Pretty straightforward last night. 8 minute rounds, starting in side control. Top guy can only do one of two different armlocks, bottom guy has to defend his arms and regain guard. Chad and I paired up and drilled it twice each side. It was pretty tough. When I was on the bottom, I defended pretty well, and got back to half guard a couple of times, but never all the way to full guard. When I was on top, I never got an armlock, but never let him get back to guard either. So it was pretty much a half hour stalemate between us.

Tim was watching and provided a couple of interesting pointers for both of us. For me, I was having trouble switching from side control to north/south, Chad was blocking my hip with his elbow and forearm. But if I rock my hip back and forth a little bit as I’m rotating around toward his head, I can get past that. I did manage it a couple of times, but didn’t time switching my grip from his head to his arm very well, so he would pop back to side control, and I’d have to start over.

I stuck around for the tournament prep session too. I’ve been thinking about and visualizing nailing a takedown all week, and wanted a shot at it. However, we had an odd number, and me being the only one that wasn’t actually doing the tournament, I dropped out. Sat on the sidelines and watched for a bit, chatting with Kevin, a morning regular that I haven’t met before.