Tonight's Practice - 9.11.2008

So I strayed a little from my normal Monday/Wednesday jiu-jitsu schedule, instead going on Monday/Thursday this week. At my school, Monday and Wednesday are gi nights, Thursday's are no-gi, while Saturday switches back and forth. September 20-21 I'll be attending a 2 day Marcelo Garcia seminar at a school up north; one day is gi, the other is no-gi. So I thought it best I get a little more no-gi under my belt. I'm really stoked for that seminar. If you don't know who Marcelo Garcia is, I highly recommend you head on over to YouTube and start searching for videos. I'll post a few of my faves here for starters :)

Marcelo Garcia highlight video - The title speaks for itself....
Marcelo Garcia vs Mike Van Arsdale @ ADCC 2003 - I love this video. It perfectly illustrates what Marcelo re-iterates in his training DVDs: Your opponent may be pushing your head back, shoving your head side to side, pulling your legs out from under you, it doesn't matter. You must stick to your game. And that's exactly what he did...
Marcelo Garcia vs Vitor "Shaolin" Ribiero @ ADCC 2003 - Shows how lightning quick Marcelo is, and another great example of how he's able to get an awesome choke in from pretty much any position heh

Then the next weekend, September 28, I'll be attending a Rylan Lizares seminar at my own school. Rylan is a Pedro Sauer black belt, and there's a few videos of him on YouTube as well.

Anyways, on to tonight's practice. As I said, it was a no-gi practice. It was only my 2nd no-gi class, and wow is it different haha As I predicted before I went, I was lost without any fabric to grab on to. Trying to learn the overhooks and underhooks, I realized just how often that I do in fact grab on to fabric to assist me with various techniques, or simply to gain a more dominant position. We started off with basics warm-ups (jogging, stretching, shrimp drills, etc), then went into drills.

First drill was the pummeling drill, where you're fighting for underhooks (as soon at the beginning of this video). It was my first time doing the drill, so it was a little difficult at first, but I caught on heh One thing we did different than that drill was whichever arm had the underhook, that same side foot was forward. So we were constantly switching stances while pummeling.

Then we moved onto a self defense technique from that same position: blocking attempted knee strikes to your stomach/groin. This was done with each of us having an underhook and an overhook. A proper knee would come from the side of your body that has the overhook. This way, when you're kneeing, you can pull on the underhook you have on the opposite side of of your opponent to pull them into you and into your knee. Also, you'll have better balance. So you each have a right underhook and a left overhook. This means your opponent will be kneeing with his left knee. When the strike comes up, you'll move your left hand (the overhooked arm/hand) from their elbow/tricep down between you to block the knee. And that's it! haha Remember that after you block that knee strike to bring that left hand back up onto their elbow/tricep as to not allow them to get a quick fist/elbow strike in.

Then we moved onto a takedown from this position: the sacrafice throw. This one uses your opponents momentum against them. So you're back into the clinch, each of you have a right underhook. Start to push forward and let your opponent react by pushing back into you. When they push back, sit back over your right foot and extend your left leg out forward and to the left. As you fall backwards, use that underhooked right arm to pull your opponent over your body, and you should end up in side control. A variation of this that works for those of use with long legs, is instead of just extending that left leg out to have your opponent roll over, stick your left right into his right ankle. That way when they try to catch their balance by posting their right leg out, it'll get stuck under your left foot.

Then we worked a butterfly guard pass. So your opponent has you in butterfly guard. You'll reach down with your right hand and cup your opponents heel underneath. So when you extend your right leg to swing it into their guard, they won't be able to extend their leg to keep the left foot hook in. When you bring your right leg in, bring your leg all the way around their right foot hook also, so that instead of their right foot hook being on the inside of your left leg, it'll be on the outside of your right leg. And you'll put your weight down into their right leg to put it flat on the floor. Then you'll reach down between you and your opponent with your left hand and grab his right ankle. Now you're going to roll your body up towards their chest, bringing your right leg over your left. You should end up in a rear facing side mount. Then slide your right knee up under their left knee to get their knee out of your side and get "regular" side control. That one was sort of hard to explain. I hope that makes sense to others who read this...and me when I come back to read this for review later haha

And since this was my first class, I asked Mel about the principles behind no-gi jiu-jitsu. One of the main things being differences in technique since there isn't a gi to grab on to. He elaborated a lot more on what I had heard before: use the underhooks and overhooks. He concentrated most of his explanation from the bottom (guard, half guard, etc). Utilizing the underhook, whizzer, wrapping the back of the head to break down your opponents posture. There were some other things too, but I'm having a hard time remembering at the moment. I'll come back and add more to this post as I remember...

Rolling was a lot of fun (as always). I rolled with Rhet, and another guy who's name escapes me; it's been awhile since I've seen him at the school. Rhet pretty much dominated me the whole time. I had a really hard time trying to switch my mind from trying to grab fabric to getting underhooks or overhooks. By the time I remembered, Rhet was already on his way to submitting me. I was able to successfully execute the butterfly guard pass we had just learned though, so that was good. Then I rolled with the other guy. The other guy has a history of wrestling 4 years in high school, going to state, etc. I've rolled with him once before, and really like his style. Going slow, working on technique, etc. He's been training jiu-jitsu for awhile too, he's one of the more experience white belts. I felt more confident rolling with him as I actually had time to think about technique heh As we went along, he'd stop me if I passed up a submissions, too. For example, after slipping into side control, I was able to get his near side arm between my legs. From there I'd always keep the arm trapped there while reaching over and trying to work a Kimura or Americana. He showed me how I was able to sit back and put stress on the elbow with it trapped between my legs still. Another was when he had an underhook with his near side arm. I was able to get a modified armbar from there. I guess I'll go ahead and explain those while I'm typing hehe

So you have side control, facing forward, on their right side, and you get their right arm in between your legs (over your right leg, under your left leg). Reach down with your left hand and keep their arm posted between your legs. While keeping it posted down between your legs, bring your right foot up and over their arm. From here you can push your foot towards the floor, putting pressure on their elbow. In addition, you can bring your left leg over your right ankle and lock it up much like a triangle.

As for the "modified" armbar as I called it... So you have "regular" side control on their right side: overhook with your left arm (arm under their head) and underhook with your right. Hmm, now that I think about it, I can't remember the setup exactly that I was doing while rolling, but off the top of my head... Pull your left arm out from underneath his head and put in a whizzer on his right arm. Then sit up making sure your left forearm stays above his elbow, up on his bicep, and plant your right foot flat on the ground, right up against his right side (shin in his side). Then as you lay back, throw your left leg over his head as you would a regular armbar. But this way, instead of holding his wrist with both your hands, his lower arm (hand, wrist) will be trapped underneath your left armpit.

I'm gonna go ahead and post this. I hope I didn't forget anything. This took me a couple days to put together as things were pretty busy since Thursday night.

Until next time... :-)