MMA and me; day 72

So I couldn't go to the gym yesterday, because this year is my high school wrestling coach's 30th year coaching, and there was a small gathering of wrestlers past to thank him and embarrass. It was pretty cool. I did go to the gym on Monday, but never got a chance to blog yesterday because I was too busy. So lets talk about Monday.

I went in for MMA class first, and we worked on a lot of Muy Thai clinch, and knees. We started off with pummeling drills, where all you're doing is trying to get an underhook on one side, and an overhook on the other, and swim your overhook to an underhook as your partner does the same. First was just a clinch drill, where your partner gets their hands around your neck, and tries to pull your head down. This is defended by trying to look at the ceiling, and walking your hips in towards theirs. We did that for a round, then worked on countering the clinch. From walking your hips in, you swim one of your hands under their arms, and slip it behind their neck. You then push them back and look away, then quickly pummel your other hand around their neck and gain your own Thai clinch. Lastly, we worked on throwing knees. Your partner has a kick shield, and you put them in the clinch. From there, you push them away, and then pull them to the side of your rear leg, and drive the point of your knee straight towards the midsection. We finished off with planks and it was on to kickboxing.

We worked on teeps, or push kicks, in kickboxing. This kick is usually used to control distance, or to drive back an opponent who likes to crowd you. First, the rear leg push kick, where you bring your knee straight up, and lean back as you pop your hips forward and really drive your leg to full extension. It's more of a shove than anything else, but it's with your leg, which is much stronger than an arm. Next was a front leg push kick, which feels a little odd. You bring your rear leg up near your front leg, then it's the exact same movement, knee up, lean back, extend hips and push. We then worked on a couple combos involving the push kick. First a lead leg push kick to high 10. As you push through with the front kick, instead of bringing the foot straight down, move it off to the side, lean over to that side, and bring the 10 up with mean intentions! The last one was odd, because it was two kicks thrown from the same side. You start with a lead leg push kick, but instead of bringing the leg back to a normal fighting stance, drop it straight down so you are in an opposite stance. From there, run your rear leg (formally your lead leg) over to the outside, and dig in a low 10. It's a lot like when we learned a switch stance to run up low 10. It felt pretty nasty! We finished with planks, and leg holds, then it was time to grapple.

No technique, just an hour of grappling. I rolled for probably 45-50 minutes, 10 of which was spent under a kid that weighs quite a bit more than me, but I am proud to say the only one who tapped me out was my coach. Yay me!