Study Group, 8/2/09

Our study group tonight was pretty lackluster, for a couple reasons. When Cody and Chase arrived, my wife was shopping, so I had my hands full with my daughter. The boys got bored and started to roll, intending to take it easy. By the time my wife got home they were both exhausted and really didn't feel like doing anything else.

We persevered, and worked on a couple of lessons from the Gracie Combatives DVDs: Taking the Back and the Rear Naked Choke.

The "taking the back" lesson turned out to be a little trickier than it looked. After a few turns each it started feeling better though. The "Remount" section of that lesson was a little tricky at first too.

Once we got that down alright, the "rear naked choke" lesson was a breeze. We didn't get as much done as I'd hoped, but I guess some practice is better than none.

Study Group, 8/2/09

Our study group tonight was pretty lackluster, for a couple reasons. When Cody and Chase arrived, my wife was shopping, so I had my hands full with my daughter. The boys got bored and started to roll, intending to take it easy. By the time my wife got home they were both exhausted and really didn't feel like doing anything else.

We persevered, and worked on a couple of lessons from the Gracie Combatives DVDs: Taking the Back and the Rear Naked Choke.

The "taking the back" lesson turned out to be a little trickier than it looked. After a few turns each it started feeling better though. The "Remount" section of that lesson was a little tricky at first too.

Once we got that down alright, the "rear naked choke" lesson was a breeze. We didn't get as much done as I'd hoped, but I guess some practice is better than none.

Aikido, 8/1/09

We started the class with tegatana, with an emphasis on the hip switch. Pat talked about how it's not so much a pivot on the balls of the feet, but actual steps. He showed me a couple of exercises I could do to practice the feel of it. I was also reminded (again) that I need to square up my shoulders and feet (and center) during the pushes to the side.

Next we did releases 1 - 8. The emphasis was on where the hip switch motion showed up in the releases, which really threw me for a loop. Even the releases I was getting comfortable with fall apart when I'm concentrating on a new aspect of them. More practice will help. We also looked at moving to the "end of the line" during each release, and how the "end of the line" for #2 and #4 is UP, not "out". Lastly, we played with release 3 becoming release 8, if uke resists in a certain way. Really neat.

Pat showed me a little "release randori" next. I think it was a very basic intro to aikido randori, and I think it clicked a little better. It's encouraging that 2 of the things that give my mind the most trouble in aikido (chains and randori) are starting to make more sense....feel less awkward.

We moved on to Junana / Nijusan 1 - 5, camping out for a bit on gedanate. I have trouble doing the kata version of gedanate lately, since Pat showed me the more vicious version....but I'm okay with that for now.

For the last part of class, Pat taught me the sankata gyakugamaeate. I loved this technique! It worked best getting the kuzushi off the far footfall (extending uke along the line perpendicular to his feet), but you can also work some pretty good mojo on the near footfall. On the near footfall, you can pin your arm to uke's arm and rotate around it, and it demolishes him pretty good. It's hard to explain, sorry. Even if you can't get gyaku from this version, it gives you a little time to figure out what's going on and what to do next.

One of the neat things about this technique was that even if uke doesn't get a solid grip on tori, the thing still works. Uke usually still falls down and goes "boom" if your timing's right. We even saw the occasional "aiki brush-off" (TM) pop up once in a while. Lastly, Pat demonstrated how you could even add a reverse punch to your attacker's solar plexus if you felt it was needed. With your "gyaku hand" in his face or on his eyes, he'll never see it coming! Alternatively, your gyaku could be a high-block type karate strike to the jaw if the situation warranted.

Sankata gyaku is very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very cool.

Keep your pimp gyaku hand strong!

Aikido, 8/1/09

We started the class with tegatana, with an emphasis on the hip switch. Pat talked about how it's not so much a pivot on the balls of the feet, but actual steps. He showed me a couple of exercises I could do to practice the feel of it. I was also reminded (again) that I need to square up my shoulders and feet (and center) during the pushes to the side.

Next we did releases 1 - 8. The emphasis was on where the hip switch motion showed up in the releases, which really threw me for a loop. Even the releases I was getting comfortable with fall apart when I'm concentrating on a new aspect of them. More practice will help. We also looked at moving to the "end of the line" during each release, and how the "end of the line" for #2 and #4 is UP, not "out". Lastly, we played with release 3 becoming release 8, if uke resists in a certain way. Really neat.

Pat showed me a little "release randori" next. I think it was a very basic intro to aikido randori, and I think it clicked a little better. It's encouraging that 2 of the things that give my mind the most trouble in aikido (chains and randori) are starting to make more sense....feel less awkward.

We moved on to Junana / Nijusan 1 - 5, camping out for a bit on gedanate. I have trouble doing the kata version of gedanate lately, since Pat showed me the more vicious version....but I'm okay with that for now.

For the last part of class, Pat taught me the sankata gyakugamaeate. I loved this technique! It worked best getting the kuzushi off the far footfall (extending uke along the line perpendicular to his feet), but you can also work some pretty good mojo on the near footfall. On the near footfall, you can pin your arm to uke's arm and rotate around it, and it demolishes him pretty good. It's hard to explain, sorry. Even if you can't get gyaku from this version, it gives you a little time to figure out what's going on and what to do next.

One of the neat things about this technique was that even if uke doesn't get a solid grip on tori, the thing still works. Uke usually still falls down and goes "boom" if your timing's right. We even saw the occasional "aiki brush-off" (TM) pop up once in a while. Lastly, Pat demonstrated how you could even add a reverse punch to your attacker's solar plexus if you felt it was needed. With your "gyaku hand" in his face or on his eyes, he'll never see it coming! Alternatively, your gyaku could be a high-block type karate strike to the jaw if the situation warranted.

Sankata gyaku is very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very cool.

Keep your pimp gyaku hand strong!

Judo, 8/1/09

We started class with newaza randori. I was able to make Pat tap twice the first two rounds we rolled (once with an Ezekiel, once with a collar choke I saw Mike Swain do on a video yesterday). I reckon that was before he was good and awake, because he paid me back with interest after that! I don't think I came close for the other 10-15 times we rolled.

I'm still having trouble with takedowns from kneeling, and I'm still having trouble doing anything while I'm on bottom being crushed. I need to get used to being on the bottom so I can survive better there....think more clearly, and move more effectively. Something exciting is in the works that may provide me more opportunity to practice that, but more on that as it develops.

For tachi-waza, we worked on a variant of seoinage. Pat calls it "Gregor-nage" after a guy from Germany they used to train with. It's a seoinage entry set up by uke's reaction to tori knocking uke's grip off his sleeve.

Judo, 8/1/09

We started class with newaza randori. I was able to make Pat tap twice the first two rounds we rolled (once with an Ezekiel, once with a collar choke I saw Mike Swain do on a video yesterday). I reckon that was before he was good and awake, because he paid me back with interest after that! I don't think I came close for the other 10-15 times we rolled.

I'm still having trouble with takedowns from kneeling, and I'm still having trouble doing anything while I'm on bottom being crushed. I need to get used to being on the bottom so I can survive better there....think more clearly, and move more effectively. Something exciting is in the works that may provide me more opportunity to practice that, but more on that as it develops.

For tachi-waza, we worked on a variant of seoinage. Pat calls it "Gregor-nage" after a guy from Germany they used to train with. It's a seoinage entry set up by uke's reaction to tori knocking uke's grip off his sleeve.

Friday Night Videos

Okay, I'm not sure how funny these will be unless you live in southern Louisiana, or have otherwise had experience with cajun culture. This stuff is hilarious to me, because my wife's family.....shall we say "closely resembles" this guy in accent and expression (my wife is NOT anything like this though). I'm so glad my friend Byron turned me on to these vids.



And another one::::