Another great session this week. It's still all about the guard passes, which is great as far as I'm concerned, tonight working against the spider guard (another version of Rodrigo's folding pass v.s. the DLR and a pass I call the Jack Pass) as well as a refresher on the Fowler pass from Monday.
As I've said, I love the fact that I'm getting to spend so much focused time on guard passing. So much of jiu jitsu is about developing sensibilities, and there's no better way to develop sensibilities than do repetitions, drill, over and over again. There are a lot of other considerations, I suppose. You don't want "bore" anyone. But the fact of the matter is that there's really only one way to get better, and training lately has been especially geared toward that very purpose.
The armbars from mount/armbar escape to side control was a nice late drill, and then to finish up with something fast paced like the arm drag drill - just a perfect class.
Live training was about 30+ minutes with Danny, Lance (2x) and a purple belt from Bellevue, Darrin. Great challenges all - and different looks. My game wasn't flowing as automatically as I'd like, even from half guard. But there were some good moments, including my first ever Glover #2 deep half pass to the back (I didn't get the back-take, but it was the first time I'd ever really gone after that move in live training), that are worth carrying forward.
One thing I've noticed rolling with black belts over the past week (Profs. Rodrigo and Carlos, Casey and Lance) is that I end up pulling out of my gi all sorts of techniques that I never use otherwise, but have been desperate to integrate into my game. That deep half move is one example. The single X is another. And even though I'm rarely successful, the fact that these moves come rocketing out of my subconscious when I'm under the stress of a black belt trying to pass my guard.
Most of the time I just get passed. But every now and then, something I'm not expecting happens and it's the second or the third attempt at the pass that works instead of the first. And sometimes defending until the second or third pass is accomplishment enough.
161.2 on the scale, post-train. Steady as we go. Off the mat tomorrow. Back on Friday and Saturday if I'm lucky.
