February 17th 2016 - Gi All Levels

Theme & Techniques: Headlock Escape to Back Mount, Kneeling Guard Break, Knee Slide Pass, Knee Through Guard Break
Students: Mike, Frank, Morgan, Ben, Tom, Byrav, Jordan, Dave

Nice sized class for a Wednesday morning!  We also had a drop in, Frank, who trains at the old school with Ken.  I also met him at a Hapkido class that I visited some time back. Always happy to have a visitor, especially if they've trained.

Tips on this week's techniques:

• Headlock Escape: I emphasized focusing on moving your shoulder underneath you instead of trying to pull your elbow out.
• Knee Slide Pass: After breaking the guard it's important to bring your knee up right away and connect your elbow and knee.

I showed the knee through guard break because it sets you right up for the knee slide and gave the guys that have done kneeling guard break a bunch a different option.

Rolling: Guard (4 x 2 min), Free Rolling (2 x 5 min)
Rolled With: Tom, Frank

We had even partners during the guard portion so I watched and tried to coach where I could.  I tested Tom's butterfly guard again today and saw some improvement.  He even had a decent attempt at shin on shin to single leg x.

I tried to be pretty flowy but precise with my techniques when rolling with Frank.  He had some skills and knew what he was doing positionally. He seemed to be a little worn out so I didn't want to push him too much and gave him a little bit of room to work.

Office Hours Partner: Mike, Ben, Tom

More discussion on shin on shin, single leg x and x guards.  I commented to Mike that it seemed like shin on shin was having an insurgence in our school lately as I've taught it to a couple people recently and seen it taught by others.  So word to the wise stay away from trying to pass in combat base.
 
Had an Epic roll with Mike.  I'm happy about avoiding ankle locks but did run into a bit of a problem from bottom turtle.  I went to turtle to escape side control but he took grips on my belt the back of my collar and I couldn't move without giving up my back.  To make matters worse he would double knee ride to make the experience more demoralizing.  I ended up giving up my back but I defended well enough to get my shoulders to the mat.  Somehow I ended up fighting for a toe hold and used it to get up and pass the guard making him turtle and eventually take his back.  In transition I got a cross collar grip and sunk in a tight collar choke from the back.