This is one of the instructors I’ve been working with, David Boehme, a brown belt who trained under Megaton.
He is a super nice guy and always willing to help. It’s good to train with him because he knows when to go hard and go soft, so that I’m not always being smashed and can actually walk away learning something.
He’s also around my height and my size which also facilitates the learning process.
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Today we reviewed escapes from mount and side control. It’s been a while since I actually went over these so I was a little rusty. Dave had to remind me of the benefits of establishing an underhook when recovering guard from being on the bottom of mount and side control. One thing I had trouble with was trying to recover guard from being on the bottom of side control. It’s easy to drill it, but when we did some live drilling, I couldn’t get it because when I tried to create space with the hip escape he followed my hips with his knees so I couldn’t bring my leg in. The solution to this was just to shift to the other escape where I establish the underhook and turn onto my knees. These escapes always work better when you chain them together shifting from one to the other and back.
He gave me some pointers for me to work on regarding my open guard… I need to extend my legs more when they’re against my opponents hips and my hands are gripping their sleeves, to further make them feel like they’re being stretched out and uncomfortable. When I finally picked this up it turned into a great set up for a triangle.. which I also needed polishing on.
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I still need to work on getting my trunk perpendicular to my partners. Dave also gave me a great pointer on clearing the persons arm/elbow to the other side when I’m trying to finish with the triangle. Extending my hips (clenching my butt together to lift my hips off the ground) is a great way to dislodge their arm, so I can push it to the other side and submit with the triangle.
I showed Dave the Bow and Arrow variations as well as the guard pass I learned at Babalu’s and he had some suggestions for those as well. In regards to the guard pass, he showed me a slight variation where the set up was the same (right hand grabbing lapel, left hand holding his right sleeve or controlling his right hip with elbow at his right thigh), where I start standing with my right foot by his armpit and sort of press my right hip against his left hip… this causes the guy on the bottom to start twisting and is really uncomfortable.. and they’ll eventually open their guard. My right hand shifts from holding his lapel at the level of his mid section to near the bottom of his waist (to protect from triangles). Once that happens I shoot in with my right arm to place their right knee on my left shoulder and I can go for the single or double leg pass.
Overall I feel like I’m making good but slow progress. Can’t wait for the next session.
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