (2009, 2011)
3x Pan American Champion (2012, 2009, 2007)
3x Grapplers Quest Pro Division 1st Place (Del Mar 2009, 2007)
Sao Paulo State Champion (2006)
European Champion (2006)
World Silver Medallist (2011)
World Pro Cup Silver Medallist (2012)
Pan American Silver Medallist (2011)
World Bronze Medallist (2012)

 

And here's a pretty cool highlight vid of Lucas in action.

 He is well recognised as being one of the best practitioners of the Half Guard in the world and given my current leanings towards learning Half Guard I think this could well be one of the most useful seminars I've attended (trusting he goes with Half Guard as his subject). Can't wait. ¬m/

Checkmat Bjj - 12/6/12

To finish off a quality 2 days of training I attended Chico Mendes' Bjj class in Bristol's LA Gym, Tuesday evening. I have to confess to being a bit knackered and achy going into the class, after mine and Marcus' hammering No Gi sesh earlier in the day it's not really a surprise.

Venue: Bristol Combat Legion, LA Gym, Bristol, Uk
Instructor: Chico Mendes - Checkmat (Grade 2 Black Belt)



As is the norm for us we arrived a little late so we were getting changed while the rest of the guys were doing the warm up. From where I joined in we did laps of the mat with knee ups, butt kicks and mat touches.  Hips escapes for 2 lengths then we partnered up and did a length of mat in wheel barrow each, ending with 20 Push ups, then we carried our partners 1 length each, then carried backward 1 length each. I was with some MMA dude for this who seemed about my size. Didn't think it would be fair to team with Marcus on that one. Hehehe.



Techniques:
Chico started us off with  the fairly basic Closed Guard Hip Bump Sweep. Your opponent is kneeling in your closed guard. Chico demo'd this with a guy trying to break closed guard using his elbows on against the inside leg whilst holding his belt. Chico first dummies one way, as if to attack the arm on one side, then throws himself the other way. He opens his guard but ensures his knees are clenched together to control the opponent, then, picking a side, he bases out with his arm on that same side then throws his other side arm up and over the guys head and shoulder and grabs the guys arms at the triceps on the selected side and then hip bumps and pulls the guy over. You flip the opponent easily over so you have him mounted and in a great position for attacking.
I drilled all the techniques that night with Marcus as both of us were a bit knackered so we went a bit easier on each other.


The next move was the Closed Guard Kimura. Chico just showed us this as an option off the blocked Hip Bump Sweep. As you're hitting with the hip bump the opponents uses the arm you are grabbing to base out on the mat so as to block the sweep. Using the arm you had based out with, grab HIS basing arm at the wrist and release the triceps with your other hand and reach further over and inside the arm to grab your own wrist. Then bend the opponents arm up and back using the superior strength afforded you by the double grip and move yourself out to the side so you are perpendicular to him. For additional pressure on the hold, when you bring the guys arm up high, pull your supporting arm (the one that is reaching around and grabbing the your other wrist) in tight against the opponents shoulder.
Very painful. I'm still feeling tight now and that's two days after.



Next up was a Closed Guard Flower Sweep variation. An old favourite of mine, Chico's version worked for when you opponent is grabbing your lapel high on one side. You grab the cuff of the high arm with a pistol style grip and reach down to the guys other side leg and grab a hand of gi pant around the lower leg. Then, open the guard but as before, keep the legs clenched at the knees and swing the guy over by pulling up on the guys leg and raising your same side leg slightly (whilst keeping it tight) and dropping the other side leg slightly (also keeping it tight) to sweep him over on to his back, once again mounted for a great attacking position.
It struck me during the drilling of this move, that I haven't used move in ages and I think that's because I nearly never use closed guard any more. Weird that my old go to moves have been left behind since I've been trying to evolve my game.



The last move we were shown I have just spent the best part of  10 minutes trying to remember as I was quite shagged by that time and my head wouldn't have been working at a hundred percent. Stupidly, the only notes I left for myself on this was "Closed Guard Foot Out Sweep and Arm Bar" which was particularly useless and left me racking my brain in the effort to conjure up what the hell it was.
Starting off in closed guard, you've grabbed the opponent's wrist at your lapel, as for the flower sweep, so the opponent bases his leg up on the other side as if to try for a guard break. From there you "chop up" with your arm, under the opponent's leg preferably as low as possible to knock the guy off his base and bring his leg up so his foot is near your head. You bend your arm at the elbow and keep you arm raised above your head, so his leg is secured and stretched out next to you. From there you can hit and arm bar if you manage to keep the guys arm stretched out. The point of the move was for the sweeps though. You need to gage which way the opponent is resting his weight so you can sweep him with his over balance. You sweep him the same way as the side of the arm you've grabbed by twisting your legs that way and leaning forward and to that side, lifting the leg as you go. To go the other way you quickly grab the opponents other arm and twisting your legs toward that direction and sit forward, this time holding the leg out of the way.
We were trying those moves for quite a while before Chico called time for some rolling,



Rolling:
I can not remember much at all about the rolling except for who I rolled with and some very vague details. Oh and that it was 6 minute rounds.

I rolled with Marcus first and as we were both knackered it was just a very sloppy back and forth affair.

Next I rolled with Jase BrookSbank in a very good roll where I remember hitting a semi decent half guard sweep. I also took his back at one point but he shook it off quite easily. It ended with me in his half guard trying to pass or hit a kimura, until Jase at the very end (and with some advice from Ronan) got a pretty sweet sweep.


The next was Judo Andy (as I've taken to calling him, even though I am unsure his name is Andy and he hasn't done Judo in many years), a very strong and advanced white belt with a tight holding game. I was really feeling the pain by this time so I just jumped guard and attempted to sloppily throw up subs against him whilst fending his attempts at passing. I have become reasonably proficient at using my legs and arms to block out attempts at passing my open guard and just rolling away from the pass. This was frustrating Andy somewhat, who was trying to grab both my legs and then throw them out of the way to jump past. This was fended off easily and I even threw in a couple of choke attempts (pace, cross and even a gogoplata). That was pretty much the roll.


Next up I went against a girl called Leigh, who is relatively new to Bjj and is focused more on MMA so she only really grapples no gi. As she isn't very experienced at all I mainly just showed her how to break a closed guard, how to pass guard, how to escape mount and a half guard sweep. Just some functional stuff she could use, instead of just smashing her up and destroying her confidence.


Last roll was against Rich long and it was pretty much identical to the Andy roll. I basically did the guard defence bit and various sub attempts, with absolutely no sweeping attempts. I was even managing to do the turtle-ing up and inverting stuff to defend the guard pass. I'm particularly chuffed with the turtle as it's never really been part of my game before but it's coming along nicely. I was close to a gogoplata at one point (I WILL hit that move one day) but Rich defended it well. Rich managed to pass to my half guard at one point to which I rolled him over using a kimura sweep, which he defended and then rolled me back over using a similar sweep before I recovered guard which is where we ended. A really good roll with Rich there.

A great class there from Chico with a good, yet sloppy (on my side), rolling session at the end. And I also got a couple of good Jiu Jitsu T-Shirts while I was there. One I had pre-ordered through Ian, from Tatami and the other was the new Bristol Combat Legion/ Checkmat T, which is awesome ¬m/

2 Man Training 12/6/12

It was back to just two of us for mine and Marcus' Tuesday No Gi session. And as I was a bit lax with the pre-planning for this one, it was Marcus who stepped up with some techniques. And he really did have Disco fever. I am unsure if this is all the moves we drilled, in fact I'm pretty sure there were more, but as I didn't write anything down at the time I've completely forgotten some of the stuff.


First up was the Tornado Guard Triangle. As there is a perfectly good video of this technique laid out to the internet masses just over half a year ago by the Bjj Weekly crew, featuring the creator of the Tornado Guard, Roberto 'Cyborg' Abreu, I will just put that up here and anyone reading this can watch it. It's nowhere near as hard as it looks (in practice).

Same again for the next  technique. We did the Tornado Guard Sweep to Kimura, same source, same master. Great move, a little bit harder to pull off though.

For the next move of the day we tried the Half Guard to Toe Hold at 1:50 of Jason Scully's Half Guard bottom vid. I didn't really bother with this yesterday as I don't really train leg locks in Gi as you can't use them in competition until Brown Belt anyway (and that's a loooooooong way off for me). But in No Gi it's like open season. Try it out yourself. You'll love it.

The last move I remember was an escape from Kuzure Kesa Gatame (Scarf Hold) bottom flip to Darce Choke. It took a couple of tries to get the manoeuvre right but when you do it feels really sweet. And of the super disco moves we worked today I'd say this would be the easiest to attain (I wouldn't put the Toe Hold from Half on the disco list just so ya know). If fact it might be worth subjecting myself to a bit of Scarf hold situational just to try it out sometime.

We rolled shit loads after that. Probably rather unwisely too, as we both went training in the evening too. I was aching and blowing out my ass after this one though and I'm fairly sure we managed to clock up 35 minutes of rolling in total for that sesh. At least my cardio's getting a good run out.


I'll try and finish off the write up to Chico's lesson tomorrow night or something. S'laters \m/

3 Man Gi Training - 11/6/12

I've hand a bit of a bumper couple of days of training this Monday and Tuesday. I started off with a Gi session over lunch on Monday, then a No Gi session lunch Tuesday and finished up with a class under Chico Mendes Tuesday evening.

Now usually it's just me and Marcus trying to rip each others arms off on a Monday and Tuesday but we were lucky enough to be joined by fellow club mate Tom Hill. It's always good to have more people to train with and Tom added a different dynamic to our rolling at the end, as his style is different to both mine and Marcus'. Where as Marcus is very technical and exceptionally good with his hip escapes; and I use a lot of flexibility and try to use a bit of agility in my passing and guard maintaining; Tom uses quite a bit of strength and likes to close out his opponents by grabbing them and giving them minimal movement space. Sometimes it can be tricky rolling against Tom with this style as he doesn't leave you a lot of room to get controlling positions on him and he's very quick to power out of any bad positions you have him in if you let him, which trains you to tighten up your game.

So coming in I had a load of techniques planned out. It's been a while since any of us had done a good old Half Guard session so I went back to the Jason Scully YouTube vids that have been doing the rounds and found the Half Guard Bottom one. Jason basically rams as many techniques into one video a he can get, usually only giving you one view of the move but occasionally two angles on some of the trickier moves. He outright says it's not an instructional vid but rather just a visual record of as many techniques as he can get in. But if you sit down and go slowly through each technique, writing them out in (semi) detail, you can pick up quite a lot. And there are quite a few moves that I'd never seen or rarely seen, so it's really helpful.

So here's the video I have been using (many thanks to Jason Scully). Take into account we only really covered the first 2 minutes or so of it cause the vid really has loads of stuff on it and we were limited for time.

Now rather than write a full description for all of the techniques we covered I shall just list them along with any notes I had on the move. The video is sitting right there if you would like to look at it for the moves yourself.

We started out with Jason's Basic Half Guard Position. Where as I like to secure a leg with my inside leg and hip escape out to the side slightly, holding the opponent off with and arm pressed across the his chest, the other arm free to fend off his outside arm or grab a leg if it comes up; Jason Scully secures the leg with his off side leg, using it to pull the guys leg out and upset his balance. He also favours an underhook and leans in towards his opponent, still using the free arm to defend or attack as necessary. I must confess to finding this position preferable to my usual half guard style but you need to have a lot of space to really get the lean in correct. There is LOADS of sweeps from here though.


First move we went with was the Transition to Rear Mount, exactly the same as Chico showed us a couple of weeks ago. Great move and I've managed to hit it a couple of times since learning it.


The first sweep we learnt from the basic position was a Half Guard Push over sweep at 1:24 on the vid. From the basic position but the opponent leaves his offside leg too close to you. Reach down with your free hand and pull it inside, then using your other hand, grab it around the back to destroy any chance of basing out, and lean forward to tilt the guy over onto his back. Easy and simple.







Next was a Half Guard Flip Over at 1:31 on the vid. As if you’re going to back (as before) but the opponent has a strong over under hook. You sort of turn around and base out with your free arm, pushing against his near side arm with your trapped arm so he pushes back, then drop down and shoulder roll over, grabbing his leg as you go, to flip him. (probably need to watch this one). We all loved this move. It's really slick and the momentum makes the move fairly easy.




Now the Kimura flip sweep at 1:44 was difficult for us to work out, mainly because my notes were shit. What you actually do is attempt to base out the same as before, then bring your free (basing arm) back to grab his nearside wrist (remember it's over under hooking you at that point) and circle round his now secured arm with your other arm to grab your own wrist. You can then come out the side and spin over, flipping the opponent with you if he's sensible, ending up in a top control position with a wrist lock right there. This move was a little tricky to hit at first but once we got it we felt it was a pretty slick tactic to use.


We then did the single leg takedown stuff that starts from 1:55 for a couple of move, including a variation with a knee pick if he decides not to stand with you.


We chucked in the Calf Slicer at 2:12 which is a very cool move, even though we won't be able to use it in competition. Always nice to know. All you gotta do is duck out the side as if you're going to back but instead turn around and pull the opponent's leg up while your trapping leg (you use the inside leg this time) is pulled in his knee crook.


Next up was a Kimura on the opponent's free arm at 2:18. From the basic, secure his free arm at the wrist and reach over for the kimura. You can roll the opponent over you using this technique for the sweep.


Last technique we did was the Arm between the legs sweep at 2:24. Push the guys free arm between his legs and reach over his back with the arm you've just released from under hooking (reach past his shoulder on the side of the arm to be Kimura'd) to his belt and then twist and push out to rotate them away and over to the commanding side control with the Kimura right there.


After that we did some good hard sparring for 5 minute rounds.

So that was a good session with some great Half Guard moves to sink our teeth into. I really am starting to fully understand how to get a threatening Half Guard now. I won't say I have it anyway near mastered or even competent yet but through understanding something your ability to practice and become proficient at it grows. I will be continuing to work on my Half Guard as it's a valuable position to have as a strong part of your game. When you think about it, it's the last line of defence before an opponent has top control on you. Having a useless Half Guard leaves you just clenching your legs together to trap your opponent in place, to stall his progress to top control for as long as possible. But having an attacking half guard makes this position still a threat for the opponent to be in. You can still sweep, you can still submit. I used to consider Half Guard bottom a position I needed to escape from the same as side control bottom. It's all about the positioning of your body. As long as you can shift your body out to the side (not be flat on the ground) you can be a threat.

Gotta keep training Half Guard.

DV8 Academia de Jiu Jitsu - 7/6/12

Once again there was a great turn out for the Ian's Thursday Class at Sweat FA, Weston Super Mare. There was also a bit of a buzz about the new club logo being designed by one of the newer students, Chris Cook. After a few good attempts he's come up with some really cool designs now that everyone seems to be appreciating.

We were also discussing the up coming Leo Vieira seminar in August, with loads of the guys stating their interest which is a bit better than previous times Ian's presented stuff like this and there's only been a select few of us (usually the same guys) who go. There seems to be a bit more enthusiasm and club spirit about at the moment and I can only hope it keeps ups. Good things for the future.

Not the new club logo, just something I knocked together to stick at the top of my page ;o)

 

Venue: Sweat FA, Weston Super Mare, Uk.

Instructor: Ian Rossiter 

 

 

 Laps of the mat, including, ass kicks, knee ups, facing inward for a lap, facing out for a lap and arm windmilling for a couple of laps. Neck, Arm and Shoulder stretching. Push ups 10x4, Squats 10x 4,  Crunches 10 x 4, then some leg stretching.

Techniques:

We started of with a Kesa Gatame (scarf-hold) Side Control Bridge Escape. The opponent has you pinned to the mat leaning across you in side control but facing sideways on towards you, with one arm (nearside) wrapped around your neck, the other securing your nearside arm at the elbow (usually to pull it up under their arm pit) like so:

What you do then is grab your hand that is coming out of the rearside of his arm pit with your free hand, turn your lower body toward your opponent and bridge up hard into him, using your arms to push him up and away, twisting your body back over at the last second to land the guy on his back with you in a commanding side control position.
I drilled this with Marcus.


Second technique Ian demoed was another Kesa Gatame escape. This time you walk your legs away from the opponents body so you're more perpendicular to him. You manage to pull your nearside arm out from his underarm grip and use your lower hand to wrist like a blade edge to push into the guy's throat, bracing it out with your other arm. This distracts the opponents somewhat and pushes them back away from you a little so you now have room to swing your legs up and pass the off side leg under his head. You can now kick back, rolling the guy over to his back with you coming up and over into side control.
This has always been my favourite escape from Kesa Gatame due to my flexibility. I have quite an easy time of getting my leg up and under an opponents head and generally use this escape quite a bit. I've even modified it a bit and used it as a standard side control escape on occasion.
Me and Marcus also had a little play about with the Andre Galvao escape to arm bar when the guy has you in the slightly different Kuzure Kesa Gatame. That's the one where the opponents nearside arm is underhooking your off side arm instead of wrapping around the neck, as shown here;

From there you overwrap the guys nearside arm and repeat as for the last one to get your leg up under his head but this time position your other leg with the knee hard into his torso/ribs. Now as you roll him over you can lay back putting immense pressure on the trapped arm.



Ian then linked a finish option to these moves as being the same Arm bar we did two weeks ago. This works under the assumption that the opponent did not release the headlock once you'd flipped him on his back so he's closer to being sideways on or back presented. From there (on floor in a sort of side control with opponents back presented but still in headlock position), you push your far side knee (knee the furthest from the opponents head) into his back and use your forearm to press against his neck, first pressing down into the neck, then scooping upward to apply tight pressure on his carotid artery, making him quickly release the hold. It's just a quick movement from there to secure his arm and pass your near side leg over the opponent's head, then fall back for the really tight arm bar.




Next Ian moved us on to something completely different - Standing wrist locks. It's funny 'cause I was just saying to Marcus the other week that my knowledge on wrist locks is fairly shocking (about ten seconds after he'd tapped me with one) so this was a good little training segment from me. Opponent starts with his hand on your chest as if he's pushing you away. You then push his hand down a little (so it bends at the wrist slightly) with your same side arm, while gripping back of arm just above the elbow with your other hand . You then pull the guys arm hard towards you and switch to a double hand grip at the back of his arm for extra control and pressure. The pain is immediate. Most guys will be tapping (or begging for mercy) in pretty short order.





Ian then moved this on to work from a closed guard position. The opponent in your closed guard is pressuring your hips as if to set up a pass. You secure one of his hands with the same side hand and grab that same arm at the back just above the elbow (same way as before). Then, open guard (but still maintain pressure with legs) and hip escape away from that arm so you are sideways on to it. Now use the same double arm pull technique to hit the painful wrist lock. Ouch, that move hurts loads. And if you're stupid and try and find ways to resist or struggle against it you end up getting hurt more. D'oh.


To finish off the techniques Ian gave us a back up move if the opponent is able to successfully block the wrist lock by angling his hand to the outside of you so it can be slipped of. Fairly easy, just whip it round into an omoplata. I drilled this move first with Glenn Cutter, then with Rich Presley. I also practised the monoplata on both guys, where you switch to the omoplata but the guy manages to retain your leg underneath him.
During this time Glenn showed me a pretty cool (and fairly obvious when you think about, though I never had) pass for closed guard. Occasionally you're in someone's closed guard and they lay right back for a rest and pull their arms right up and away from you too as if to disallow you any control over them. Just turn yourself around, stepping over his torso and flipping him over onto his front, coming over into a sort of self imposed boston crab like position (put on only because he has his leg wrapped around you) which the opponent quickly lets go of. From there you can scramble for best position, either getting to his back or at least to side control. If you end in half guard from that little number then you've done something really wrong.



Rolling:

I roll with Rich first who seemed to be having a bit of an off night. I jumped guard first from where we jostled a bit for position until I managed to hit an Arm Bar on him. Restarted and this time I went for a takedown so he jump guard on me. I managed a pass after a considerable struggle but once into side control I managed to gift wrap him over into rear mount and slap on a Bow and Arrow.


Next up was Big Steve. I was a bit chuffed with the beginning to this second roll as I usually do not even bother to try to grapple from knee to knee with Steve (he outweighs me by at least 3 stone) but on this occasion I thought I'd try a little grip battle and managed to grab his left hand sleeve cuff with my right hand and grab his left arm tricep with my left hand and arm drag him right over to take his back really quickly (thanks Marcelo). Executing an arm drag against a guy so much bigger than me was a pretty land mark occasion for me but equally impressive, and somewhat surprising, was Steve's ability to defend from his back. I was constantly active trying to pry his arms away, trying to grip his collar, trying to slide an arm in, but Steve was defending like a total demon. I was equal parts impressed (with Steve's defence) and frustrated (with my inability to finish) come the end of the round. Fair play to him, a great round from a bad start for Steve.



Next up was a round with Tom Hill. Tom is a fairly competitive guy and uses a lot of strength in his rolling (especially for his size and weight). He jumped guard on me which I struggled and eventually managed to pass. Tom then played a great defensive game. I Was on the verge of taking his back right at the end but we'd rolled off the mat. By the time we got back on and Tom tied his belt the time was up.
I may be getting a spot of One on One Training in with Tom on Monday lunchtime which I look forward to.


Last up was Rob. He tried to dummy me a bit by talking some, then bull rushed me for a takedown, so I swept him straight away. I got to side control and left him to try and break out of it for a bit. I then went to mount using the crescent kick pass and tried to tap him for the last 15 seconds with an arm bar which he was able to block out.

A great and fun lesson once again from Ian with the attendance and general camaraderie really making this club a pleasure to attend each session. I'm a bit bummed out though as Marcus won't be able to train Mondays and Tuesdays for a while (if ever again) as he's working to get money up towards moving down south with his missus when she leaves for University. Bugger! I will be planning some sort of adequate punishment for this. Still, Tom Hill says he's game for a Monday sesh occasionally and hopefully I'll be able to pull someone else out for another day. Can't go back to one day training a week. No way.

\m/