Holiday Class

Yesterday being the 4th of July, normally there would be an open mat…but with Bernardo in town, it’s a combination of drilling and open mat.

The drills we ran were three variations on a De La Riva sweep. The first is one we’ve done before. Sit up and hug a leg, switch grips and roll for the sweep. The next one is a backup if he breaks your grip while you’re switching hands, you just grab his nearside arm instead. The last is if he breaks that one too, or you can’t grab it, you can grip his lapel or belt instead.

I rolled with Renato, Arya, a new guy Matt, and then Renato again. I was going to call it a day and head home…and then Damian pointed at me and called me out.

We had a good roll together. He swept me a couple of times with that damn butterfly guard sweep that I hate. I did get a turtle shoulder roll back to guard at one point, and then used that same sweep back at him. Mounted, I went high up on his chest and then for an armlock, which he defended, so I countered with a triangle. He told me that I “needed to be more squirmy” and work on my defense. I said that I was having trouble finding that boundary between “I’m okay” and “I’m starting to be in trouble”…and he said “that’s why you’re a blue belt” Which makes perfect sense!