Wednesday

 

’This is my way; where is yours?’ – thus I answered those who asked me “the way.’ For the way- that does not exist. –Nietzsche

Monday FOD: Iron Needle.
Tuesday FOD: Free choice. I picked Touch Bridge.

Pic on the GB site: Bryan got another stripe! I'll have to ask him if he can smell that black belt yet. I'd so love to be there when he gets his black belt. But since I'm only at about 1 in 4 of the particular classes he hits (at best), I have about a 25% chance of catching it.

(Ye gods, is this promotion cycle ever going to end? Before anyone starts eyeing *ME*? Usually they do a bunch of promotions over the course of two or three weeks, and then let it mostly lie for three or four months. This batch of promotions has been dragging on for two months straight.... everybody and their sister and their dog are getting promoted.....eeeee.....)

Some e-mail discussion between the Turtle Drum facilitators about adding more formal ritual elements to the event. They really want to do so; I lean toward simplicity. we agreed to do a little experimenting and see how it goes over.

Lunchtime BJJ at GB Sea.

Before class, I used the mat to run a couple reps of the rolling portions of 5 Points Of the Star and Wood Monkey. Also sneaked up and choked Steve from behind, leading to a short warmup roll.

People I have not seen for a while- Z and Bree. Unfortunately I did not get to work with either, and we lost Bree by the second round of drills (she was honking on her inhaler before we even started).

Positional sparring from back mount with one hook in. I was with Angela, so I did not have great success here (and better on escaping than on attempting to hold/sub).

Eight minute spars- Angela (triangled AGAIN, dangit!), Steve, a small purple belt guy (Carlos was working me today, putting me with all higher belts!) I got subbed a couple times by each of them, but also spent some time on top, and am not displeased in whole.

 I am really noticing that I feel much less defeatist when I have people in guard. I can't say I'm actually PERFORMING better, but my mindset is more "Okay, I have guard, time to work on this," as opposed to "Okay, I have guard, now I'm F'ed and it won't be long now,"
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Wednesday evening BJJ at Sleeper. Eric and Lamont were teaching. Grip fighting, standing arm drag to the back, pendulum sweep, sparring. Lamont hurt his back and thus did not leglock me tonight.

I sparred Sonia three times. Lamont wanted me to run a clinic on her and see how many points I could rack up while he practiced refereeing. I couldn't do it. She's only been training a couple of weeks. When I roll with a brand new person, I want to let them work some- not just smoosh them.
Hey, I got a triangle on Terry. That was cool.

I Youtubed a little baseball bat choke from mount. I was looking for a good, easy no-gi choke from mount that would not fail due to short and weak forearms or a light frame that is easy for the bottom person to buck off. I didn't find one right away (suggestions, anyone? I need a CLEAR and English-speaking vid, preferrably with different viewpoints so I can see), but I found this and decided that I wanted to choke somebody with it. Unfortunately I did not get front mount on anyone this afternoon, and the only person I got it on tonight was Sonia- but I am going to continue trolling for victims.