10:00am private Kelly –
Gi - First off, to find someone who teaches in a way that really clicks for you is a priceless asset. I experience too many “a-ha” moments to mention them all. I will say that although it’s going to be a very hard road I’m going to go ahead and embrace the Gi training. Although it was an utter train-wreck for me today; I can see the beauty on the other side. Because today was my first Gi day we talked a little about grips and she showed me two chokes. I have to say it is real nice having all these cool handles conveniently placed all over the opponent; but getting handled in my Gi was a real eye-opener. The first thing that became glaringly obvious to me is that I am NOT in tune with it (my gi) at all. I would find that I couldn’t, for example, move my knee and I would basically mentally write it off and try something different. It’s not my first thought to make the connection that clearly they have a hold of my Gi at the knee and are controlling my knee with it and I should probably stop that. I’m not making that connection at all. I’m not feeling through the Gi, but I’m sure that has to get better. Right now it feels like all this extra stuff between me and the opponent. Gi: 2, Lynn: 0
Hips - A few classes ago Kelly told me some conceptual things about hip movement and I’ve noticed that I am starting to apply it better (particularly when I’m in trouble) and that it’s really helping me out a lot, but today I learned a hip movement in side control that had never occurred to me. The concept of using the hips to clear the arm or the knee in side control wasn’t going to occur to me naturally. I was going to just keep driving and driving to no avail. Having a private class is the.coolest.thing.ever.
Don’t quit - I also need to not give up on something when it doesn’t work the first time or when the outcome is not what I expected. A prime example of this was when she would be passing my guard and the way I would move my hips out would allow her to press her hip down next to me and then I’d think, “Well, that didn’t work like I planned” and sort of blank out. After I did this a few times we addressed it with “keep moving the hips out”. In essence, I would try once and then quit. Same with sweeps, shrimps, etc. Don’t give up on it.
Brain disconnect - Everything from here on out was a total disconnect between my conscious brain and my physical body. Many examples of “I know this, but I did this instead”.
Death Grip - I was seeming to do better with another major concept about keeping elbows and knees in until we noticed that all session I kept getting a grip on her collar or over her shoulder and behind her neck and then just hanging on to that so of course she’d show me the error of my ways by getting that arm isolated. In fact, she did the exact same thing that ended in my arm bar twice in a row. I knew exactly what she was going to do and I couldn’t override the *death grip* command that was sent to my hand and she got my arm again. I noticed that I feel less vulnerable with my arm over her shoulder than under her shoulder. I thought I had learned the value of underhooks in my match and then today I completely disregarded them over and over and over and over. And, of course, Kelly was helpful enough to keep demonstrating my death grip by pushing my head away and letting my own refusal to let go add to my head control stress. She is quite good at the non-verbal lessons.
I’ll need to write “underhooks” on the backs of my thumbs so I’ll see it every time I wrap my arm around the back of their neck and just hang out there. It’s weird to identify something that my brain just keeps ignoring. I can literally say, “Okay, don’t do that” and then 8 seconds later I’ll do exactly that. So, my mantra last week was “hips, hips, hips”. I’m thinking this next week will be “underhooks, underhooks, underhooks” .
Make space – Related to my lack of letting go with my grip in order to try to get an underhook is my seemingly natural instinct to close the space no matter what. I intellectually know that BJJ is about closing space when you need to and also about making space when you need to. However, physically I apparently am only comfortable closing the space. I think the death grip around the back of their neck is related to this and so is my inability to get my knee in there when I want to. I have plenty of room to go ahead and make more room (sliding my hips back or away) in order to get my knee in, but I would just stay so tightly engaged that I wouldn’t allow myself the room. In essence, I will suffer (Kelly proved this over and over today) to stay tightly engaged even when making space would be very good for me. I won’t “make space”. Seriously gotta get over that.
Knee - The other thing I’d like to see happen more naturally is getting the knee in there when they want to pull me into guard. During tit-for-tat today I overcommitted forward and I could feel that I was in a place where her next move was going to be to pull me into her guard and I couldn’t think of what to do about it….so simple, get that knee up. It’s bizarre the things that my brain decides to ignore or just refuse to commit to long term memory.
I know things will occur to me over the next few days that I can't recall so I'll add them later.
No comments:
Post a Comment