In all athletic disciplines, it is the internal work that makes the physical mat time click, but it is easy to lose touch with this reality in the middle of the grind. - Josh Waitzkin, “The Art Of Learning”
I skipped lunchtime class today so that I could get my taxes done. That acidic charred scent on the wind is my brain combusting.
Evening BJJ at Gracie Bellevue. I had trouble with the warmup pushups, so I didn't attempt the alligators or army crawls. When I got the stink eye from Carlos, I reminded him about my rib injury. He informed me that he could still do these exercises when *he* had a rib out- and that it's good to move and work the injured rib. I'm sure he has no idea how old I am, and maybe someday he'll grok that a 38-year-old doesn't bounce back from these sorts of things with quite the same gleeful and reckless elasticity as a (professional athlete) 26-year-old. And I'm all for moving and working it- that's why I'm here- but not to the point of being in agony tomorrow. I am glad that he has high expectations for me and that he pushes me- that's helpful for me- but I hope he's not going to think too much the less of me for being firm about eschewing the alligators.
He was driving us kind of hard tonight... Mina was there for the first little while (then she vanished); he was hard on us last time she was here too.... I was thinking that maybe he's trying to impress her with what hardcore badasses we all are around here. But by the end of the class, he apologized to us all and said that he was in a bad mood, missing his family, having some trouble in his family, and sorry that he was taking it out on us. When Professor ees not happy, nobody ees happy. How true it is.
We skipped the standup "self-defense" technique we usually begin with because there were way too many students crowded on the mat tonight to do any standup safely. We drilled a basic guard break, stand up, reach behind you to pry the ankles apart, then pass. I was drilling with Irina, who does not hestitate to correct me if I get a detail wrong (good thing I'm used to THAT, huh? Chuckle). I was having some problems getting the ankles apart, and she was giving a titch too much resistance.
At one point, Carlos demonstrated the technique again and asked us (standing with both his unguarded ankles way too close to the opponent's reach) "Theese all right?" No, I knew- especially as we had JUST been discussing that takedown on Jiujitsu Forums. Most people roboted back "YES SIR" except for one brave soul who hollered, "No!" I didn't say anything. We all had to do fifty pushups, except for that one guy. Mercy. I did some slow, careful ones. Not fifty of them. I should be more assertive when I know I'm right- in here, at least, where I'm not all mousified by the presence of JM.
Positional sparring from closed guard. First for the top person- try to pass, bottom person give minimal resistance by way of spider, butterfly, or half guard. Then for the bottom person- try to sweep, top person give minimal resistance. Carlos specified that the higher-ranking person start on top for the sweep portion- but Irina just lay there and looked at me, and said that she didn't know any sweeps. Well, scissor sweep a LITTLE. I told her to just try that one, and she couldn't get through it. It needed more help than I could verbally give her from the top, especially with the language barrier. So I told her to get on top, and hoped that Carlos wouldn't notice that we weren't exactly following his instructions. I walked her through the scissor sweep several times, and Carlos came over to suggest that I 1)make sure I have my knee positioned firmly enough in her shoulder so that she couldn't push it down and put her weight down on me, and 2)place my bottom foot on the opponent's knee to push it back, especially if I couldn't get her tipped right away. Then when we switched places, she was able to do the scissor sweep several times.
I had enough energy by the time we finished to contemplate staying for the advanced class, but I decided that between my rib and Carlos being on one of his drive-em-hard moods, it might be best to quit while I was ahead.
My coach also recommends the foot-on-knee-push version of the scissor sweep against anyone larger because, even when you pull them forward correctly, there's still a significant amount of weight in their back half to make slicing the bottom leg through nearly impossible (i.e., guys whose legs weigh as much as me...).
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