November 30th 2016 - Gi All Levels

Theme & Techniques: Standing Headlock Escape to Hammerlock, Mount: Armbar, Elbow Escape
Partner: Jess, John

Didn't even realize it until I was writing this entry, but today was an all "J" class, having Jerad, Jess, John, and Josh in class.  Jerad and I played around with our new clock timer, it's awesome and we used it to time our rounds.

Jerad gave some good details on both techniques and we added an extra armbar technique for John and I to break the grips apart. A couple of quick tips for the techniques of the week.

• Headlock Escape: A huge part of this is when you get a hold of their wrist, push it into your body instead of trying to pry it off.  
• Armbar: Take your time with the mounted armbar and don't fall to your back without having stepped over their head and you have control over their arm.  You shouldn't have your back on the mat trying to pull their arm down.
• Elbow Escape: Once you get your elbow in place it should be treated as a point that you are going to shrimp away from.  Originally I thought you were supposed to shrimp and also push with your elbow, but it's much more effective to shrimp away from it. 

Rolling: Mount, Free Rolling
Rolled With: Jerad, Jess, John

I always enjoy mount position training as it's tough to escape and I've been on a quest to make the top a good place to finish.  One thing that I need to work on more is transitioning to the shin across belly down armbar when I encounter a big bridge.

I had a couple good rolls with Jerad during and after class.  At one point we were stalemating each other with grip fighting and while it may not have looked like much to someone from the outside I was looking for a certain knee grip and he kept denying it or stripping it.  He made the comment afterward that whoever won that battle for that grip would have determined the outcome of the roll which is an interesting thought.  In a different roll I had snuck in a loop choke from half guard.  I felt pretty good and solid about it but he did a great job of keeping me from freeing my legs.  I kept trying to get my butterfly hook free but when we talked about it later I should have put my foot on the mat and backed my hips up and it probably would have freed it.  I just had tunnel vision on trying to get it free, but I think I learned an important lesson.

John asked about butterfly guard and we had a lengthy discussion about many facets of it.  We covered posture, not reaching with your feet, being on one hip or side rather than being straight on, and grips and stuff.  It was a cool little mini-chat session that got pretty technical without doing too much technique.  Great stuff!