Oli & Jadon joined me last night for another Newaza only
session at Yoshin Ryu. This was the second week running that Oli had attended
this class which, until last week, he hadn't been on the mats’, other than to
assist teaching the kids class at Dorking, for almost 1 year. It was perhaps
for this reason that I refused to tap when he caught me with a nice collar
strangle last week. I was pretty close to going out but for some reason (ego
perhaps) I decided I was not going to tap to him, due to his inactivity and how
that would look for me tapping to someone who, by his own admission, was a
little rusty. Luckily for me I was able to eventually escape his strangle and
the rest of the roll was a good back and forth exchange although neither of us
were able to get a submission or pin.
Last night Oli was the first person I sparred with and again
we had a good back and forth tussle. Both of us actively going for subs and
defending and reversing our positions. No subs were forthcoming again but it
was a very enjoyable roll.
I had a nice roll with Jadon where I was able to pass his
guard in to Yoko-shiho-gatame but in a moment of madness I looked away from him
and he was able to trap my head with his leg and turn it in to a San-gaku-jime
where he eventually got the tap. The rest of our roll was pretty close and I
was actually able to return the favour when he passed my guard and got a
Yoko-shiho-gatame on me as I used the same escape on him but matte was called
before I could try for the submission.
An orange belt was next, who also trains BJJ at RGA in
London and is a blue belt. He pulled guard and tried to play spider guard but I
was able to shake off his grips, pass his guard and sink in Sode-guruma-jime
for the tap. We started again and he continued with a very open guard, clearly trying
to play spider guard. I grabbed his legs and spun him over where I attacked the
turtle with a Juji turnover and finished him with a Juji-gatame.
Sensei Dave was next
and he played guard to start with. I attempted to use the techniques he had
taught the class earlier on him (Sode-guruma-jime) but this obviously wasn’t going
to work on him. It was when he decided he wasn't going to play on his back anymore
that I started to get in trouble and he caught me with a couple of subs towards
the end and a pin.
Something that I took from watching the Judo at the recent Commonwealth
games was said by Neil Adams regarding attacking the neck and then the arm and
vice versa. I noticed last night that when I attacked someone’s neck they invariably
presented an armbar opportunity. The same thing happened when I looked for
their arm, they left their neck unguarded. This may seem quite basic and I've
probably been told this before but it really worked for me. I’m gonna have a
play with this and see if my submission ratio improves. It certainly did last
night.
