March 27th 2014 - No Gi

Theme & Techniques: Half Guard Gordo Sweep #1, Wrist grab Roll Back to Defend Darce

We had a return visit from Eric from Colorado.  He had been here back in July 6th 2013 Open Mat.  The cool thing is that he gave me some pointers that got started with the cross guard to omoplata sweep which I've expounded upon and is a huge part of my game now. 

I worked with Adam on the half guard stuff.  The takeaway today was that Greg mentioned that the elbows need to be at 90 degrees or more while in the diamond position.  I think that is why I get smashed every now and again in half guard.  The second technique was great.  I've seen it in the gi before but haven't tried it during rolling.  I think the hardest part is the grabbing of the wrist/sleeve and at the end Greg showed us a little trick to make it a little easier.

Rolling: Free Rolling (3 x 10 min)

Although we did 10 minute rounds the time seemed to fly by.  I was able to keep Adam from submitting me and I felt like I was able to maintain guard longer than usual, but side mount was inevitable.  I was able to escape once with an underhook back to butterfly.  He kept doing what he called the butcher every time I tried to turn into him.  I've got to figure out how to prevent that.

I rolled with Mike next and we had a good exchange.  His guard is very difficult to pass and I believe he eventually swept me using a guillotine.  He spent some time in mount until I was able to reach deep half.  From there I took the advice he's been giving me and swung to my knees.  I then ended up with my own guillotine and he went into side control to defend.  I had to keep low but keep attacking.  I attempted a north/south choke, guillotine, kimura, I thought about armbar but felt I would probably lose it and sat him up into back mount instead.  Select for spoilers Finishing with an RNC!

Jerad was last and while I spent some time on top it was short lived.  It seemed like he was going to go to deep half for a second which would have been the first time I've seen him there but decided against it.  I spent a lot of time in his mount as he eventually setup a triangle to armbar.