April 5th 2015 - Weekly Review

Focus of the Week: Deep Half Back Take, Half Guard Knee Shield Arm Drag

Theme & Techniques
Beginner/All Levels: Kesa Getami Escape to Backmount, Standing Guard Break, Knee Slide Pass
Partnered and Rolled With: Anthony, Jordan, Dave, Bhuvana, Brian (New), Ty, Zack, Robert, Brian (FF)

I was able to attend a rare Thursday evening beginner class and drilling open mat this week.  I miss being able to go to the advanced class but I've got to keep my priorities straight. 

I felt like I helped quite a few of my fellow students this week which felt nice.  The standing guard break is something that I feel confident about.  Had some good rolling and I'm seeing a lot of improvement from people in the beginner classes like Bhuvana, Dave, Jordan, and Anthony to name a few that I work with regularly. 

Zack has also been my drilling buddy after Tuesday and Friday classes.  We both have some things to teach each other.  He's been focusing on butterfly guard lately and I've found as I'm relaying things that I like to do in the position I'm figuring some things out for myself as well.  An example is how important using your head and it's position is.  I remember having a really hard time with my head when I was first learning the position.

Drilling Open Mat: Half Guard Knee Shield to arm drag, Deep Half Position
Partner: Mike (Tumbleweed)

Mike worked on some straight foot lock stuff and it was very impressive.  He's definitely ahead of me with foot locks.  I drilled the knee shield to arm drag in no gi and it still felt strong without the sleeve grip.  We discussed why it worked so well and he seemed impressed with it.   The second round I just worked the position and it was pretty difficult with Mike.  A big takeaway was that I need to focus on where his knee points and try to go in that direction with my sweeps.  I attempted the waiter a few times and it put me in trouble for foot locks.  Not cool. 

Open Mat
Rolled With: Henry, Jerad, Josh, Bhuvana

I did some drilling between the kids class and open mat with Jerad and Greg.  I worked on my back take from deep half and it's coming along.  I also worked the knee shield arm drag.  Unfortunately Jerad laid his glasses down not far from where we were working.  He showed me a back take that he was working on and I base out placing my hand right on top of his glasses and they completely crumbled.  Fortunately he said he just mad a visit to the eye doctor and is getting a new pair soon.

Henry: He played guard and I was able to pass it with my over/under.  I started working some side control attacks and he left his neck open for the north/south choke.  I was in pretty deep right away but he decided to rotate away and try to escape.  I locked up a really nice super guillotine.  We scrambled to control the leg positions and where are hips were but ultimately I was in too tight.  I did okay in our following rolls as well but I wasn't able to match his relentlessness.  I played a lot of half guard and noticed that he was mostly escaping by standing and pulling away from me.  Something for me to think about and learn how to deal with.  He submitted me with an armbar off the baseball bat choke and another choke that was probably a baseball bat. 

Jerad: I had some good and not so good moments with Jerad.  I was on top for a little while and threatened a pretty good bread cutter.  Later he told me he just barely escaped it.  I could have done it better and grabbed his collar rather than settling for his shoulder.  I was in north/south and he exploited a point when my legs were close together and rolled me over.  I feel like I'm doing better with dealing with his knee pass but still need some more work.  I'm at least moving a lot more and affecting his balance.  He submitted me with armlocks I believe.  

Josh: Haven't rolled with him for quite a while.  He definitely wanted to play guard because he would grab me as I was sitting and attempt pull me into closed guard.  My immediate reaction was to bring my knee up and not allow him to close.  My main goal was to focus on going with the flow and taking what he gave me.  I played back mount a bit as well as some north/south and side control.  I heard him tell Fuji later that our roll was educational for him.  I'll take that as the compliment of the day!

Bhuvana: I went over some more omoplata stuff with her and gave her a few extra pointers.  Like triangling the legs and how closely related it is to the triangle.  She was doing better with the leg position to finish, this may be something viable for her to learn.  We rolled a bit and I gave her a hard time from side control mostly.  After rolling we went over 3 options for side control escapes that I think she can use and what I use.  The basic guard replace, hooking with the far leg and then the under hook.  I showed some options for how to put them together and it seemed to trigger some light bulbs.

Greg: Greg said he would drill a few things with me when the mat cleared early.  I went over the deep half back attack again and he drilled his crescent kick to leg drag.  I gave some resistance for the leg drag that disrupted him a bit but he was able to find a solution by stepping on the other leg.  For my back take he said maybe I should try an exercise of getting to the first part with their hips on my chest and just hang out there with some newer guys.  That will help me understand the position a little better and learn how to deal with common escapes instead of always rushing to the back attack and potentially losing the position.

So I had said a couple weeks ago that I was going to set aside the deep half for a while but when I talked to Greg about something new to focus on he encouraged me to stick with the position.  So I've been playing the Deep Half DVD every night while I'm playing Call of Duty and I've been picking up a few things along the way that I'm taking a piece at a time.  I'm pretty happy that I'm sticking with it now because a couple of weeks ago I thought the position was getting pretty stagnant for me.