Competition team training today, with four black belts on the mat and two brown - yikes! myself included along with Lindsey, who I got to train with for a round.
A lot of good training. I had about 8-9 7-minute rolls (Lindsey, Benny, Prof. Christiano, Jesse, Clint, and three other guys - all blue belts - over the course of about 90 minutes. It was a good pace and I felt like I'd gotten a very nice workout by the time the Open Mat session was called.
Not as focused as I would have liked, though I did find myself in deep half with Prof. Christiano. I'd really wanted to work on The Stomp and The Super Stomp from Eddie Bravo's book, Mastering the Rubber Guard. The Stomp and The Super Stomp are both ways to deal with chest-to-chest pressure from the top when in half guard. Saulo has "Bullet-time" (see page 179-180 in Jiu Jitsu University), and Jeff Glover has his deep half replacement. So I figure that if I can add The Stomp to my toolbox, then I'll have an ideal set of tactics from when I'm in the chest-to-chest situation.
Still working on guys flying around my sitting guard - Jesse, Lindsey and Prof. Christiano all hurdled my sitting guard with only minimal interference. I did a better job of controlling the arms against some of the other guys, but I need to do more than just seek to "control" the arms. I need to be working for a real advantage.
A few other notes. Reverse de la Riva guard might be a worthwhile addition to my guard game - I found myself in that position with Benn and didn't really respond as I would have liked. Saulo covers this sweep quite a bit, as well.
My shoulder held up well - despite getting tugged on again when I was trying to pass with the #1 deep half pass. Both of the two times I've been in deep half, it's been the #1 sweep that's gotten me the reverse - even as I'd been looking to go for #2. Again, I'm not finishing off that #1 deep half sweep as I should. But I am getting on top.
160.2 on the scale post-train. A very hard workout today, but I was able to keep up and not take any breaks that weren't the 2 minute team water breaks. The off-mat conditioning is definitely paying off - as is the patience on the mat under pressure.
