Good training today, though again the paradox of time continues as I arrive on the mat just as the warm-ups are getting underway. The Self-Defense moves were techniques against the around the neck choke from behind, with and without the choke-side leg stepped forward. This is basic choke-protect, squat, look-away, hip throw stuff, with the caveat with the leg being that you want to step out and around with the choke-side leg around his leg and then go back to parallel stance and then trip the guy backwards over your leg.
More work from the back as The Fundamental. I really like the rear mount work we've been doing for the past several classes and I can feel my confidence from that position increasing. Like I said, given my growing preference for chokes, mastering rear mount is a priority.
And so is escaping it. I spent far too much time fighting off a pretty persistent attack from a tough white belt, Clay, during the final sparring session. I've got to do a better job of pausing and executing my escapes instead of trying to deal with bad situations athletically. That's a mistake I've pretty much eliminated from my mount escape game. It's good to get more training improving that strategic aspect of my rear mount escape game.
I was having more trouble converting Turtle top to rear mount than I would have liked. There's clearly some major technical issue - my guess is that I'm not gluing my chest to his back when I make the sit back and spin move, so I end up trying to pull him with me instead. One nice thing, though, was that I got to see the detail that Rodrigo was showing with the pivot-knee side elbow to the mat. Maybe improving this detail will help with the sit & spin also.
162.4 on the scale post train. Rodrigo announced that we were going to start competition training Monday and Tuesday nights at 7 p.m., Fridays at 12:30 p.m. and Saturday at 12 noon. With the Revolution about 10-11 weeks out, it's getting to be about that time and I'm looking forward to what the competition training classes will be like. I'll be looking to get 2-3 of those sessions in a week, in addition to the competition training. This will require, among other things, getting some rest during the day so that I'm clocking 9 hours of sleep a day.
As Bryan joked, I don't have a lot of purple belt competitions left. The idea of significantly "improving" my record as a purple belt is out due to math, and I'm not even preoccupied with the idea of "going out with a bang" as a motivating factor for the July Revolution. More than anything, I want to finally feel fully "present" in a match, and a part of that (a large part) will be getting my conditioning to a level that it hasn't ever been at before.
I also need to take an inventory of mistakes - and now, with 10+ weeks go is the best time. Chronic issues like passing the guard and taking the initiative standing as well as other issues like having the right fuel at the right time (no more competing on an empty stomach as I did earlier this year are things that are less likely to recur if I focus on them now.
The Gracie Barra Friendly is on May 22nd - two weeks after the Renzo seminar. That will be a pretty good opportunity to see where I'm at in a point-jiu jitsu sense with (hopefully) three, 4x training weeks at my back.
