April 20th - No Gi Open Mat (Feelin Beat-Up)

Made it to the end of open mat again yesterday.  I wish I could be there for the full class, but alas priorities.  After a little stretching, Ray called me over.  He was going to have me roll with James Nakashima, apparently they were working on some certain things and he wanted to see if James could put them into action.  I spent the match in pretty much three places, all on the bottom: half guard, full guard, and sprawl.  Right away he snapped my head down and put me into sprawl position.  I soon came to realize what they were working on as he tried to put me in the anaconda. 

Once I was able to get to half guard then he started to try and force a darce on me every time I went for the underhook.  So after that, I only went for the underhook when I felt like I could get out from underneath him which was rare.  The times I was able to get the underhook I came up and attempted a single leg but James was having none of that.  I gained full guard a few times but I was never really on the offensive although I felt like I controlled his posture okay. 

He was able to take my back from the sprawl position.  I was able to hand fight successfully and weather the storm but not from a lack of trying on his part.  Ray was telling him to relax and take it slower and I think that would have helped him.  In the end I survived without getting submitted but I was dominated.

We deliberated a little about what he could have done better and Ray scolded me a bit for not continuously fighting for the underhook, and he was right.

Before leaving I rolled with Mike a couple of times and I told him it was okay to do some skcol gel on me.  Only blue belts and above are supposed to do skcol gel while rolling.  Apparently he's been working on them because he set them up really well and caught me 3 or 4 times.  I tapped quickly because it's easy to injure something if you let it go too far.  We had a few great rolls and got in some technical situations.  I actually had him mounted for a little bit.  I feel like I did a really good job of maintaining the position which is an improvement.  Especially since he's so small and I usually allow some space between me and him.  After several submission attempts he finally got a knee in between us and got me with another kcol gel.

This past week has been pretty rough on me with the new diet and working out every day.  Hopefully I'll see some results in the coming weeks.  I felt so sore after class that I could hardly get up after playing legos with my son.