MMA and me; day 193

After one day back in the gym after two weeks off, I am a walking ball of sore. Everything hurts, but I just don't care. We worked kickboxing in stand up today, and I'm sure the trend of soreness will extend into tomorrow. First we did skippies, but instead of doing them up against the pad wall, we partnered up and did them into a kick shield. Without hanging too rough on the neck, we threw knees continuously for three minutes, then switched, then repeated it all over again. Next, we put on our shin guards, and moved on to bump drills with counters. So when throwing a leg kick, the usual reaction is to counter with the other leg after your opponent brings their leg back to resume their stance. The drawback to this, is that it is expected, and very easy to counter, or check. Instead, if you return the counter kick with the same side leg that was attacked, you target the leg that is likely to have all the weight resting on it, and can really inflict some damage. We did two rounds of this, with each partner getting a chance to be the initiator. We then did a round of kicking to the midsection and instead of holding a pad, we used our hands with boxing gloves placed over our hip bone on the outside to catch the kick. The motion of the kick to the body is different, as the motion is upward into the ribcage, instead of downward, digging into the thigh muscle. We finished off with a five minute round of touch sparring, just like yesterday, except with punches and kicks. Class ended with two two minute rounds of knee push ups, and like Coach said, anyone who calls them girl push ups to imply ease needs to get kicked in the junk. They are TOUGH!!! Great class, and then we moved on to jiu jitsu.

Like yesterday, we warmed up before getting into the meat of class. Some stretching, and work on the balance ball got a light sweat going, before we brought out the grappling dummies. We worked the same transitions we did as yesterday, again keeping the focus on pressure. We added a few new positions to the chain, knee ride, chest knee ride with a body shot, buck mount, double knee ride, back spin from chest mount to side control, among the few I'm sure are escaping me at the moment. We next worked on passing guard techniques, including the cartwheel pass of half guard. Getting earthquake braces on either side, on the near side by the head, and the hip on the far side, driving your head to the mat on the far side, From here, go up into a head stand and whatever way their legs move, fall away from them, even if you have to fall into a bridge on the other side of the body. You can flip your hips faster then they can reclaim guard, and BAM, you're in side control. Another way to pass, is to switch your hand placement, putting your near side hand by their hip and on the opposite side, and your far side hand up by the head, on the opposite side, which allows you to cartwheel from your knees over and around their head to land in either north/south, or far side control. Lastly, we revisited the lunge pass. Key points here, are strong posture, a firm grip on the Gi jacket with one hand, and the other firmly on the stomach, right above the....well let's say junk (or hands on hips in no-gi) keeping a rounded back, and extending your hips to prevent from being broken down. Wait for an opportunity to drive a knee into their backside, and lunge your other leg far out behind you, straight back, and when it is as far back as you can get it, while maintaining your pressure, turn towards the lunged back leg until their guard pops open, and as soon as that happens simultaneously swim the arm opposite your lunged leg into the gap in their legs you've created to under hook that leg, and over hook their other leg with your other arm. It shouldn't be too much of a straight up and down over/under hook. It should be your hands off axis of the elbows as much as possible, and you need to be driving the shoulder of the over hook into their stomach, which is made easier by posting up on your feet and popping your behind high up in the air. From here, drive your head to the mat on the side of your under hook, and wait for your chance to pass. Either headstand pass, or if they try to drive you over, curly away from them and pass the leg to end up in side control. The key to all of this is pressure, pressure, pressure. Great classes!!