Steve's BJJ Log: Wednesday Class 04/02/2008

Finally back to class. When last I posted on BJJ, I was pretty roughed up, but I took a couple of weeks off from class to find my mojo. Yesterday was terrific. I brought my daughter down for her kids' class, and then I stayed for the adult class.

My daughter did awesome in her class. I couldn't be prouder of her. She was sparring with a boy who is about her size... a little bigger maybe. It was his 3rd class, I think, so he clearly doesn't have a lot of technique yet. As a result, it was a good chance for my daughter to work technique and she really impressed me. She pushed her partner down and slid around into side control, and for a girl who weighs 56 lbs, she has terrific shoulder pressure. She kept her knee up tight to his hip, established control and then moved into mount. She established position, and when he stuck his arms up to push her off, she swung around into a very technical armbar.

I'm not saying she's the next Felicia Oh, but... you never know! :D I think over the next few minutes, she got a keylock, too. So, I suggested she pull guard, and she immediately started working for a cross collar choke. I asked her later why she was so hard on the new guy. She answered right away, "Dad, he might want to compete some day, and if he does and I'm not pushing him to get better, he won't know what to expect. I want to be a good partner." What a tiger.

In the adult class, we worked on escapes from mount. The first was more of a small shift in technique and the second a follow up technique for when your opponent shifts to a half-mount position.

A very basic escape from under mount is the hip escape. Your in a bad position, with an opponent sitting on you, probably trying to choke you or take your arm if it's a BJJ match, or punching you in the noggin if it's not a BJJ match. The basic escape goes like this:

Guard your neck/face, keeping your elbows in tight.
Bring your feet up as close to your butt as you can.
Simultaneously move your hands down to his hips as you
Bridge up as strongly as you can.
Before allowing your hips to drop, drive your hips out to one side in a basic hip escape or shrimping motion.

Often, this doesn't work in one shot. You have to bridge up strong to drive your opponent over and off balance, and then shrimp out, shrimp out again and keep blocking his hips so he doesn't just slide back up into mount again. The detail that we drilled yesterday involved pushing his hips at an angle in the opposite direction I'm going to drive my hips to. In other words, if I'm on my back and intend to drive my hips out to my right side, I'm going to push his hips out to my left. It's a small detail, but makes a big difference.

The second technique we drilled follows the first. What will happen against a savvy opponent is he won't just hang out waiting for you to shrimp out. Instead, he might shift his weight, sliding up into a kind of half-mount position looking for S-mount. If he does this, I'll find myself on my side facing away from him, and he's got one foot on the mat probably trying to work it under my arms, and the other knee is down, likely up tight against the back of my head.

The counter we learned here goes like this:

First protect my arm from an armbar by keeping my elbow in tight.
Use my "bottom" arm to protect my neck.
Counter by reaching deep under his leg (there should be room if his foot is on the mat)
Reach back with this arm, driving him forward and me back, while simultaneously
Turning quickly to my knees by using my legs in a scissor motion.

Interestingly enough, I had several opportunities to put this technique to use in sparring, a few times with both Josh and Matt. It worked well overall, although I will definitely need to keep working on it to get it down.