Now I managed to drain my 1 litre bottle of water in about 20 minutes on Tuesday leaving me to become extremely dehydrated. I managed to experience all of the other side effects listed above also. I couldn't use explosive power, I was totally drained after about 40 minutes of drilling and I got a leg cramp at one point. Also, due to the lack of energy, I started to lose concentration/awareness which knocked me off of the technical aspect of my game and prevented me from taking much of the lesson in. Which is why I find myself hardly able to remember any of the lesson. Which is why I'll not be taking creatine again. Bloody stuff.
Venue; LA Gym, Bristol, Uk.
Instructor: Chico Mendes (Grade 2 Black Belt).
Warm Up:
We were getting changed when the warm up started but I can remember doing some neck and arm limbering, some running and some sit ups and press ups. The Chico had us do lengths of the mat doing some less orthodox stuff. First was some frog jumps. Then one legged frog jumps (a length for either leg). Then we did these weird things where you fire your leg out one way then reset to a frog position, then the other way and reset, all the way down the mat (I was mega shit at these).
Drills:
To start off we were paired up and told to aggressively drill passing the guard from standing. The guy on the floor is on his back with his legs tucked up and he has to try and get a half guard or closed guard on his opponent. The standing guy just has to try and pass to side or mount or back.
I paired up with Marcus Hedley first off and then went with Mark Acton (long time Blue Belt). Can't remember how well I did. That's pretty much going to be a theme for this write up as I'm finding it difficult to remember anything.
Chico then showed us a couple of techniques that can help in our ability to pass from standing. First he said it's most important to squat down in a combat stance so you're on the same level as your opponent. Standing guys are easier to sweep or pull into your guard. Another tip was to find which is you opponent's strong side, that being the side he leads with and finds more comfortable to attack for sweeps with. For this you see which leg the guy is leading toward you with. More often than not this will be his strong side. Chico is a firm advocate of trying to get the guy attacking you with his weak side. To do this you need to ensure that your lead leg in your squat stance in on the other side to your opponents favoured lead leg (meaning if he starts coming forward with his right leg then you lead with your own right leg so he has to switch to his left leg if he wants to attack your closest point) thus leaving him attacking with his weaker side.
We were then shown some techniques to pass the guard. You're standing up in your attacking posture, your opponent is sat up, leant forward with one leg out (preferably his weaker side leg). You can forcefully lift his near leg in the air and then come forward so your weight is pushing into his raised leg (kind of like a half stack) with both legs clenched around that leg leaving him in quite an uncomfortable position. You can then easily swim past the leg into side control.
For the second, same start as the first with the opponent leant forward with one leg out (preferably his weaker side leg). You come forward toward him and push on his forward presented knee with the same side hand (his right knee your left hand) and with your other hand press on his same side hip to keep him away from you. From there you can press the knee out and down pushing him onto that side of his body and walk your legs out and around that flattened out leg so your body is extended out but you have a lot of your body weight pressed against him. From there you can either attack straight into the pass but give the guy a chance to recover in the scramble or you can wait for him to move and pass when his leg is moving in the wrong direction to get a fine pass into side control. Also, if the guys forgoes moving the leg and instead tries to sit up into you, you can push your head into his upper body to keep him from getting anywhere.
Next up was an attack against the opponent who has both legs forward or even raised in the arm slightly while leaning back (bad position that, even though some think it's good). The standing guy just needs to pull them up and toward him and then push them apart so the opponent is going into a quite painful split. As a result of this the opponent will either try to alleviate the pressure or try to attack, either way they'll bend one of their legs at which point you can push both legs in the direction of the non-bent leg and attack the bent leg in the style of the first pass.
Three good passes. Chico then pitted us against each other in situational rolling. Guy on bottom had to try and get a secured guard or a sweep on his standing opponent (or a sub but that wasn't very likely). The guy standing had to try and pass the guard. I was really blowing out of my ass by this time and can barely remember who I rolled with or how successful I was (I imagine not very).
Rolling:
We finished up with a bit of sparring. I really was good for nothing by this time and rolled against Andy (Judo Guy). After a brief struggle for the takedown I tried to be too flashy (idiot when I was that knackered) and tried to hit an armbar when Andy was over balanced. Unfortunately Andy has a pretty amazing base and managed to power me down on my back and then proceeded to crush me in side control/north south for about 4 and a half minutes with me feeling pretty feeble in my attempts to get out. He attacked once with and Americana attempt and a few times with Kimuras and chokes. I eventually managed to get out and turn him over so I was in his guard and then had about 30 seconds to do anything by which time the horn (Chico's phone) sounded and it was over. Pretty poor show from me really.
Next roll was against Tom Hill, a regular to Chico's class and Ian's Weston Class. Tom was fresh off a win at the latest instalment of the Hereford Open where he took the Gold medal in the under 64 Kg category at white belt. Well done for that Tom, it's a really good achievement. So I rolled with Tom, which pretty much featured me trying to pass his guard for most of it. I eventually did but didn't get to do much from there before he reclaimed guard. Pretty uneventful roll really.
I sat out the final roll as I was totalled by this time. Just to reiterate this, I WILL NOT BE TAKING CREATINE AGAIN. Bloody stuff ruined my Bjj game for the night.
After class Chico told us that he is going home to Brazil for a month to see his daughter and family and train with some of his old friends back home. He did leave us with a good bit of news though. Raphael Heck managed to get a new visa and is on his way back to take the classes in his absence (if all goes to plan). Great news.
Once again to anyone who reads this, I apologise for the lack of detail and can't emphasize enough how shagged I was during that class. Really wasn't operating on full. Promise you I won't do that again.
Til next time \m/.
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