DV8 Bjj 16/1/14

Great class on Thursday down at the new place on Coker Road, Worle (Weston Super Mare). Loads in attendance and we also had Glenn Cutter's 'other' son, Luke, along to take some pictures.

Ian started us off with a Clock Choke. We actually did this last lesson too but as I haven't typed that up yet I'll go through it here. You've got your opponent turtled up to your right with you resting across his back. You reach under his neck from the nearside with your left hand and take a deep grip of his right collar. Reach over the top with your right arm and pass your hand under his arm to take a secure grip of his right wrist, holding it in place. Now finish the choke by kicking forward with your nearside (right) leg and leaning back as you go. To make the choke tighter you can angle to 1 o clock with the kick forward.


Next up was a counter to the clock choke set up. In fact you could use this as a counter to someone attacking your turtle in general if they put the arm over. So starting from the opponent laying over you with the collar grip, reaching for your wrist. You pull his reaching arm into your chest. You then move your legs away from him slightly so you can get your head positioned near his stomach while you pull your left arm out and grab his pant leg at the ankle. You now have the leverage to turn the guy over the top of you, flipping him onto his back, with you carrying on the roll to land beautifully in side control top. Very nice move.


We then moved on to the Anaconda Choke from Single Leg Takedown Defence. First off he showed it from if the opponent is attempting to single leg your right leg from Turtle. You've sprawled to defend and managed to pass your right arm between his head and shoulder to reach under across the chest and grab him at the arm pit on the other side of his body. You can then rest your weight on his back and kick the leg leg he has secured hard backwards to break his grip, continuing the downward pressure so his arms are stretched out. From there you can push your right arm further through to close your other arm around that hand. You now rest your head off to the left of him (his right) and barrel roll off left. As you roll the opponent will roll with you, taking him over your head to land off to the side in an arm in guillotine position. Then you can close your body in toward your opponent by balling up and wrapping the top leg over for the tight choke finish.

The last move was a counter to the Anaconda set up. When he gets to the sprawl by kicking his leg out, you pull his arm in to your chest. Then posture your head up into opponents right hip and sit through with your right leg to turn the guy over. If he's sensible he'll roll and you'll get side control. If not he ends with his arm in a hammer lock position. A nice finish to a really good class.

All that was left was to take some class photos, one of which you see above.

I've been having a good run of training in the week too at the moment so Bjj life = good for Marty. ¬m/

New Year.

I've been criminally neglecting my blog page over the last month. In part due to the fact that I've had a very busy end of year festive period and also because I'd temporarily lost my blogging mojo. I've only really been using my blog recently as a way of cataloging any techniques I've been training in lessons with Ian and occasionally what I've been covering with Marcus, and sometimes Chris, on weekday lunchtimes.

As I'm still pretty busy with studying to expand my knowledge base in web design, as well as spending time with my family and enjoying my influx of new stuff from the above mentioned festive period, I am content to update this page as a knowledge base for the time being. I am happy with this style at the moment although I can't imagine it's amazingly interesting to others. In the future I have plans to change the blog to a different style but for the here and now this suits my purpose.

I'll also apologise to people who do follow it (I know there are a couple of you ) for not updating recently but I'm going to do a job lot run down of my last month pretty soon.

While I've got a bit of wind in my sails though I thought I'd tell you about my recent Bjj related gift haul. This year I didn't request any clear cut technique books as, quite frankly, I have them coming out of my ass. I literally have more technique books than I can possibly learn from properly in a year of Jiu Jitsu. So instead this year I went for books on Bjj with a more literary bent. Firstly was the highly recommended Bjj Globetrotter. This has quickly become the book the most Jiu Jitsu enthusiasts should of read. A guys 140 day trip around the world to train Bjj in as many places as possible. This could well be a dream come true. A lot of us Jiu Jiteiros would love this opportunity to train across the world with loads of different clubs and characters in this art we love. But with life, money worries, a lack of courage, most of us don't have the balls to take that trip. If I won the lottery tomorrow I would convince my wife and kids to travel the world like this guys has done, visiting a different club at every destination. That'd be sooo cool. But alas, that will never happen so I'll just read the book about someone who did it.

Next up was a copy of "Don't Wear Your Gi to The Bar and Other Jiu Jitsu Life Lessons" and I have already read and finished this one. It's quite an amusing little book with some funny stuff put in with some important Jiu Jitsu Does and Don'ts. Lot's of stuff in there from Personal Hygiene to Rolling with the Class Spaz, all written in an anecdotal style for a few giggles. A decent book to read on the bog or in the bath if ever I read one.

The last book I received was a copy of Zen Jiu Jitsu, Beyond Rolling. The 30 Day Program to Improve Your Game 1000%. This one also wins the award for the longest book title in my collection. The general premise of this one is that the author, Oliver Staark (a self confessed pseudonym as the author wanted to remain anonymous), challenges you to follow his program for 30 days and is completely convinced your Bjj game will improve. I'm only one chapter in on this so I'll do a bit more of a type up on this when I know more about it and have maybe even tried it out.

My only other gift for the day that does not get mentioned in January was another gum shield, to replace my nearly worn away, old Shock Doctor Max. My new one, a Shock Doctor Gel Max in Orange. Perfect :0). Thanks Mum. If I had to recommend a gum shield to anyone this would definitely be it. easy and straight forward to fit, looks cool and comes with a sleek little case for hygienic transportation. Awesome.


But that's not all!! I also took the liberty of pre-ordering myself a brand new Gi. The most recent offering from Strike Fighterwear is the Crowd Control 2.0. This gi, like the last version, has had every major decision of it's manufacture chosen by the companies fans on social media. I personally tried to by involved in this process pretty much every step of the way and was pleasantly surprised when most of my choices matched those that were chosen. This encouraged me to plump for the extremely reasonable pre-order price of £55. I was really tempted to go for the £100 for both variants offer as Strike Fightwear also offer for pre-order as limited edition, the second best option, which was a sweet Blue and Orange variant. I elected to go with the black and blue that I feel I helped pick though. I can't wait for this to land on my door step (hopefully toward the end of January).

So that was it guys. My year end gift haul and I feel pretty damn chuffed with that little lot. I've still got a lot of books to read without drowning in technical knowledge. My gum shields (along with my belt) are probably my most consistently used piece of Bjj paraphernalia and I'll always want new Gi's!!

Happy New Year Guys. I'll start typing up all these technique write ups now ¬m/