Last night I attended the advanced class. Unbeknown to me, all advanced classes are tournament prep until January 8th. I thought I was going to do some drilling followed by light sparring where I could work on my de la riva guard. Boy was I mistaken.
We started off with conditioning drills, which were pretty tiring, but I've done a lot worse in my day. The most fun one for me was monkey men. Because I absolutely loved this drill, I will describe it: you start by jumping guard on your partner who stands with their legs apart and their arms held straight out to their sides (picture the vitruvian man). Your goal is to climb up and over their shoulders, down their back (upside down), out through their legs and then back up their front, returning to guard with them standing. All of this without touching the ground. As an added motivator, for every rep that someone completed without touching the ground, everyone did 10 burpees. We did a total of 30 burpees because three monkey men were completed.
Next we did a relay with some monkey walks etc.
Finally, we divided into groups of three by weight and went 5 minute matches. We went in the order
Best vs. Worst
Best vs. Middle
Middle Vs. Worst
I declared myself the worst in my group as the other two were a purple and a blue who was promoted about a year before me.
My first match was exciting because I wasn't that tired, I'm not competing, and generally will try the most preposterous things I can think of when rolling with people who I know are much better than me. I pulled guard immediately, which he passed as I went to my knees for a single leg. I sat through and we scrambled for a bit with him coming up in sidemount top. He collar choked me and we reset.
I pulled guard again and he worked to pass, but I was much more on the ball with my passing defense and I used the single under counter sweep to start a scramble and end up on top in turtle. I fought for the clock choke for some time but he rolled and reversed me into side mount. He moved to north-south where I stiffarmed his hips and tried to take his back. I had to settle for inverted guard which allowed me to set up a real, live omoplata and sweep for another scramble. Then time ran out.
Next I rolled with the blue for a much less exciting match. I pulled guard again and he went to knee slide pass. One thing I noticed was that because he controlled my left arm expertly, I wasn't able to underhook and shuck him off my head to take the back, as I am want to do. Must protect that arm in the future. One exciting bit was that I swept him from quarter guard, but I have no idea how. Let's just call it a fluke. I tried playing de la riva to absolutely no avail whatsoever.
The best part of this class, though, was that it reminded me of how much I actually like hard work. That feeling you get when you've worked out super hard and your mouth tastes like iron? I tell myself that it's a bad feeling, but I really do love it, and it's good to be reminded of that.
No comments:
Post a Comment