More armbars from the guard today. A big class, with more than a few new folks that Rodrigo worked with. Jesse was there to lead the warmup and teach the class, adding a few extra details to the move on to what Rodrigo and Lindsey went over on Monday.
One thing that Jesse helped me remember is that you are often going to have one side that really works and one side that is competent at best. I actually overheard Rodrigo making this point to Troy and his training partner a few days ago, so in a way the point was only more reinforced.
I don't have a very good armlock from the guard. But the movement to attack the right arm for the armlock is much better than the movement to attack the left arm. So more than just having one side that is not going to feel as good during drills, I also know that when I try to do the armlock in actual sparring and guard/pass guard specific drill, I need to focus on the attack on the right arm, that set-up and others that go well with it.
A couple of observations from the tatame: guys are all over my Flat Pass lately. It reminds me of what happened to my half guard awhile back as guys became more and more accustomed to it. I think the high point of my half guard came this spring at the Revolution when I pulled half guard in my first two matches to go up 2-0. Now is a good time to start to move away from it more aggressively and start to cultivate some other guards that will work for me at the higher levels.
The same is becoming true about the Flat Pass. Part of my disappointment at the last Revolution (a large part) was the fact that I was looking forward to testing the Flat Pass in competition and never really got the chance. Maybe that opportunity will come in December at the inter-school.
But even if it does show up and perform, the Flat Pass needs to go back on the shelf while I develop other guards, especially Scissorhands (given the work on the armbars from the guard), the cross guard and sitting/butterfly stuff, as well.
I like how Rodrigo has been emphasizing only pulling guard to attack with the sweep. I managed to get a couple of good hook sweeps in over the past two days based on trying to follow that thinking. One of the problems with my half guard game has been that I'd started to get into the habit of "Cadillac-ing", hanging out in a position I felt relatively comfortable defending almost indefinitely. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if part of my problems with my shoulder have to do with spending too much time on the bottom on my side.
One of the good things about the sitting guards is that you can't really hang out in them. You're either gaining ground or losing it. There's a little drill I've been trying where I butt-scoot forward quickly and shoot in the hook sweep, the kind of move that can be incorporated into a number of semi-scramble situations.
156.2 on the scale after training. This is about where I want to be for now. I'm looking to train Thanksgiving morning and again on Saturday which will give me a nice four-train week.
