A goodly sized class to start things off on Monday. A couple of very new folks that Brock ended up working with, and some not so new folks that Lindsey took down stairs for training.
Upstairs with Rodrigo we worked takedowns and X-guard. The takedown drill was a variation on the fireman's carry/kata guruma takedown I remember Rodrigo working on with us late last year. I remember working with Reuben one Friday and having a terrible time getting it right. Working with Benny (the Blue) Tuesday, I was able to do a much better job. I'm glad, because this takedown along with the others that Rodrigo has been working on with us all go together very well: the collar drag to Jacare ankle pick, or to seoi nage and now to kara guruma.
We also worked on some X-guard entries from the sitting/butterfly/Cobra guard. Here you have a behind the back grip and a knee grip out of the guard and, as before, you dive under the leg to get into position below the hips. Dive with your knee grip hand leading, and use your front hook to lift the guy up. You will be driving down a bit in the direction of your knee grip (knee grip shoulder dipping first).
If you can't get the leg high enough with your front hook, or if you just don't have the hip dexterity, you can slide your outside leg through so that both knees are away in the sort of Double X guard position Bravo shows in his first book. But with the right lift with the hook, it shouldn't be too hard to get into the position.
The other variation we worked on was entering the X-guard from standing. Here, you go to double sleeve control with feet on hips. Then switch to a cross guard. Get an underhook on the leg of the sleeve grip side and use your cross guard hook to help create the space necessary to slide the other leg/hook inside.
A very bruising training. We did some specific sparring where we rotated from partner to partner after about two minutes. I went with Benny, Casey, Nate, Lindsey and Lance. Very grueling. I did a little specific sparring afterwards but I, like most people who attended both classes, was pretty much spent.
A horrifying 163.2 on the scale post-train. That at least explains why I've felt so fatigued and sore. My "cardio" per se doesn't feel especially poor - but the extra six pounds, I think, are having a bad effect. I should be closer to 155 than 165 - especially after training. We'll see what the numbers look like after Tuesday.
