October 20th 2016 - Gi All Levels

Theme & Techniques: Technical Stand-up, Guard: Hip Bump Sweep, Kimura
Partner: Bhuvana

We worked quite a bit on the technical standup.  The main thing emphasized today was that you don't have to do all of the steps depending on the space your opponent gives you.  You may be able to stand-up after the first kick, you may have to kick them attempt to stand up they move in again, you lay on your back, repeat until you get enough space.  I think the most important thing to practice once you have the ability to stand-up down is knowing how far away they need to be for you to stand-up safely.

Bhuvana and I went over a few different kimura setups and some different ways to trick them into putting their hand on the mat in order to jump on the kimura.  She seemed to appreciate this exercise.  We also did a kimura from half guard and I was telling her to go to half butterfly but Greg said to just stay in half guard, so I was a little mixed up about that and will have to collect my thoughts. 

Rolling: Guard KOTM
Rolled With: John, Bhuvana, Bob, Jordan, Chris, Anthony

Had a lot of fun rolling and appreciate being able to roll with other blues like John and Jordan.  Apparently David is coming to early morning class tomorrow.

Didn't focus on any techniques in particular, I did hit a hip bump or two.  I tried to stay away from cross guard from the bottom and did more collar grab to open guard.  From top the focus was on floating and hip switching after a standing guard break.  I resorted to over/under a few times but might need to expand my passing game a bit more. 

There is always the dilemma of working on my best stuff or trying new things to challenge myself.  I'm planning on experimenting with some new things in the near future.  Just not sure what yet.  Ankle locks are on my list for sure.  Maybe a different guard like De La Riva.

Office Hours Partner: John

Watched John and Jordan roll and gave John some pointers on going to butterfly half when under hooked and cross faced in regular half guard and an entry into deep half from bottom of mount that he could have capitalized on.