February 26th 2016 - Gi All Levels

Theme & Techniques: Koshi Guruma, Basic Triangle Setup
Partner: Craig, Jesus

Conan did a different warm-up to emphasize falling properly.  It was a little like the small kids' class in that we circled up and did some break falls from sitting, crouched, and standing.  Then some rolls landing in the appropriate falling position instead of getting up right away.  I showed off a little bit when he had us do a jumping roll since we did that so often in Hapkido.  I think this was probably great for Jesus since it's his second week of training.

Rolling: Closed Guard (4 x 4 min), Free Rolling (2 x 5 min)
Rolled With: Craig, Zac, Ty

Felt good about my rolling today.  I was able to setup a few triangles and had some guard passes.  I focused on some guard retention and playing some de la riva at times and basic open guard.  Something that has been very strong for me lately has been getting 2 on 1 and moving to a butterfly sweep, if that fails they usually adjust enough that I can hit the arm drag and take the back or sweep. 

Office Hours Partner: Conan, Zac

Had some tough rolls and felt like I held my own today.  Conan commented that I was difficult to pin down today.  I was thinking a lot about readjusting whenever Conan would start to move to a passing position.  Where usually I would try to stop him in some spots I instead tried to hip out and make space.

After we rolled Conan said that often when you start to defend a technique that a person is good at they eventually stop attempting it even if they are close to finishing it.  He has been saying lately that there are times when you need to keep attacking something to eventually wear them out.  I have a hard time figuring out when this is the case or when I'm wasting energy on something that won't work.