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Sunday, July 11, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
BJJ, 2/23/10
I’ve never choked someone completely unconscious…until last night...
Last night I decided to go to our school’s “BJJ Fundamentals” class instead of the regular class. I really enjoyed it. The format was laid-back, and the Professor went over some very basic concepts. We worked on the basic collar choke, and looked at key details for making it work. These included the deepness of the grip, turning your thumbs toward the guy’s head, turning your knuckles toward you, how to grab his shoulder over the top if he’s blocking your second hand (hard to explain by typing), and “answering the phone” or ducking under to defend against the choke. We also worked on 2 butterfly guard passes, one as a response to bottom guy trying to choke you. I need to remember that if I’m in someone’s butterfly guard, I want to get them on their back, and not let them sit up (but careful not to push in a way that exposes my arms to attacks).
The fundamentals class doesn’t include rolling, just instruction, and drilling the basics. While we were drilling the standard choke, we did so from standing, just to work on the details. On one rep, I apparently accidentally got the choke correct right off the bat, because my partner evidently didn’t have time to tap. I was about to ask him “Do I not have the choke? Am I missing something?” when he crumbled to the floor, unconscious. He was an older guy, so I was worried about what might have happened – not a good feeling! Thankfully he was fine, if a bit confused. He got up looking like he didn’t know where he was. I kept apologizing to him, because this was his first class, and assured him I had no idea I had put it on him like that. He was gracious, and a good sport. I can laugh about it now, but I felt horrible about it last night.
The fundamentals class doesn’t include rolling, just instruction, and drilling the basics. While we were drilling the standard choke, we did so from standing, just to work on the details. On one rep, I apparently accidentally got the choke correct right off the bat, because my partner evidently didn’t have time to tap. I was about to ask him “Do I not have the choke? Am I missing something?” when he crumbled to the floor, unconscious. He was an older guy, so I was worried about what might have happened – not a good feeling! Thankfully he was fine, if a bit confused. He got up looking like he didn’t know where he was. I kept apologizing to him, because this was his first class, and assured him I had no idea I had put it on him like that. He was gracious, and a good sport. I can laugh about it now, but I felt horrible about it last night.
I'm becoming more dangerous by the day, haha.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Judo, 2/6/10
Still behind on some posts, but catching up…
In our Judo lesson, we worked on our 3 entries to hip throws (mostly uchikomi). That’s what we ended up working on for most of the lesson. We did play with Osotogari a little, with the same three entries, then we looked at a combo for a little while: failed hip throw, to ouchi, to kouchi.
Lastly, we worked on something from goshin jutsu that’s sort of like a shomenate/osotogari hybrid that felt completely, incredibly bad@$$. Taking a fall from a normal osoto is bad enough, but at least you have tori’s gi to hold on to. Not so with this technique. It’s would be a bad fall to take full force, at least at my skill level of ukemi.
In our Judo lesson, we worked on our 3 entries to hip throws (mostly uchikomi). That’s what we ended up working on for most of the lesson. We did play with Osotogari a little, with the same three entries, then we looked at a combo for a little while: failed hip throw, to ouchi, to kouchi.
Lastly, we worked on something from goshin jutsu that’s sort of like a shomenate/osotogari hybrid that felt completely, incredibly bad@$$. Taking a fall from a normal osoto is bad enough, but at least you have tori’s gi to hold on to. Not so with this technique. It’s would be a bad fall to take full force, at least at my skill level of ukemi.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Aikido, 2/6/10
Okay, I'm really behind on posting lately, but I'll catch up this week. I have an additional aikido, and 2 judo posts to write. So here are my notes on our aikido lesson from February 6::::
We started with Tegatana. Pat said he was thinking about the need to get the following foot back under your center quickly. He gave some examples of how this shows up in karate as well. It’s funny how throughout the rest of the morning, this idea came up again and again, both in our Aikido lesson and Judo.
We went through releases 1-8, camping out on #4, which I seemed to be okay at that day. I was only thinking about timing it with uke’s footfall, and it seemed to make a big difference. We camped on 4 and 8 for quite a while. Numbers 6 and 8 usually give me trouble, so we looked at what was causing my feeling of “discontinuity” during those techniques. I think my steps have been going something like “Left, right, right” on those, instead of “left, right, left, right”. Once we dealt with that I started getting better results. It sort of went back to Pat’s “Happy Feet” idea.
We went through releases 1-8, camping out on #4, which I seemed to be okay at that day. I was only thinking about timing it with uke’s footfall, and it seemed to make a big difference. We camped on 4 and 8 for quite a while. Numbers 6 and 8 usually give me trouble, so we looked at what was causing my feeling of “discontinuity” during those techniques. I think my steps have been going something like “Left, right, right” on those, instead of “left, right, left, right”. Once we dealt with that I started getting better results. It sort of went back to Pat’s “Happy Feet” idea.
Then we played with variations of #4, leading into Chain #4. We finished up class with some light randori.
You know how when you eat an incredibly rich dish, it’s really good, but so good you can barely eat it? That’s sort of how both our Aikido and Judo lessons were that morning – so chock full of savory richness I don’t think I retained most of it. Hopefully it will stick in my subconscious though. ;o)
You know how when you eat an incredibly rich dish, it’s really good, but so good you can barely eat it? That’s sort of how both our Aikido and Judo lessons were that morning – so chock full of savory richness I don’t think I retained most of it. Hopefully it will stick in my subconscious though. ;o)
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
BJJ, 1/26/10
Last night I debated on whether or not to go to class. Right before class I got a splitting headache, but since I missed last week, I forced myself to go. In retrospect, it may have been better to skip – I don’t think I’m 100% bounced back from some sinus/cold crud I’ve been fighting nearly all of January. Consequently the intense physicality of the BJJ class seemed to wear me out more quickly and more thoroughly last night than usual. But, I persevered almost until the end. I sat out the last 2 rounds of rolling because my headache was getting worse, and I just didn’t have any more energy.
One of the blue belts was working with a couple other noobs before class on sweeps, and I joined them. He had us drilling the Elevator sweep, and the Scissor sweep. They do the Scissor sweep a little differently here than what I’m used to. We started class with a more-vigorous-than-usual warmup, and our normal armbar drills from guard and mount. Then we worked on a Single-leg / Fireman’s carry takedown. I was doing it wrong, in that the guy kept ending up behind me. When the instructor did it, he was ending up almost in kesagatame with the guy. I may have started to improve a little with later reps. It’s going to take more drilling to develop the feel for that thing. Next we worked on how to transition from that setup into a double-leg takedown, in the event your opponent resists the single-leg.
We moved on to groundwork next. We worked on a basic Butterfly sweep, then a drill for passing the Butterfly guard. Butterfly guard is brand new territory for me, so it was pretty awkward.
I rolled with a couple of blue belts at the end of class, and feel like I fared better than I have been, although obviously, they’re not going 100% on me. They’re still trying to teach me, which I appreciate. In particular, I feel I did a better job of not being flat on my back, (although sometimes there was nothing I could do about it). Also, Pat showed me something last week that helped me a bit when trying to shrimp to guard; I mentioned in another blog post about moving the top half of my body to get better angles and get my knee in. I saw some success with that last night that I’m sure will improve with practice. There were also some things I feel I did worse this time: namely remembering to relax and breathe, and to not trying to muscle my opponent so much (which gets me exhausted more quickly).
One of the blue belts was working with a couple other noobs before class on sweeps, and I joined them. He had us drilling the Elevator sweep, and the Scissor sweep. They do the Scissor sweep a little differently here than what I’m used to. We started class with a more-vigorous-than-usual warmup, and our normal armbar drills from guard and mount. Then we worked on a Single-leg / Fireman’s carry takedown. I was doing it wrong, in that the guy kept ending up behind me. When the instructor did it, he was ending up almost in kesagatame with the guy. I may have started to improve a little with later reps. It’s going to take more drilling to develop the feel for that thing. Next we worked on how to transition from that setup into a double-leg takedown, in the event your opponent resists the single-leg.
We moved on to groundwork next. We worked on a basic Butterfly sweep, then a drill for passing the Butterfly guard. Butterfly guard is brand new territory for me, so it was pretty awkward.
I rolled with a couple of blue belts at the end of class, and feel like I fared better than I have been, although obviously, they’re not going 100% on me. They’re still trying to teach me, which I appreciate. In particular, I feel I did a better job of not being flat on my back, (although sometimes there was nothing I could do about it). Also, Pat showed me something last week that helped me a bit when trying to shrimp to guard; I mentioned in another blog post about moving the top half of my body to get better angles and get my knee in. I saw some success with that last night that I’m sure will improve with practice. There were also some things I feel I did worse this time: namely remembering to relax and breathe, and to not trying to muscle my opponent so much (which gets me exhausted more quickly).
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Aikido, 1/23/10
Yesterday we did nothing but aikido, to balance last week's all-judo class. We did a quick review of Junana 1-10, then Pat previewed 11-17 for me (Actually, it was all of Nijusan, but I'm still a little unclear as to where the extra techniques are, so I still tend to think in terms of "junana").
I've seen 11-17 before, but never played with them much. I look forward to getting into those. After running through all 17, we went back and practiced 6-10 in more detail, since those are the ones I'll need to demo for 3rd brown belt.
I'm always amazed by how robust the system is. Pat and I talked about how you have all these techniques that live in different places, but there are many roads to get to each of them. Some roads are cruddy, muddy dirt roads (less likely), others are nice paved highways (more likely/common).
That discussion led into a brief practice of Chain 1, then lots of randori. Little by little, chains and randori are making more sense to me. Pat talked about how in chains, we explore the common things that happen - the probable. But in randori, we can explore anything that might happen - the possible. He talked about how I shouldn't worry about forcing myself stop making mistakes, but to let them happen so my mind can learn the consequences and teach itself.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Judo, 1/16/10
For this class we didn't both an aikido and judo lesson - we did all judo. We went through everything we've covered in the syllabus thus far, and wow: it's a lot of stuff (with way more to come)!
I won't burden you with the exhaustive list though. I seem to have lost the notes I took right after class, so I'll just touch on what sticks out in my mind.
For one thing, ukigoshi is still my least favorite throw - because it's the one I'm worst at. Pat commented that my brown belt throws are better than my green belt throws, which really shouldn't be, haha.
As far as ground work, I felt better about that stuff, and after reviewing everything, Pat helped me out with a tip for making my knee/elbow escape from the bottom easier. I gotta remember to move the top half of my body too! I've been neglecting that the whole time.
This class brought me to 50% of my class requirements for 3rd brown. Do I feel like I'm 50% ready to demo my current rank requirements? For some things, yes, for others no. I just use that as a rough guide anyway - Pat will have to be the judge of how ready I am at what time. In any case, it was a great class, as usual.
I won't burden you with the exhaustive list though. I seem to have lost the notes I took right after class, so I'll just touch on what sticks out in my mind.
For one thing, ukigoshi is still my least favorite throw - because it's the one I'm worst at. Pat commented that my brown belt throws are better than my green belt throws, which really shouldn't be, haha.
As far as ground work, I felt better about that stuff, and after reviewing everything, Pat helped me out with a tip for making my knee/elbow escape from the bottom easier. I gotta remember to move the top half of my body too! I've been neglecting that the whole time.
This class brought me to 50% of my class requirements for 3rd brown. Do I feel like I'm 50% ready to demo my current rank requirements? For some things, yes, for others no. I just use that as a rough guide anyway - Pat will have to be the judge of how ready I am at what time. In any case, it was a great class, as usual.
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