The Can Opener

This is going to be quick because I need to study O-chem. I have a test on Friday. I just want to write a little about BJJ and what I learned today. There is this 19 year old guy who goes the classes during the morning. He's really nice towards me. However, the way he does things annoy me a little. He doesn't that much of a fashionable workout pants. He doesn't own a gi. He wears socks when training because he says that he wants to learn how to grip better with his feet. That doesn't make sense because one would learn how to grip without socks on. I know in Goju-Ryu, we practiced proper stance and tried to grip the floor with our toes. If I wore socks when I did my kata, that would make gliding across the floor a lot easier. I'm surprised that he doesn't listen to our Paul Tom, our professor because he doesn't like that idea either.

I don't think that BJJ comes very natural to him. He's suppose to be strong and a guy. I'm surprised that he doesn't use his strength that much. Maybe, he does at the last minute. However, he just spazzes out and thrashes when I'm close to submitting him. He uses his strength at the wrong spots. I don't think that he has ever mounted me before. He says that he's so used to defending and that's it. He's not used to attacking anybody. Our first sparring match, I beat him with a wrist lock. I tried to armbar him; however, I couldn't make it work. Most of the time, armbars don't work for me. I'm hardly on mount anyways.

So, I let him attack while I defended pretty much minimally. He pulled me into his guard. The first thing he wanted to do is cross choke me. He almost pulled it off; however, I kneaded the bread on him which made him tap out. So, I can only do that on beginners. I did that to Brent one time. He countered by scooting away from me which made the choke even tighter. Every time he attacked me from our knees, he put me into his guard and tried to cross choke me. Of course that didn't work because I have a good defense for it. However, it does make me give up my base though. I pretty much let my lapel go around part of my head instead of my neck. Dave said that's bad because people can cross choke the jaw instead of the neck. He tried to do a wrist lock from guard which didn't work. He tried to do two armbars which were really lose and sloppy.

I'm just surprise that he can't really do anything to me. Pretty much all beginner guys give me a hard time. I can't submit them too often because of their strength. However, I'm getting better because I'm spending more and more time controlling them. I just need to get many of my submissions down. I'm like that guy, I'm so crappy at attacking because I'm always defending.

So, my neck hurts because we practiced the can opener. I stand up in someone's guard, pull at their neck to make them open up, sit on their thighs while squeezing my knees, then throw one leg across their body, and end up chest to chest. He was keeping have a lot of difficulty learning that move. He kept on not having his weight on me. It ended up that he wasn't squeezing his knees. I can defend the can opener is by making a cable grip with my hands and putting my forearm on my forehead. The guy lifted me up while I did that.

Professor said that I can keep my base in someone's guard by putting my hands on their chest instead of under their rib cage. Dave called it the bread basket. Last night, I counted how many months I've been doing BJJ. I was really surprised that I'm at the end of my six month. I should be doing a lot better than this. However, I'm doing OK because only guys that have a lot more experience than me can tap me out just like that. Except with Miller because he's about 300 hundred pounds. Last Saturday, he did a bicep crusher which I didn't see. I thought he was going to do an armbar from side control.

I was disappointed with today because I didn't really get to spar. I was submitted the guy. However, I really wanted my heart to pump and sweat. Professor, only taught us for an hour. He didn't start on time because he was talking to a lady that wanted to use his dojo. Three of his kids where there. I noticed that a guy purple belt liked to scrunch of his face periodically when professor had him show the move against another white belt. Maybe, that's why Dan said not to show anything on your face while sparring. I didn't know if anything was bothering him or not or if it was just a habit. I noticed a girl in my ward named Mo Lee likes to scrunch up part of her face periodically, probably just out of habit. There another girl named Sarah that her smile is lopsided. I met a girl in Bellingham Washington that it seemed like half of her face was paralyzed because her smile was really lopsided.