2012 Off to a Good Start!

Last night was the first class of 2012 and it fell in line with number five on 2012 BJJ goals. With the school closed for 10 days due to remodeling, no one able to train, and a majority of us went on an eating binges, this class was an excellent wake up call. I know I tried to remove as many of the coconut cupcakes; my wife made to prevent them from falling into enemy hands.

We started class with some shrimp drills and then some arm bar drills from guard, but the class got even better after the drilling. We welcomed 4 visitors from Jiu Jitsu Nation,a Relson Gracie school, in Myrtle Beach, which is an hour or so away from Florence. These are some top-notch guys.

I missed the picture opportunity :(

The introductions allowed everyone to be able to catch their breath from the drills. Then we moved into the gauntlet of pass and defend, the next 30 minutes would be rough. The instruction given for the session was not submit or sweep the person in the guard, but to let them work technique to pass into side control. One thing I discovered doing this, that I need to work on my guard passing a lot this year. I might need to reassess this in the oncoming weeks; it could be the extra cupcakes making my techniques sloppy.

After pass and defend, it was open mat, and I wanted to roll with the visitors. I started my first roll with Josh, who is a seasoned blue belt and we went for two rounds at least. In those two rounds, I found myself on the receiving end of three collar chokes, but as I learned what not to do, I did manage to get him in side control for all of thirty seconds.

I shook his hand and thanked him for showing some errors I was making. The next training partner, Phil, was pretty intimidating to me as he sat there is brown A5 gi and his purple belt. I found out, that there was no need to be intimidated. Phil was an awesome training partner. We started rolling and I started getting submitted, once he would submit me, he would show me what happened and the submission technique. I certainly need to incorporate the two techniques he showed me. One was a submission called the “Stick Shift” and the other was arm pin called, “Hog Tie”. Both techniques were highly effective in leading me to tap.

A couple of rounds went by, and Phil ended the small submission clinic he had happening. I then went to Jeremiah, who is a veteran blue belt, and once again, the workshop was open. This was a spider guard and open guard sweep seminar. We only had the chance to roll one round, but it was a great experience to see how effective spider guard can be.

At the beginning of class, I did not want to train with these guys. Why did I not want to spar with them? I saw their belts with their years of experience and was gun shy on how I would have faired training with them. I knew if I rolled I would tap and I knew these guys were more skilled than myself, but I wanted to see what would happen or what the outcome would be. I wanted to see if I could pick up a few tricks or may be even survive a couple of minutes. I am glad these guys stopped by, training with them has set the tone for 2012. 

The training showed me something about Jiu Jitsu community and myself at the end of the day. We are all training partners and should learn from each other. I had an awesome time training with Jeremiah, Josh, Phil and JR(Who I did not get to roll with), thanks for the training and you guys are a class act.