It's Nice Being the Windshield Instead of the Bug

10/23

We started off with 2min drills of as many moves as you could think of from a specific position. I started off fine with KOB submissions, but KOB escapes...not so much. Short of shrimping out, the only ones I could think of were the Sauer hook-the-foot and dump them one way or the other. However, I was missing some key details so was failing pretty badly there.

Technique portion was attacking the turtle. Most of the attacks occurred while they were still in turtle instead of breaking them down. With the exception of the Peruvian, I can't imagine I'd trying to finish a sub while someone is still turtled. We did the Peruvian with and without the gi. Nasty choke.

For whatever reason, the stars aligned and I was on FIRE during the rolls today. Started off with Nate, who got to a top position but I somehow slapped on an inverted triangle without consciously thinking of it. I couldn't finish it though b/c I couldn't figure out the angle that I needed. He got into top position again, and then I again somehow miraculously ended up on his back and was threatening that for the rest of the round.

Then a roll with Jason, who usually has superior open guard control, sweeps me and then works from on top. Today I was able to pass his guard (with a little help from James coaching), get to N/S and then I don't remember what happened. That is far and away the best I've ever done with him.

Last roll was with Todd, who also usually gets on top. Today I got his back too, threatened chokes and arm-bars for awhile, ended up in closed guard, threatened triangles and arm-bars, and was working an omoplata as time ran out. I was in good positions, but his defense was better.

Overall, I'm really, really happy with my rolls today. Mostly I'm happy b/c I was competitive with guys that normally have top position and crush me for the duration of the roll. I'm also happy to see that I'm doing things like getting control of my opponents legs when I'm transitions through various positions.

I wish I could put the previous 24hrs into a bottle so I could have this kindof feeling for every class. I know it's a lot of factors that come together, and many of them aren't under my control. Going to relish it while I can.