My Crazy Gi!!

I finally got my butt in gear and made a gi for Meerkatsu's gi competition. People have made some really cool gis. Go check it out!! :)



For more information about this crazy competition, visit Meerkatsu's Page or Tatami Fight Wear!

In other news, we've had some major plumbing leaks at the house and I've been wrapped up in moving furniture and jack-hammering up the floor. As we speak, I have a friend coming to take out my kitchen cabinets. Sigh...

But the bright spot of today is that I am having a private lesson with Fabio this afternoon! Woohoo! I'm going to ask about guard passing and sweeps from guard. I will let you know how it goes!

I have kind of been "cheating" an getting quasi-privates during every class by watching Fabio when I'm sitting out from rolling. I've noticed several things he does when he is defending his guard and I've tried to mimic them. They've gotten me instant results.

I mentioned a few of them in my previous posts, but here is one more: Fabio has a fifth appendage. (So THAT'S why he's so good! lol). It's his head. He uses his head in the most literal sense. Sometimes, he uses it like an extra arm or leg to pin something somewhere, or make space, or keep pressure.

When he is doing butterfly guard, I noticed that he always uses his head to keep space between himself and his opponent. For butterfly guard to work properly, you need a certain amount of space between you and your opponent so you can get the proper leverage to sweep. Fabio uses his head to keep that distance. And he does it in more than just butterfly guard.

I added that to trying to keep on one hip or the other (to stay mobile) and instantly my guard became a little harder to pass.

There are a few other things I noticed him doing in defense of his guard, but I don't understand them well enough yet to write about them. I plan on asking him about it in today's private. Happy rolling to all of you!!

Move It!!

It's funny to me how Fabio can tell me something and show me something over and over again and it still doesn't take. I understand the concept, but I can't seem to reproduce it in grappling. There's some kind of block. Then, out of the blue one day, something clicks and that little piece of the puzzle falls into place.

That's how it was this afternoon.

I had been having a lot of trouble defending my guard and was using strength, even though I knew that was stupid. I was trying to keep people in my guard. Fabio kept telling me I needed to move my hips. I didn't get what he meant. I thought I WAS moving my hips.

Then, this afternoon, I was sitting out during for one roll and watching Fabio go against another blue belt in the school. He was defending his guard for most of the grapple. He looked effortless while the blue belt was just scrambling trying to get around.

While I was watching, something clicked. I noticed the way he was moving his hips. He was never sitting facing his opponent straight on. He was always on one hip or the other. When his opponent tried to power through on one side, he'd slip out the other side and get his back, or hip out and return to guard, or go inverted and return to guard. Hip, hip, hip. Move, move, move. THAT'S what he had been trying to tell me!

What I was doing was killing my movement by trying to hold the person in my guard with my arms and legs. I was sitting on both butt cheeks most of the time, or worse, laying flat on my back with the person in my guard. It goes against my instincts to think that the way to control someone in a fight is to move. Normally, you'd think the way to control someone is to get them in a position and hold them there. But that's not BJJ. And it doesn't work.

How many times had Fabio or Ben explained this to me? I don't even know. But I couldn't wait to roll again and try it out. When I did, the difference was like night and day. Moving made it easier to stay in a dominant position. It wasn't the SAME position the whole time. But I actually felt less vulnerable. I felt a LOT more mobile to do different things.

After class, I told Fabio that I was finally beginning to get what he had been trying to tell me. He said he knew I would, but that this is how it goes. You hit a wall, get frustrated. The instructor can tell you what you need to do, but only mat time brings you to the place where you can FEEL it and understand it yourself. That's why a lot of people end up quitting. They get to a certain point, hit a wall, get frustrated and decide it's not worth the frustration. The people who stick it out and keep working are the ones who really love BJJ.

Hopefully I will remember this the next time I hit the wall. A friend of mine in class says I go through cycles like this in a regular pattern, every couple of months. I wonder if he's right. I should be able to find out from looking back at my blog. lol

Ye of Little Faith

I have been running into a frustration lately when guys hold onto my arms while I have them in my guard. Whether they are pinning my arms down to the mat, or simply grabbing and holding on wherever my arms happen to be, it's a really frustrating thing.

Ninety percent of the time, said guys are stronger than me. So just yanking my arms free is not an option. Sometimes moving them at all is not an option. I try to do the thing where you turn your wrist around in a circle to break their grips, but sometimes I can't even get my arms off the mat to turn my wrists.

I was talking to Fabio about it this afternoon and I told him I tried and it didn't work. He told me I was trying and giving up. I need to not only turn my wrist one way, but if they resist that way, turn them the other way.

I said, "But they're too strong."

And he shrugged and said, "Ok. Then Jiu-jitsu doesn't work."

That got me back peddling. He has explained to me before that, if someone has my arms pinned, fine. I can still move the rest of my body. If their weight is forward in my guard enough to pin my arms to the mat, I should be able to use my legs against them. I should be able to move my hips.

I can't move them. They are too strong. But I can move myself around them. That's what I have to try to remember.

Technique Today:

We worked on a sweep from butterfly guard. You have your opponent in butterfly guard and you hip out diagonally to one side, keeping your hooks in, but letting your bottom leg be flat against the mat. At the same time, on the same side that you hipped out, you swim the under hook and hold across the person's back. If they post out with their other hand, grab them at the wrist and pull their arm to your hip. This will make them fall on their shoulder. You drop onto your shoulder and onto the trapped arm. Hip into them, using your feet-hooks to bring them over.

Variation: If they sprawl when you hip out diagonally, take their back.