Wednesday BJJ Class 8/29/2007

Yesterday's class was fun. Overall, it was a lighter workout than on Tuesday, but that's okay by me. I was beat after Tuesday's class.

Warmups were pretty good... lots of ab work and then in lieu of technique we worked on a lockflow drill, and then 3 minute rounds against one of the upper belts. Sparring was relatively light for me, because my right elbow is still not 100%. It's doing okay, but while we were doing the sitout drill, it got tweaked a little bit. Nothing major, but I want to be gentle with it.

So, the lockflow drill is one I've done before, but never as shown by Coach Foster. We've done it a couple of times during warmups. It was a great workout, and in order to do it, you have to really mind your hip movement and technique. It starts with a basic armbar from guard. So, I trap an arm, get one leg high on the shoulders to prevent my partner from posturing up and then swing the other leg around into an armbar. The counter to this is for him to stack me up and pull his arm out. When he does this, I have a head and arm still in danger, so I swing my leg back around and secure a triangle. The basic counter to the triangle is to posture up and move around in the direction of the trapped arm. He does this, and so I swing around into an omoplata. When he realizes his mistake, he tries to posture up, where I will then move back into a triangle, and then finish the lockflow drill by swinging my arm around into an armbar on the other arm.

Next class will probably be on Sunday.

Upcoming Seminar

Tuesday BJJ Class 08/28/2007

Whew. I finally made it back to class. I managed to scarf down an apple and some granola before I left work, but I'm accustomed to eating something with a little more protein prior to class. As a result, I had a predictable hypoglycemic response and got very nauseous. Nothing major, but ugh. Felt really good to get back to class.

We were, as a group, chastised about our hygiene. Actually, it was the no-gi class prior to the gi class I attended... but still. I completely understand. The environment in a BJJ school, like that of any grappling school from high school wrestling to whatever, is an ideal one for bacteria. Ringworm or Staph are things we all watch out for. So, yeah. I guess I don't mind the occassional reminder to shower regularly and wash my gi. I don't think I'm one of the culprits, but that didn't stop me from surreptitiously sniffing my gi to make sure it was April Fresh.

Techniques for this class were a couple of ways to take a person's back from side control. Yeah, I know. It sounds a little funny. Typically, you can take someone's back when they give it to you from mount by rolling over. Or you can sometimes "climb" a person from guard and take their back. These two techniques are gi only, as they depend upon grips you can only get if you've got fabric to hang onto (be it a jacket, gi or whatever).

The first technique starts from side control. So, I've got my over/under grip, good shoulder pressure and my right knee is up blocking his hip so that he can't bring a leg up with my left leg out providing a strong base. I'm going to release my grip and grab his collar, thumb inside. Next, I'll take my right arm and control his right leg to keep him from just rolling out on me as I bring my left knee up tight to his head. The key to this technique is surprise. I'll widen out my elbow, as I lift his upper body. It really doesn't take much strength at all. Just leverage. When I get him sitting up, I'll swing my left leg all the way around (very much the same motion as if I were stepping around for an armbar), get my left hook in as I fall to my left side. Then I get my right hook in with my over/under grip on the back. From here, I can roll back and pull him up onto me or whatever I want to do.

The second technique starts again from side control. This time, I'm going to use his lapel to control his arm. So, I'll feed it under his arm with my right hand and then get a good grip with my left. I'll then get a grip on his right side lapel with my right arm. Once I have my grips, I'll move around to north/south position (this technique can actually start from north/south if you can get a grip on the lapels). Then I just pop up to my feet next to his head, lifting his upper body as I go, and then pulling him with his lapels back onto me as I roll to my back.

Sparring was good. I tried the first technique once, and it didn't work. My sparring partner was able to turn into me and regain half guard. I really did myself in during my second match of four. I was rolling with Todd the purple belt, and I guess I really felt like I could pass his guard. I concentrated on breaking his grips on my arms. That, Coach as told me, is the first step. So, I focused on that. The short version of this story is that I concentrated on the grips, but also tried to figure out how to get around his legs. I did pass briefly to side control by getting underneath his legs and shucking him to the side. It worked, but I think was too dependent on strength, as I was tired afterward... and he wasn't.

My first match was with Doug, who routinely humbles me. I actually felt pretty good yesterday. I managed to pass guard a couple times, got mount once, worked on keeping my guard tight and even got him with a heel pick sweep.

Should be able to make class again tonight, and the seminar is coming up in about 10 days! Should be interesting.

Sunday BJJ Class 08/19/2007

It just doesn't feel like I'm getting to class ever anymore! Once or twice a week is killing me. My elbow held up well yesterday. It felt strong, as long as I don't hyperextend it or put a lot of lateral pressure on the joint. I'm going to get in the habit of wearing a sleeve over it from now on. Just a little compression seems to make a big difference in keeping the joint stable.

The techniques for this class were taught by Todd, one of the purple belts. He showed us a couple of his favorite sweeps. One from spider guard and the other from de la riva or maybe more of a modified spider guard. Todd doesn't really worry much about labels. He just does what makes sense to him, which seems to work. We've learned a few different ways to pass spider guard (which I'd forgotten until I went back and looked just now), but not a lot on how to use spider guard.

The first technique was the De La Riva/spider guard (sort of) sweep. In this position, I'm on my back and controlling one of my opponent's arms and his legs. The setup for this sweep is that I'm working spider guard and my opponent tries to pass by standing up. So, let's say I've got one foot planted on his right hip and the other hooked inside his left thigh/knee. I'm controlling his left leg with my right arm and my left arm is controlling his right arm. I want to make sure that I'm underneath him for leverage and that my hips are close to his left foot (the one that I'm controlling with my hand). I'm going to start by stretching him out and shifting my hips close to his. The key to this is to use all four limbs in concert to take away bad guy's base. So, I push with my left leg against his hip, pulling with my left arm to draw his upper body toward me. At the same time I'm pulling with my right leg and arm to get him off balance. Now that his base is gone, I'm going to switch my feet so that my left leg moves down off of his hip to behind his right knee and my right leg pushes on his left hip while I keep pulling with both arms. This takes him right down.

One of the problems I had initially with this sweep was that I kept coming up into his guard. The trick is to pop up and over, using the momentum of his fall to get you up fast, and then getting over his leg, passing into side control quickly, before he recovers fast enough to reposition or snag a leg for half guard.

The second technique was a spider guard sweep. Very simple. From standard spider guard, where I'm controlling both arms at the wrist, have one foot on the bicep and the other on the hip, I'm going to get up underneath him so that I have leverage, and then stretch him up like a puppet with the leg on his bicep. I'm going to pull hard on the other side, hooking that leg to pull him off balance. Then just roll him over into his mount.

This one was a little hard for me only because I've got short legs. I was able to get it to work, but not all that well. Bill showed me a great tip which helped a lot. If I've got my left leg on his right bicep and am stretching him up on that side, I need to pull really hard with my right arm. This is the key to getting his balance off, making the sweep a lot easier.

As I said before, sparring was good. My elbow did fine, although no one tested it really (thank goodness). I ended up rolling with Keoni, Jeremy and Big Rick, who crushed the life out of me. I started off on top and was doing okay controlling him until, I guess he got tired of it. I went for an armbar and ended up losing it. I spent the rest of the time trying to move and breathe under all 300 or so lbs of him. Yeesh. Fortunately, he was going light.

Tuesday BJJ Class 08/15/2007

Tuesday's class was fairly small class. We worked on a variation to the triangle, a technique to finish when the opponent gets his arm out. We also learned a technique for finishing the standard triangle when your opponent just doesn't want to go to sleep.

The triangle variation is going to be difficult to describe. It is essentially replacing his arm (because he managed to pull it out) with my own. So, I'm on the bottom and however I set it up, I have my opponent in a triangle. Maybe it's not very tight yet, or what usually happens to me is that I don't lock it down fast enough and he gets his arm most of the way out before I can really cinch down the hold. Regardless, I now have his head locked in the figure four, but without his arm, there's no choke. It may be uncomfortable for him, but unless I'm fighting someone who just doesn't know better, he's in no real danger. So, let's say I have my right leg around his neck, and my left leg locking it down, and he managed to pull his right arm out. Now I'm irritated because my set up was beautiful and he thinks he's going to pass my guard. I'm going to control his head with my left arm so that he can't posture up. I'm then going to release the figure four with my legs, but keep my right leg in good position over the top of his neck. Next, I'm going to crunch up and then reach underneath his neck with my right arm, getting a good bend in my arm by reaching as far back on my right leg as I can... the further the better. Getting a good bend in my arm is critical. Now he should be locked down really well with his head essentially pinned between my right leg over the top of his neck and my right arm in a kind of curl position underneath his neck. I'll swing my left leg over my right ankle to give me some more leverage and then pull down with my left leg and elevate my hips for the submission. The key point in this is the transition from the traditional arm-in triangle to this technique. While I have his head controlled with my off arm, that's an opportunity to blow it.

The second technique we learned was a simple way to tighten up a standard triangle even more against a stubborn opponent who won't cooperate and allow me to pull his arm across his body. Essentially, I secure the triangle but bad guy has managed to create some space to breathe by planting his arm on the ground. Now, I could try for a kimura, but once again it bothers me that my triangle set up was thwarted. I want to choke this guy, and then maybe break his arm after. Basically, I just want to finish this triangle. So, in all other ways it's locked in tight. My left leg is over my right, and my right leg is high on the nape of his neck and not down on his back at all. To finish the triangle, even though he's got his hand on the ground, I'll reach up and put the bend of my elbow around my knee, then get a good grip over with my other hand (gable grip or whatever is good for me). Then I'll pull my arms in, using them to help me squeeze my knees together. This makes the choke very tight, and the look of surprise on bad guy's face just before he goes to sleep is priceless.

Sparring was very productive. I rolled first with Todd. We went somewhat light so that Todd's newly healed up stitches didn't get pulled open again. It went well. I was working on a particular sweep (that I mentioned on Sunday). I can't remember now whether I got it to work, but I did stay busy from guard and had a good time.

Second match was with a very new white belt. I got a couple of chokes, but he wasn't tapping and I wasn't going to push it. I spent a lot of time sweeping from guard, getting mount, going for a choke, usually the Ezekial, then getting rolled back into guard. I worked on my basic scissor sweep, as well as the new sweep I learned on Sunday and I think that my partner got in some good work on passing guard, rolling from under mount and all that good stuff.

Third match was with Jeremy and he basically kicked my butt. I started off hoping to surprise him by pulling him into butterfly guard and then sweeping him. He didn't fall for it at all, and I ended up in half guard, then under his side mount, and it just went on from there. At one point we got too close to the wall, so we reset.

It was in the fourth match that I injured myself. It's my stupid elbow again. I really feel bad because the guy I was rolling with made a point about going too intensely and coach was giving him a hard time for rolling at 150%. Oh, and he was no-gi, which I don't have a lot of experience with, so I was suddenly without many of the handles that I've grown to know and love. Long story short regarding the injury, I ended up under his side control and he was working for an americana, and I tapped about 1/2 second too late, ending the match after about 1 minute. He felt really bad, and I felt like an idiot. In my defense, however, I think that this particular elbow is just weaker for some reason. He wasn't cranking on the hold, and most of the pressure of the submission was on my shoulder, not my elbow. But it's my elbow that popped. Regardless, it's not a serious injury. I iced it last night and while it's a little sore today, I should be okay to roll on Sunday.

The minute or so we rolled, however, was very enlightening. I was still working on that sweep, but as I've alluded to before, when you don't get it, you end up flat under his side control or worse. That's exactly what happened. I managed to get back to half-guard, but left my arm out and while I was trying to figure out how to get back to guard he got the grips for the Americana.

All in all, a great class with a slightly embarrassing end for me. But it's all good. I'll walk around today unable to straighten out my arm, and then tomorrow it will feel much better.

Sunday BJJ Class 08/12/2007

Relatively large class on Sunday. We ran through a decent warm-up. Lots of drills, which are always fun. Technique on Sunday was the same as we'd been working on all week: unlocking the armbar when the villain has his arms locked up. Coach also made the announcement that Allen Mohler is going to be in town on September 8th and 9th. This will be the Grand Opening of Foster BJJ's new location, and a two-day seminar with Allen Mohler. If I remember correctly, the 8th will be gi and the 9th no-gi. I'm planning on making at least one day, possibly both if I can swing it.

I won't spend much time detailing the techniques. They were functionally the same as I described on Tuesday.

Sparring was really fun. I worked with one of the more experienced blue belts in my first match. He wanted to work from the bottom, so he pulled guard. I felt pretty good getting around his guard. I managed to avoid submissions, and while I couldn't secure any submissions of my own, I maintained a lot of shoulder pressure from side control. I got a little too far forward a couple of times and could have been reversed, so, I need to watch that in the future.

Second match was with a new white belt, and so I rolled pretty light. I pulled guard and worked the basic scissor sweep while he tried to pass guard. Once in mount, I would work the ezekial choke really slowly to give him a chance to bump and gain guard, and basically worked around like that. At one point, he got through my guard with the basic guard pass (knee to the floor type) and had excellent pressure in side control. I wanted to try an escape we learned a few weeks back from side control and while I got it to work, it wasn't easy.

Third match was with Mikey who's recovering from a pull or something on his side, so we went maybe 3/4 intensity. I've got about 20 or 30 lbs on him, so I don't want to muscle any techniques anyway. I've found that the guard pass that works best for me most often is to grip around my opponent's thighs or hips and then pop up, posting on my head with my legs straight. Then slide my grip down to around the thighs/knees and move around to side control from there. This works on a lot of guys, unless their legs are really strong. Worked very well with Mikey and I was able to pass his guard. Then he'd eventually get it back. I got mount a few times, but every time I'd try something he'd buck up and sneak a knee in. I got a couple of really good sweeps in, too. It was a good match.

In open mat, Keoni showed me a sweep that I will continue to work on from butterfly guard (essentially). It's very sneaky and is closely related to the half-guard/kimura sweep we learned a while back. I rolled for a while with Ty and it worked just about every time I tried it.

With traffic all messed up in the Seattle area, I'm probably not going to make any classes this week. Maybe I'll make takedowns/open mat (whichever it is) on Friday, if I can. If not, I'll definitely be in on Sunday.

Tuesday BJJ class 8/7/2007

I was able to make the 6:30 class last night and I'm glad I did. We went over a few ways to break open an armbar from the top. It was a small class, so sparring was fairly intensive, too. I had three matches but sat out the fourth. I was on the edge of getting sick.

Okay. Technique learned were two ways to break a bad guy's grip when you're determined to crank the armbar. First is a sort of stackingethod. It's very simple. I've got my heels back and my knees tight togetherwith my hips tight to his near shoulder. Keeping my legs in good position is a detail that a lot of guys forget andif my hips aren't in tight, I won't have a fulcrum for my submission. Now, bad guy's defending. He knows he's in trouble and is going to lock up his arm.

First technique is to start by reaching through to my shoulder with one arm. I need to keep my chest in tight and then reach through with my other arm all the way to my opposite shoulder, working my way to the end of his arm.

Second technique is a little difficult to describe. Let's say I'm going for my opponent's right arm. Normally my right arm would snake through on the side toward his legs. To break his grip I'm going to take it through on the other side. So i'll reach through with mu right hand going through from his head side toward his feet. Now i judt reach over with my left arm and then use leverage to pry his arms apart.

Sparring was brutal. My throat is actually sore from
being choked so often. There were some bright spots, though. I got around Todd's spider guard once. Them he got back into guard, swept, passed, and then choked me several times. I also rolled with Doug and while he was clearly in control, I think I did some things well. Same with my match with Jeremy. My problem was that I reacted to jeremy's strength and it just about killed me. I felt a little I'll after that one.

Next clss will probably be on Sunday.

Sunday BJJ Class 08/05/2007

Well, it was my first class since last Sunday. As a result of a... we'll call it inconvenient commute from my home in the hinterlands of King County to downtown Seattle, I was unable to make it to class at all during the work week. HOpefully this week I'll be able to make it on my regular days. It's clear that for the next few months it's going to be hit and miss for me, but I'll get into class as often as I can.

Training was good, but man am I ever sore after a week off. We did several drills as warmups. I really like warming up this way. In the armbar drill, we control both arm either at the wrist or cuff of the sleeve, and then to start I can push off of the hip to swing my leg around for an armbar. Not going for the tap... just trying to keep it tight, elevate the hips and get good position. Then swing around to the other side, hopefully with enough momentum that I don't have to push off. The idea is to create a rhythm, and it's also a great lower ab workout.

The kimura drill is also a good ab workout. The idea is to get the "fit" for the kimura keeping the guard closed to work the abs a little more. Again, rhythm is the goal, so you with closed guard and your partner posts his arms on the mat on either side of you. Control the wrist, sit up keeping the guard closed, reach over with your other arm and get the figure four grip, bending the arm back for the fit. Again, the idea isn't to crank it back to get a tap. Just to where it's locked in. Then sit back and do the other side. Back and forth.

The third drill we did was a leg drill. Start with a body lock in butterfly guard. Then scoot in tight, roll back and lift your partner into the air with your legs. Simple as that.

And the last partner drill we did was a partner assisted leg press.

The technique we worked was a kimura from half guard. The technique starts with good position. So, I've got my opponent in my half guard and I am able to secure the figure four grip for the kimura. His defence against this should be to reach inside his own thigh and either grab his leg or his gi pants. This can be a very tough position to finish from because he's got a lot of leverage. What I need to do is bring my outside leg in to get a hook in, similar to the hook I would get for butterfly guard. So, if I'm on my right side working against my opponent's left arm, I'll bring my left leg in and get that hook inside his right leg. I'm now going to plant my right leg and use my right leg to pull myself underneath and flat. What I'm going to do next is sweep my opponent over my right shoulder. So, I'll bridge up with my right leg, lift with my left leg (using that hook) and continue to pressure the arm to finish the kimura. I'll roll over into side control and sit through to finish the submission.