6/13/09 BJJ#1

BJJ was the exercise today. Our black belt was out of town so Chris, one of our blue belts, taught class. Each week we work on a particular position, this week was mount top. We started class by warming up with rolling (rolling is just sparring or grappling) we would roll with one guy for about 5minutes and then switch partners so we got to go with a few different people. My training partner today was a guy named Ben who used to be wrestler in high school, some things you can always count on from wrestlers is that they have good top side control and balance, they are strong and hate to be on their backs. This guy was more my size so he was definitely strong and had good balance.

So, after warming up we got into technique.

Here's a picture of the mount position. yeah, yeah looks pretty gay, right? Well, believe me when someone is sitting on top of you trying to choke you that's the last thing on your mind. So, we started out drilling maintaining the mount. Picture it with a gi on but the guy on the bottom, if he knew bjj, will try to push on one of your knees and get to his side. The guy on top will grab the sleeve pull up and take up the space by moving his knees up.

Next, was armbar from the mount. Watch that video to see it in action. We worked this and drilled this live for one minute at a time. I actually got this submission in our warm-up roll today on a guy that i wasn't even close to getting this on several weeks ago!

Last we worked arm triangle from the mount. You will see this submission from time-to-time in the ufc because it's a good one to get without a gi on. Here's a good video of this particular sub. We drilled this back and forth for awhile and about that time our hour and a half was up, time to go.

It was a pretty good class today. I'm noticing I'm slowing gaining more endurance, little by little. I'm still pretty far out of shape though and one thing i have noticed since training again is how narrow minded i become when i'm tired. It's almost like having tunnel vision where you don't see what the other guy is going to do or don't see a move or two ahead you could be making. I know it's just a matter of time that I'll gain some endurance and won't gas as fast hence allowing me to thing clearly. I was really trying to push myself to think technique today when i was really tired, it didn't really work but it will come in time.


Meals: I don't like eating very close to Jiu Jitsu class so I didn't eat this morning because I have already made the mistake of eating a little too close to class time only to be running to the bathroom once we really started training hard.

1. Had the good 'ol Beast sandwich with lots of tomato and lettuce. 3p.m.
2. Apple 4:30p.m.
3. 1 banana, red grapes 7p.m
4. Turkey burger, baked sweet potato fries, mustard. 10p.m.
5.


Notes: Kayla comes home tomorrow! I'm pretty pumped about that! I'm covering a shift for a guy at work tomorrow and will have Monday off to hang out with Kayla. Monday will also be my cheat day so I'm planning what I want to indulge in for the day. The key with cheat days is not just stuffing yourself and not allowing one cheat day turn into two, three etc...