March 20th 2014 - No Gi

Theme & Techniques: Take Down Fit ins, Takedown Up/Down/Out, Rolling Backtake from quarter guard

I had planned to not workout tonight because my beautiful caring wife had texted me that she wasn't feeling well.  She is weeks if not days away from having our third child.  Mentally I was prepared to stay home, so when she told me to go anyway I was a little unsure if I should.  I ended up going but I felt a little guilty.  All through warm-ups I was disconnected as everyone was having conversations and talking about Jiu-Jitsu related things.  I went went about my business feeling oblivious.

Takedown sparring felt good today.  The overly awkwardness has gone away.  I'm still not good at shooting but I think my stance is coming along.  I ended up in the big guy group with Adam and Henry and Greg would cross over to both groups.  Everyone there is way ahead of me wrestling wise which is fine, all the better to learn from them.  I had some good moments of sprawling and escaping a couple takedowns as well as locking up some guillotines and a very close sacrifice shoulder throw.  I didn't do too much offensively.   

Adam and I worked through the rolling back take and while it looks fancy, there really isn't too much to it.  The only thing that still gets to me while rolling is I'm hesitant as to which side I'm supposed to roll over.

Rolling: Free Rolling (6 x 5 min)

I got a chance to roll with everyone (Greg, Mike, Henry, Will, Adam, Jerad).  My main focus was the leg drag which I attempted quite a few times.  I'm still having trouble completing it and I think the main reason is that I'm trying to throw it by instead of connecting it to my hip.  The highlight of my day is that I was able to get to single leg-x transition to full x guard and then completed the technical standup sweep.  I also ended up in deep half a few times but I keep stopping there in the position to get my bearings.  Mike keeps reminding afterwards that I need to be off balancing from there.  I think my problem is that I want techniques to be perfect that I miss opportunities when I'm trying to choose the best response instead of just acting.  Henry had me in a pretty good guillotine that I rolled out of but in the process my neck popped pretty loudly and Henry was concerned.  It turned out to be a good pop so no big deal.