Very nice to get to train the deep half transition to regular half as part of Prof. Rodrigo's class Tuesday night. Too often I still get stuck in a "deep half or bust" or "straight half or bust" mindset, that really limits my ability to be effective. That's why I've had the occasional "love/hate" relationship with the whole House of Half Guard.
Some of this is related to what I touched on in the last post. Some of this has to do with movement and trying to develop a much more agile, dynamic jiu-jitsu. Prof. Rodrigo also had us work on a rolling backtake against the deep half as part of a "transitions-only" advanced class that may be a sign of things to come. It took me a little while to get this one insofar as I kept trying to roll forward instead of curling the attacking leg, falling back and then tossing the guy's body in the direction of your legs. One trick I saw Ryan Hall do with a similar move was to use your outside, free foot to push against your attacking, hooking leg to help give you leverage to move the guy's body around.
Another big plus out of tonight's session was a critical detail on the folding pass. Rather than just pushing the leg sideways, you actually want to twist the leg - it's the difference between trying to take the leg from three o'clock to 9 o'clock, say, right through the middle of the clock and, on the other hand, swinging the knee and taking the leg from 3 o'clock all the way around counterclockwise to 7 o'clock. Doing it this way, it was amazing to see how easily the leg/hip could swivel. And as I learned during the specific training with the pass, if the guard doesn't open, then the likelihood of successfully attacking with the knee cross, for example, is pretty good.
159.4 on the scale, post-train. Anything under 160 in the gi is good.
