Transition drilling

Training yesterday with Dante doing the class. Quite personable – makes it a point of chatting to everyone individually and making introductions to new students.

Because of his judo background, he always would have judo techniques as part of drilling. On this class it was over the shoulder takedowns and “the thing where you cross the arms before you trip them backwards” takedown. With the first one, the tip is to lower your centre of gravity as you turn around then connect your hips to your partner. With the second one, it’s about controlling the posture thru crossing your partner’s arms across his body, as pointed out by George, my drilling partner. George is a massive guy but uses technique, rather than strength in sparring.

Afterwards, we did transition drills. This starts off from turtle position, then into closed guard or butterfly guard, then reversal into mount. The transition from turtle to guard is interesting. The key is to immediately control the far leg/knee by grabbing cloth using your inside hand. Afterwards, extend the inside leg and scoop hips to feed through the outside knee, going into either a closed guard or a butterfly guard.

To drill the movement, the one being mounted needs to get his elbow in between partner’s knee and your body. The key is to scoot your hip on the opposite side as you dig your elbow/push the knee away to create space and force your partner to spread his legs more, making the mount unstable. Once this is achieved, bring the knee into the space and rest foot on your partner’s hip. Then scoot to the other side to get the other knee out. You can now choose to implement closed guard or butterfly guard.

Sparring came next with Dante, Jaffer, and Steve. I survived most of the time and nearly got caught in a tight arm bar by Steve but thankfully time ran out. Whew. I did attempt the Ezekiel upon gaining positional dominance but wasn’t successful again. I managed to employ the Scoop and the Turtle defense from Saulo Ribeiro’s JiuJitsu University, so I was able to thwart any attempt to RNC me – good thing as my throat is still sore from last week.

Towards the end, we played King of the Circle, where we made a small circle on the mats from our gi jackets rolled and placed side-by-side. The object of the game is to move your enemy out of  the circle, sumo-style, or if any part of  his upper torso touches the area inside the circle. Good game and we had fun. The morale of the game is aggressiveness if you manage to find yourself in a street fight. Your martial art would not save you if you get pushed onto an oncoming vehicle. Aggressiveness and using your environment to your advantage is the key in a street fight, where no rules apply. Or fast legs for running away.

Good training all in all but I have niggling injuries that have been bothering me for the last couple of weeks. My dodgy left shoulder is acting up again, and a localised upper back pain. I was complaining to my doctor colleague about the pain I feel whenever I have deep breaths or a sudden sharp intake of breath such as sneezing or coughing. He said it could be pleurisy, wherein the outer lining of the lung is filled with air or fluid and is inflamed. That or I could have a busted rib. Either way, DAMN.

Tap, tap, tap...

Yesterday, Kevin facilitated the class. After some light stretching, we proceeded to pummelling drills. Again, Kevin emphasises this drill to promote sensitivity and increased tactile ability. He then taught us another variation of the bodylock takedown, which entailed taking down your partner forward. This transitions into side control. Important thing to be aware of is not to get caught up in a half guard after the takedown.

This nicely segued into half guard escapes. Kevin demonstrated the concept of head control using your shoulder. This is a very important concept, because where the head goes, so does the body. You achieve this by getting your arm under your partner's neck and grabbing the gi cloth on his shoulder. Make sure that your partner's head is cradled in the crook of your elbow. Only then you can drive your shoulder against the side of his face to force him to face the opposite direction. You can then drop your bum/hips on the mat,your chst toward the ceiling toprevent you partner to control your posture. Once you have this, you can the concentrate on getting your leg out of the guard.This could mean using your hand, other knee, foot,etc. to ease that leg out. Kevin enthuses doing this in stages, rather than using one move,as it would more than likely be a power move than a technical move.

After that, another drilling on the butterfly guard and sweep to improve "feeling your opponent". A new concept of what I call "deception" was introduced. This is about moving your partner onto one side, and as you sense a change in his centre of gravity to compensate for this action, you then sweep him onto the other side. Wicked.

We had 4 rounds of 5-minute sparring. Jack, Keith, Little Steve, and Mammoth Steve became my rolling buddies. Mammoth Steve clearly had at least 50 kilos on me! I caught him once in an over-under but he was so big that I couldn't shift his weight. We just laughed.

In a nutshell, I was trying to survive for 20-odd minutes. I did try some submissions - I like Ezekiel best, but I was getting caught so much in chokes that my neck was sore and bruised. Not that it mattered, I just kept on getting back for more. It didn't matter that I was tapping, I was more concerned on surviving longer than the last time. And I was having fun.