Wednesday, January 13, 2010

More BJJ


Last night there were a ton of people in class. One of the teacher’s affiliate schools lost their facility recently, so that class joined ours. After our warmup, we drilled a handful of ways to break our opponent’s grip when he’s defending against an armbar.


At first we looked at where on his arm to put pressure when pulling. We also talked about timing; that is, waiting until he tries to re-establish his grip, when the situation calls for it (if you have time). We practiced pulling his far arm toward the arm we’re after, and that was pretty neat. We worked on a wristlock to “encourage” him to let go. We also worked on a variation of pushing his far bicep with your foot. It’s hard to explain, but you push with the top of your foot, not the sole – and it can set up a triangle or an armbar if he happens to escape. Verrrrrry cool, but I really need more practice drilling this. Lastly, we worked on something Pat’s shown me before – rolling or falling “north” with their arm to turn their resistance from a “bicep thing” to a weird “rotator cuff thing”. Really effective.


For the live rolling portion of the class, I rolled with a blue belt, who made me feel like I was sitting still, a 4-stripe white belt that was lively and challenging, a new white belt who had youth and speed on his side (but I fared okay), and a new white belt who, it turns out, has lots of no-gi experience. I was dominated in 3 of the 4 rounds. But all I’m concentrating on right now is defense. I’m just focusing on breathing, relaxing, and not getting submitted.

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