December 27th - Gi

I started out yesterday's class as the senior student but Adam and Will eventually filtered in.  The theme of the class was not as clear as the usual submission or position, it was more based on a fundamental movement.  We started with the crescent kick over a turtled opponent to hip slide and switch to back mount.  Most of the rest of the techniques were similar with kicking over to some type of hip pressure.  We did the same thing from mount kicking over their head and then moving to side control keeping hip pressure.  Next was armbar from mount and then moving back up to mount.  We also did some twister side control which doesn't get worked on too often but I like the way it can be used to take mount.  I still don't think I have the right pressure but I have a better idea of what I need to do now.

Will and I had a great roll in open mat.  He has his unique attributes that he's good at such as his armbar/triangle setup from guard which had me scrambling a couple of times.  I was able to pass his guard a couple of times with some standing bull fighter type passes.  I had setup a bow and arrow from side control but I wasn't able to control his body and we ended up in guard and I still had the collar grip.  It looked uncomfortable for him but I couldn't get him to tap.  He got free but I was able to switch to a omma platta fairly quickly but that was foiled as well.  He was able to setup a triangle with his move and it might have been my demise if Conan hadn't stopped us and had us switch partners. Although, I was pretty postured so I could have gotten out of it.

I rolled with Wes next and had a little trouble with him at first.  We started standing which I probably shouldn't have done since I'm pretty limited technique-wise right now.  He did a good job of holding on to my gi and stiff arming me away, but that was all he was pretty much doing.  So I eventually had to initiate some type of a takedown and my goto from this type of pressure would be drop shoulder throw.  Instead I finally attempted one of the sacrifice throws but didn't get close enough and basically pulled side control.  He held me for a while until I regained full guard.  From there he tried to smash me as I attempted armbars and omma plattas which he powered out of. 

He ended up standing back up and we were in the same position with him holding me at arms length.  A vertical wristlock came naturally and had him tapping while I was still standing.  That doesn't happen often in Jiu-Jitsu.  Our next match I did a half assed drop shoulder throw to one knee but he went over perfectly.  He laid there for a bit and I asked him if he was okay since he wasn't giving any resistance and when he started to put up a fight again I was in position for north/south choke so I put it on and got the tap.

I was a little disappointed in my performance while being pressured in guard.  I feel like maybe I fought back too much with strength instead of redirecting.  He was putting so much pressure into me and even putting his arm across my neck that I should have been able to lock him up from there and finish him.  I think on my armbar attempts I might have swung my leg to wide and made it easy to block.