No, not the James Brown song. I just feel good. I’m coming off a week vacation. I’m working on cleaning up my diet again. Rolling in class last night was great. The engine is firing on all cylinders.

I’m always a bit worried about going to class after a break, regardless of how long it was. It seems like my cardio disappears if I don’t go to class regularly. That’s apparently just in my head, as I had no issues last night. I was paired up with Brendan, and newer white belt. He was pretty tense, and the techniques we were doing weren’t easy, so we just went slow and worked as best as we could.

Damian led the class. We did a technique chain starting in guard when our opponent has double under hooks on our legs.

First step, is to never let them join their hands together. We did this by establishing sleeve control on both arms. Then we can raise our hips up and make it difficult for them to pull us in and stack. From here there are many options, but last night we inserted one butterfly hook, released the opposite site arm and kicked up to grab their belt. If they pull one arm out, we can omaplata. If they pull the other out, we stand up in base, and end up in a crucifix position and can inverted armlock. If they bend their arm to avoid the armlock, we somersault into a reverse omaplata. Or, if they keep both arms in, we can grab their outside knee and sweep into side control. It’s a dilemma.

For rolling, we started in the double underhook position. Every time we had to reset, due to submission, off the mat, whatever, we restarted and switched spots. I rolled with Little Bob twice, James, and JR. Did well with Little Bob. Omaplata and a correct backtake that I’ve been working on into a rear naked choke. With James, I got on his back right away and had a pretty good wing choke going, but he was stuborn about it. Switched to an armlock and lost the position. Got on top and landed in a guillotine. We restarted and I did get him in an belly down armlock right at the buzzer.

For the last round with JR, it was first to score a point wins. I never was able to break his grips and pass, and he swept me twice. Over all though, I felt like I was moving pretty well.