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Wednesday, September 1, 2010

I Need to be a Parasite

Weird title? Yeah, well I'm a weird girl. But that is an actual thought that went through my head while I was grappling someone yesterday afternoon.

I was grappling a guy who weighs a somewhere close to twice my body weight. Literally. I cannot close guard or a triangle around him. Even though he's a big guy, he moves a lot. He makes a noticeable effort to use technique and not muscle, but he is still a heck of a lot stronger than me. I was feeling tired yesterday and had just gotten out of the grapple where I rolled the wrong way and tweaked my knee. I wasn't really looking forward to grappling this guy.

When we sat down to start, I thought, "I need to be a parasite and move around him. Or else I am about to be pancaked."

The whole grapple, I tried to think like that. I didn't worry about trying to control his whole body. I couldn't do that. Instead, I used my whole body to attack either his upper half or his lower half.

I would have thought it would be harder to sweep him doing things this way, but I actually found it to be a little easier. If one half of his body is going a certain way, the other half really has no choice but to follow. It was also a lot less intimidating for me. I know it doesn't make much logical sense, but dividing him up that way in my mind made him seem less scary. lol

One thing I noticed that I need to improve on is being tight while at the same time not being tense. I need to leave less space, but not grab and hold. It's such a hard balance to find.

4 comments:

Kalle said...

Absolutely. I apply the same kind of thinking whenever I've taken someone's back. My thought is "I am a backpack."

Georgette said...

This is exactly how I look at controlling from the top. I control one half (usually the head and a shoulder or two) and the rest follows or at least is neutralized. I also think like a parasite (I think spider actually) when I'm taking the back from guard, halfguard, etc.

Laura said...

I think 'heavy wet blanket'. It makes it harder for the guys to benchpress me.

Megan said...

Love it. Definitely going to pass it on to some of the littler ladies at the gym.