Friday, April 21, 2006

Thursday 4/20/06

We worked on holding and escaping the side position last night. I trained with Cyrus who is very suceptible to uma plata, and Pete who is getting btetter and better.

Art ran the judo class. Jim was in and there were 5 white belts, so the classes continued to be very novice oriented. He mostly did basic throwing and falling for the whole class. Christine did come in and she worked with the japanese girl.

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Monday 4-17-6

Regis covered a good position that he learned from Rickson while he was trainng there in Ca. the sweep is a response to the over under pass that John and I use. when the Uke trise to pass and keep your hips down, you reach up and grab his belt with the hand that is on the same side as the hand uke is using below the leg i.e. the side he is keeping his head. now with your free hand you must try to come up. you try to drive yourself up with your hips facing way from the direction that your arm grabbing the belt is on. If uke allows you to come up from his pass, you come oout and run to his back. however, everyones resonse who uses this pass is to try to drive your hips down. when uke tries to force your hips down, form the upwards position that you are holding yourself with your posting hand throw yourself to the other side of the uke. jump your hips and body position to the side away from where it was facing. use your legs to complete the sweep, but the real impetus of the sweep, comes from the hip switch. Trained hard with regis. he only caught me once. Rolled through Eric and Pete.

Judo was good. Several of the BJJ white belts were in class. i covered the seoi nage from the turtle and the trap and roll.
we then did the sticky foot kosoto gari and a same sided seoi nage on the crash pad. Cyrus did a nice job working with the new girl cherry. lots of whte belts in class and not much rank, lately. hate to admit how much easier it is to teach a cohesive class with this group that the hodge podge that we have had recently, but its true.

Monday, April 17, 2006

Sunday 4/16/6

I taught the Judo class. Again it was mostly novices, so I kept it simple. We did a clock choke and the trap and roll.

From the feet we did Sasai Tsurikomi Ashi and then osoto gari and discussed combining the two. It went well and did a little randori at the end. Lee is showing good improvement and seems to have a good future if he sticks.

Thursday 4/13/6

Urso just did an open mat. I trained but mostly Light and protected my knee.

I taught the Judo class. i hate to say it but sometimes it is nice not to have any distractions for the other instructors who can be a loose cannon (i.e. Art and Timone) It does give the class a little more cohesion when everyone is doing the same thing. I did the pedro style Jjuji gatame turnover. and then did harai oshi and osoto gari. it was mostly novices, but the did well and improved so it was a good class.

Tuesday 4/12/6

BJJ taught by Urso. he did a very interesting X guard position. From the conventional X guard position to get the sweep he dropped the high hook around the low hook and rehooked on the ankle. He pulled the ankle and scissored the top hook to get the sweep. You don't want to pushat all, just scissors the takedown.

Unfortuantely my knee popped right away from the X guard and I was forced to sit out of the drills. I rolled with a few of the guys. Jay is a particularly bad match up for me. I caguht him repeatedly. it is a good example of a good player who just matches up poorly against another player.

i also had Jen and Amir. i did more coaching during the set than actual training.

I taught the white belt class. We had 6 and I taught the Regis Half butterfly sweep.

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Saturday 4/8/6

skipped class unitl today to prepare for Pan-Ams in BJJ. I am fighting the +214 division in senior 1 (35-40). We have a good contingent of around 10-12 competitors in LA. The tournament was up and down. i technically won my division but it wasn't contested. I fought the open division and fought a small (145) guy in the first round, named Clint Crabtree. He was a wrestler and despite the size diffeerence, wouldn't pull guard as I expected. I snaped him down and forced him to pull. I wnet to the Bull pass and drove my shoulder in his belly as I passed. He tapped and complained of a rib injury. The referee allowed him to start the match again even though he tapped. he squirled back to his feet and Ijust held him off for the rest of the match as he tried to take me down. i waited adn threw him with Osoto Gari in the last few seconds to win 5-0.

The next match was against a Brazilian 190 pounder. he also wouldn't pull, and i was leary of throwing foreward and missing. he broke my balance with a decent Sasai Tsurikomi Ashi, but didn't throw or get vantage. I waited until the last few seconds to try to throw. He stayed behind me and I missed the throw. The idiot ref actually gave him 2 for it. Regis said he should have had a vantage. I don't really understand that, but, it tells me that I have to reevaluate how and what I throw in BJJ. I think that I am going to work on Sasai and sumi gaeshi. i watched him fight and i really think that my matwork is better but I am having trouble with the transition, if i fail to throw. I don't want to leave him behind me, so i have to make some decisions about what I throw. I also need to get over the fear of the throw and just attack and if I miss, continue with matwork. I am trying to hard to make it a Judo match and just throw in the last few seconds to win. i need to attack early and then just play the rest of the game. One thing that I notcied was that Senior 1 brown belts do not pull. Sean Basfield was the only guy who pulled at all, and he only did it occaissionally.

Ronniw ent 1-1 in his divisiona nd took bronze. he wrecked a guy, submitting him from behind and then lost a winnable match when he mistook the score and thought that he was winning. He was manhandled in the Open division.

John looked good with and exellent sweep to win his first weight division match. then lost in the finals to take silver. He fough the open of my division and got 2 byes to the semis. He threw Bansfield but was choked across his face. he took bronze in that division.

The rest of the team did OK. particularly Tim S., who took a bronze in his purple belt Pan Ams. in a 30 plus man division going 4-1 with 3 submissions.

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Wednesday 4/5/6

242.

On a personal not as it will effect my training, I received 6 weeks notice on the job front. This is anything but unexpected as the office is moving towarfds closing for some time. but now I will have a definate date, May 15.

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Tuesday 4/4/6

242.

Regis did the 2 point scoring class. after a couple of sets he put just the competitors into the mix. I am still not feeling as shrp or fresh as i would like, though, part of it is the competition is better in this group. (me, ron, Diego Moraeis, Tim, John P. and Brian R. a tough group). I mostly won. I almost passed diego but he started to Zoo and i accepted the sweep. I passed him a few more times and threw him big once. Tim caught me once, and Brian stalled with me until Regis put him out. I won the rest.

The downside is my knee was locking and bothering me. Everyone clinging to the half guard has put some strain on it the last few days.

I taught the white belt class. Urso is fed up with it after the incident with Shawn last week. He was forced to kick Shawn out of class for the way he was playing with another white belt. John was there and said that Shawn created the problem, but urso said he was blamed by the powers that be. So, as a result, he does not want to have to work with the white belts . I'm not sure if this will continue, but, it seems that we will be teaching again. I continued with the class that he had planned. I covered escapes from cross side and pulling guard from a turtle after you escape. Good class and several of the guys show a lot of potential. Unfortunately it seems that we will lose Darryl in a few months.

Tuesday 4/4/6

242.

Monday 4/3/6

No kettlebells this week. I want to feel as fresh as possible for pan ams. I will do class, though.

BJJ with Regis. The class was tough. I am working my weight down so I only had some peanuts all day before class. I would have been better having nothing. Regis did the 2 point drill for an hour or so. I stayed in for awhile, then Cyrus managed to knock me down. I found the sets more fatiguing than usual. Even the small guyus were just clinging to me, so it was tiring just to pry them off of me. Regis gave me a little grief about letting them jump and close the guard, but my thinking was that this would make it as hard as possible. After I was out I got Zak and passed him. As i became more fatigued I began to stop letting guys jump and throwing them. Zak was expecting me to let him jump but I hooked him in an Osoto Gari and hammered him. i then threw Pete and let him bump me over. This should be 2 and vantage so i should win. Regis gave him the points, I think to get me to stop accepting the bump. I came back in and passed Zak again. Only other note was that Brian Rago stayed in for the whole set. He is clearly the best blue belt.

I stayed for Judo but only coached.

Monday, April 03, 2006

Sunday 4/2/6

No class today. I went to coach the clubs players at the Liberty Bell tournament. The tournament was well run as always with 6 mats going, 3 of which are tatamis. I was generally happy with the performances of the group. Lee somehow went 0-2 despite dominating both matches. Jim went 1-2 and took third. He had an injury bye against a guy he would have wrecked, or he would have gone 2-2. Taku went 0-3 in the black belt division. he was competitive, but should have been in masters. Alma went 1-2 in a 2 person round robin format and took a second. Lawrence went 1-2 and threw a convincing Ippon, in his first tournament. he was 45 and fought adult. Mike Korzinsky went 2-2 in his first tournament in years. Timone fought adult and masters and went 4-4 overall. Sharon made a return to Judo and went 1-1 in masters women. Joe Chiu went 0-3 in masters, he is better in class that a tournament. All in all a solid showing, though i remanin frustrated that people who are purportedly in leadership positions within the club continue to do little to nothing to support the club outside of the rare class appearance. They barely find time to go to an occaissional class and do nothing else. Sometimes I think that they look on themselves as Jiu Jitsu players who used to do Judo rather than actual active members of the club.

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Saturday 4/1/6

BJJ this morning. Urso taught a way to avoid the double underleg pass. Keep tension and make yourself stiff and heavy so that it will be difficult to lift you to throw the leg over and get the collar. Anticipate the side that will reach for the collar and catch the bicep with the hand on that side. You drop the knee inside on the same side that you catch the bicep, pass the foot down and back inside to make space and regain the guard. This is the last way to avoid the pass.

The bettter way is to anticipate that the uke is attempting the pass. When he drops his hands to go under the legs, sit up strongly and grab the beltwith one hand. the hand that grips the belt pulls the ukes head down strongly. use the elbow of that hand in the back of the neck of the uke, driving it down to the mat, past the hip, on the same side as the arm that reaches for the belt. If uke passes his haed across to the other side, then you can't use this defense. Now, scoot you butt to the side away from ukes head, until you can reach around the back of the htigh of the uke. You can cup it, ot (ronnie did this and I liked it) grab the belt or lapel under ukes belly to secure the grip. Now, tuck your foot on the side towards where you are scooting, underneath you. Block the far knee of the uke and essentially Kharabelli him over on to his back.

I had 10 minutes with Dr. Joe. and then I took the big white belt from Miles Moffits club, Jack for 10-15 minutes. he was strong but he tries to play like he is small instead of just tossing guys off of him. But, he moves well and has good potential.

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