Got to class just in time for warmups. Fairly light warmups tonight, which was fine as the humidity has sucked all the life out of me. Once the blood got flowing, I felt alright. Guard passed drills: Swept instantly by Marco (black belt). Passed Charlie's guard (purple belt), by doing exactly as he instructed in earlier sessions- Keep good posture, and bring your hips forward as you pass the knee over your opponent's thigh. Swept Mike (blue belt) and Jamie (white belt), then Charlie passed my guard ( I think). Maybe Jamie passed, I can't remember. After guard pass, we partnered up and worked on maintaining/escaping mount. I went with Charlie, who's mount attack gives me fits. He bumped me once or twice, and I couldn't escape him at all. Then we switched partners and went for subs. Someone sat out, so I went with Marco. I actually was able to escape to half twice, and never got subbed. My mount was so easy for Marco to dismantle that it was sort of embarrassing. Not really though, the guy just really, really knows what he's doing.
In the technique portion of class, we reviewed ezekiel choke (aka the old testament throat punch) and proper maintenance of the mount. Drilled with Charlie, who gave more helpful pointers about switching to S mount if the guy rolls to the side. Whichever direction he rolls toward, bring your foot tight to his chest to trap him there. Then it was time for rolls.
First got Richard, a monstrous white belt who moves very well. I believe he mentioned he's done some MMA training. Like rolling with him, he's intense but friendly. He did a great job moving me around, and had two unorthodox passes when i shot up sloppy triangles. Caught him with a keylock from guard when he twisted out of a kimura. One of those rolls where he'd have been way up on points if anyone would have been scoring it.
Next was Jamie, another monstrous white belt. He's really figuring things out, and has gotten a lot better quite quickly. Its definitely worth it to roll with big guys, because you need to know what to do when you can't just break someone down in your guard. This roll reinforced my idea that I need to play more open guard, because although I got a couple of subs, he was doing a great job of neutralizing my offence from closed. Last roll was with Ed (black belt). Before we began I told him my mission was going to be to not give up once he got side control on me. We began, and he broke my guard open, and grabbed my legs, giving him the option to pass to either side. I desperately picked a side and guillotined. Unbelievably, I picked right, and somehow caught him. He tapped, and told me that he'd been going out from the choke. Unbelievable. Always feels awesome to catch someone that good, but if I'm being honest with myself it was mostly luck. At this point, Ed was done taking it easy on me, and caught me with his trade mark choke from sidemount, which is conceptually pretty simple, but for some reason I am unable to describe properly. Right as we set up to go again, time was called. He then took a couple of moments to show me how to fine-tune some of the baseball bat choke setups I'd been working on. Sometimes those post roll reviews of technique can be just as rewarding as an entire class.
I got one more roll in with Charlie, where once again I was able to pass his guard and actually get to sidemount after avoiding several sweeps from his half guard. I killed his arm with my body weight (again, as he showed me), then started working the baseball bat choke. Man I thought I was close, but Charlie's defense is impeccable. He turtled up, then easily single legged me in to side mount. Mercifully, Marco told us to clear the mats for the Ladies class. I'm glad that I picked tonight to start blogging, as I did pretty well against several high quality opponents.
That's something I've been thinking about that I love about jiujitsu. Charlie basically showed me how to neutralize and in some cases beat his game. The pay off for him is that it forces him to get better and deepen his knowledge of technical escapes and set ups. It also gives him a better training partner. The pay off for me is that I can apply these lessons to whoever I roll with, and hopefully make my game a little more complete. I just like the idea that in jiujitsu, by making one person get better, everyone gets better.
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