"I'm a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doom
I kill conversation as I walk into the room
I'm a three line whip, I'm the sort of thing they ban
I'm a walking disaster, I'm a demolition man ..."
*
A little under a year of training and I finally end up putting somebody out of commission.
We were doing takedown-only line sparring. I’d been through a few times. My takedowns aren’t great, but they are better than average and I’m not an easy guy to take down either. I’ve got a pretty low center of gravity, good strength and balance.
Anyway, I had just managed to throw Brandon the judo guy. He says he was exhausted—and I believe him. But it was still nice to get a throw—not a single-leg, not a double-leg, but an actual throw—on him. So I stayed and he went back into the line.
Next up was this new white belt, probably a weight class below mine. He looked a little nervous and tentative, as most new white belts do. I didn’t think it would be hard to take him down at all and, since I’d just thrown a judo guy, I thought he would probably be pretty susceptible to the same thing.
Well, yes and no. I managed to get grip on his sleeve and my other arm free. I stepped through and reverse pivoted, swinging my free arm under his “trapped” arm. I didn’t catch him at first, so I “seionaged it” by dropping to the mat to roll him. Trouble was, he didn’t roll and instead just sort of collapsed under me to avoid going over my shoulder.
I fell on him. When I heard him cry out, I looked down and thought it was his ankle that he’d hurt. But as it turned out, it was his knee. Rodrigo and Mamazinho checked him out, then Maggie the Blue (who has some sort of medical experience or something) followed up. He was done for the evening. They iced it, and later I helped him out of the academy into the SUV of another new white belt who was giving him a ride home.
The guy had a pretty good spirit about it, saying “it’s part of the game.” I felt really shitty and uninspired afterwards. I rolled with Clint and Robert (both blue belts) while the injured guy was on the sidelines waiting for the class to end, but it was pretty uninspired rolling on my part. I managed to fight off a Clint triangle. Robert caught me with a cross choke toward the end of our five minutes. I don’t think the sparring would have gone any differently. But I just didn’t feel any fire.
These things happen in this sport. A part of me is glad that at least the guy wasn’t preparing for the tournament next week. But another part of me is worried that since the guy just started, getting what is probably a significant ACL or MCL injury might keep him from coming back. I know that new students are a crapshoot in terms of sticking with it. But I hate to feel as if I’ll play a negative role as he ponders his return.
Very much appreciated Maggie telling me not to be too upset about what happened. I remember when Mario got his knee fucked up that Saturday months ago. The guy he was rolling with definitely felt bad about it and I don’t think I’ve seen him since (he wasn’t a regular, anyway, though).
I suspect we’ll be warned to be careful the next time we do takedown sparring. I know that Mamazinho is just trying to get us ready for the tournament. I want to keep working throws because I think my balance is superior to most of the guys I’m likely to fight. But I’m guessing Mamazinho will be emphasizing the single and double-leg takedowns from now until next Saturday.
In other news, I finally nailed that reversal from the scarf hold while doing side control drills with Brandon who, as a judo guy, seems more comfortable with the scarf hold than the traditional jiu jitsu side control. On the negative side, I don’t do well escaping from mount. I can do the Gracie Brothers upa move pretty well. But elbow escaping out of the mount—as a lot of guys are able to do with me—is something I’m still terrible at. I need to work on that, if only to set up the Gracie Brothers upa escape.
Back to the mat Tuesday night. The capoeira folks will be there with their drums and spinning limbs. Might be just the tonic I need to get my mind back on track.
