July 19th 2014 - Kids & Open Mat

Kids' Class

There was only one other kid besides my own.  I feel like I motivated my oldest a little bit before class.  He tried a little harder and did a good job at the animal walks, the double leg takedown, and flag tag.  He was a little lazy during falling and rolling though.  I'm going to keep trying to motivate him about class but try my best to not turn him off to it completely.  During flag tag both boys were sufficiently aggressive.  There was some good hand fighting and pummeling for the flag.  There were occasions when one kid was trying to push the other out of the ring only to have their flag pulled. 

Open Mat

Rolled with too many people to try to describe each roll.  So I'll just bring up what's worth mentioning.  I rolled with Henry, Jerad, Fuji, Greg, Mike, Austin, Tim, and Ross.

Defense:

Greg seems to be working on a particular armbar setup lately because I feel like I've been defending them a lot.  I am getting to the bicep grip (kind of like RNC) to help push the leg off my head.  He still would complete the armbar though.  

I had to defend a few Brabo grips today from Fuji, Mike, and Greg.  The one that Mike setup was pretty nasty as it had my arm locked up and I eventually tapped because it was compressing my elbow and I didn't want to risk injury. 

I felt like I defended a lot of knee on belly and side control today, but I do feel like I'm getting better at it.  I'm having some trouble with a few peoples mounts, Jerad especially.  Also Henry is noticeably better at this position. 

I need to improve my getting to half guard from quarter guard because I am stuck there way too much.  I did successfully use the cross bicep to regain guard more than once.  I'm still having a little trouble trusting it, but it's served me well so far.  I was thinking a lot about my knee placement during butterfly guard.

Offense:

I went for a lot of 2 on 1 today and was able to turn it into a back take a few times.  Unfortunately I did lose back mount to a few people, Henry and Fuji, mostly because of my position on their side when they went to turtle.  I think I need to be more proactive from this position.  I attempted the RNC on a few people and had a lot of trouble getting under the chin.  I think I'm going to put in a request to Greg for him to just attack RNC from back mount to observe all of his tricks.  I stayed away from the bow and arrow but did go for the armbar if the RNC wasn't happening.

I was able to submit utilizing a few omoplatas, some north/south chokes, a bow and arrow from side control, and some armbars that I can recall.