MMA and me; day 210/211

So last Thursday was pretty much a full day of grappling. For almost the entire two hours, I rolled with three of my teammates, and my coach, with the small addition of only being able to go for leg locks. It was tough, and I was incredibly sweaty by the end of the day, but I learned a greater appreciation for the art of the leg lock, and it made me realize that it is mentally exhausting to focus on one specific set of moves, and when you add that to something that is physically exhausting, well dang!

Last night, we worked some simple combos in stand up. We began by doing 100 punches worth of the 1-2 combo, and then the rhythm drill with 100 uppercuts. Next was three rounds of punch ups, with one 3 minute round, then two 2 minutes rounds, dropping down for pushups after the last two rounds, then we got to the combos.First, a round each with our partner of 1-2-3-low 10. Making sure to rotate on the heel as we stepped across for the 10, and circling off after finishing the combo. For the next two rounds each, we eliminated the 1, and added a feint. We also changed up our rhythm and speed on each combo, trying to keep the other person off balance. Fun class, and it was time to grapple.

More leg locks last night, focusing mainly on flowing, listening to coach, and the 50/50 guard. A lot of what we worked on, we've been doing so for the past couple of weeks, but the new thing, the 505/ guard, is pretty solid. With both legs around one of theirs, you'd think you're in danger of being heel hooked, or Achilles locked, but since you have both legs on one side of your body, you can use the leg that they are not attacking to push off the lock and defend yourself. If you can fend off the leg lock attempts, and frustrate them enough, their focus will not be on defending their own legs, leaving them wide open for you to get a submission of your own. We also worked on transitioning grips. The grip for a kimura, is exactly the same as a toe hold on the same side, and we drilled just going from kimura to toe hold, back and forth on both sides. Starting from a toe hold, as they sit up to defend, you can just lean back into a kimura, not changing your grip, just switching what you are grabbing onto, and shifting into a high judo position. From there, if they sit up into you, there is a knee bar you can hop into, and roll over their body to finish, or you can transition to a calf slicer, toe hold, or almost any of the locks we worked on last week! Leg locks are so fricking cool, it's ridiculous. Great classes!