The BJJ Club and Karate

I have to write to half page papers about my experiences with the club on Saturday and tonight with Roberto's dojo. (He's the black belt that I mentioned two posts down.) So, I just signed up to be on his e-mail list. When I wrote a little about myself, I told him how I felt about the class and a little about Goju-Ryu. I went to my dojo's website, Family Karate Center, I found out that they are holding a Gasshuku during the time I'm going to be in Spokane. For me, that's a bad thing because I wanted to go to Sensei Levi's class and learn how to grapple. It wouldn't cost me anything. Now, if I want to go I at least have to pay 35 to 45 dollars. I'm sad because I want to see everyone and say goodbye. I don't think I'm going to be in Spokane because I'm busy with school and we are getting rid of the house this month. :(

My body is complaining right now because I had four and a half BBJ training today. My body is so tired. My body is always tired after my BBJ class at BYU. I pretty much work three hours straight. Now, I'm more tired because I went to Roberto's dojo. I have a really good bruise on my left foot, a few on my for arms, a big bruise and a little one on my right knee, and a blotch of bruises on the inside of my biceps which consists of 23 little bruises all together The blotches look bad; bad because there are so many of them, but don't hurt when I press down on them. The few on my forearms and knee the ones that hurt. The bruise on my foot hurts the most when I press down on it. I'm not complaining. I'm just recording how many bruises I got today. I'm totally used it with being in karate.

Anyways, I need to write about Saturday and tonight since they are still somewhat fresh in my mind. On Saturday, Roberto taught how to defend from the rear naked choke. I defend it by wrapping my arm around the front of my head to defend my neck and having my other hand ready for a hand to go to my side or over my shoulder. If it goes to my side, I grab it, fall to that side, roll over while trying to get my knees and my arm on my opponent's arms to pin it at the same time, and grabbing my opponent's head to get into and break their guard. I tried to do that with Roberto, but that I didn't work. It really worked with Brian, who's 280 pounds. He was lots of fun to work with. I like working with people who's bigger than me because it's harder to win. They have their weight and strength to their advantage. In the BYU class, it seems like most people are smaller than me. There’s a few that a just as big or bigger.

The other defense is to grab the arm that goes over the shoulder, fall to that side, roll to them while sticking your head in the crook of their arm, and get into guard. Probably, I'm missing something because I had a hard time getting that move. Actually before this, we learned to get to from guard to their back. I forget how to do it. I know that one's has to be fast at that technique and so, it wouldn't work for me right now. I worked with Heather on this one. Then, we learned how to do the rear naked choke. I already know how do to that move, so I practiced it twice.

Then, we learned how to defend from it and that's when I started working with Brian. After that, we did some live drills. We started in the back position and someone either choked their opponent or they got into guard. Then, we all just picked a practice partner to roll around with. I got to work with Roberto which was lots of fun. I'm sure he went easy with me. He tried to get me into a whole bunch of arm bars which didn't work because I squirmed out of them. He only beat me by choking me when he was in my guard. If that's the case, I should be able to pull him off of me with my legs. I only beat him with a key lock. When I was his guard, I tried to break it but couldn't because he would always cinch up to my hips when I created space. So, I tried to drive my elbows inside of his legs and groin to break his guard because nothing was working. He started laughing and pulled my arms out of there. I liked working with because I learned a few things.

Then, I rolled with Eric who's a purple belt. I like working with him, but it wasn't as fun as Roberto. Once he had me in a key lock, at first he wasn't doing anything, so I tried to fight it. Then, he finally did it. He said that he didn't do anything at first because he didn't want to hurt me. Roberto said I should have tapped sooner because I couldn't have gotten out of that position. I learned another choke from Roberto, but I can't remember it now.

I should go to bed, but I want to write about my experience I had tonight because it was different too. Probably, I shouldn't write as much because I wrote a whole page that was single spaced. I only have to write a half a page. Actually, I have to go to bed. I haven't done any real homework today. I need to go to my O-chem and stats labs tomorrow because I didn't go to any of my lectures today. I need to do homework for stats, catch up with stats, and do laundry tomorrow. I didn't do any today laundry today because I got my tire fixed right after class and went to Roberto's dojo tonight. Sometime last week, I ran over a screw. So on Saturday, I noticed that my tire was pretty low. Preston said there nail in. It was actually a screw. Today, I went to the repair shop which on the same block and street as I and got it fixed for 10 dollars. I didn't want to go flat on me.