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.