03/12/2011 - Mauricio Gomes Masterclass & GB Submission Only Comp

Class #435
Gracie Barra Bristol, (BJJ), Mauricio 'Maurição' Motta Gomes, Bristol, UK - 03/12/2011

I've been out of training for the last week, as last weekend I got some kind of nasty flu. That meant I wasn't sleeping well, so spend the day and night sniffling while wrapped up in a sleeping bag, my laptop at the ready. Also meant I finally got round to watching the commentaries of my Blackadder box set, then put on Battlestar Galactica, which I keep hearing is really good. Decent plot and acting so far, but then I've only been through the mini-series and first episode.

I was determined to make today, as we were going to have the rare treat of Mauricio 'Maurição' Gomes popping down to do a 'masterclass', before the regular internal Gracie Barra competition Geeza runs every few months. If you don't know who he is, Maurição has four major claims to fame: first, he is one of the very few people to be promoted to black belt by Rolls Gracie. Second, he is the man largely responsible for growing BJJ in the UK. Third, he is a member of another rare group, red and black belts (the belt after black belt). Finally, his son is Roger Gracie, whose name might ring a bell. ;)

I was also to grab Maurição for an interview later in the day, which was cool: we spent a good forty minutes chatting about Rolls Gracie, BJJ in the UK, Roger, belt tests, the first female black belt and various other topics. Always great to chat to the big names. I have met Maurição before, back when I was training regularly at the RGA HQ, but I was surprised that he remembered me. Clearly a man with a good memory for faces! ;)

There was no warm-up, as Maurição went straight into technique, keeping things fairly basic. He started off with a guard pass, where you grab both their collars with one hand and their sleeve with the other. Shove that sleeve into their hip, then hop up into a crouch, basing by pressing your weight through your hands. Stand up, letting go of the collars but pulling up on their sleeve. With your free hand, press inside their knee while simultaneously stepping your same side leg back.

Ideally, that should mean you can now open their guard and shove their knee to the floor. As soon as you do, slide your same side knee over, pinning their leg to the mat with your shin. You now have two options for passing. Either you can bump their other leg up onto your shoulder, reach for the collar with your outside hand then smash pass (like I showed last week), or you can go the other way, backstepping then pulling your leg through.

Maurição followed up with some knee on belly attacks, of which I think there were about four. However, I was drilling with Maeve, so that was a bit overwhelming for a white belt, meaning we just stuck with the first one. After you've passed and established knee on belly, sliding your knee across their belt line, get a deep grip in their collar, four fingers in, just like you were going for a cross choke. Your other hand goes on top, gripping the other collar thumb in. Once you've secured that grip, sprawl back with your feet, which puts all your weight through the neck, then twist your wrists to finish the submission.

Having covered knee on belly, Maurição moved rapidly onto attacks from mount. Specifically, it was technical mount, for when your opponent has turned to one side. Again, just like a class I've taught before (although obviously I don't teach it anywhere near as well as Maurição, who has literally been a black belt longer than I've been alive), during the technical mount portion of my attacking the mount lesson.

Finally, Maurição went through a couple of basic sweeps, the double ankle grab and one of my favourites, the sickle sweep (which I last taught here). He then handed over to one of the other black belts in attendance, Nick Brooks (if you're wondering who the other two were, it was Salvo from GB Bath and Raphael Dos Santos, who runs a number of schools under the GB Cornwall banner)

Having experienced Nick's excellent instruction at Mill Hill a couple of times, I knew he'd have something good up his sleeve. Today, that was a nifty but simple half guard sweep. The starting position is unusual. You have your inside foot over their upper leg, hooking around for control, but the knee of your leg is still in front of them, pressing into their hip. Your outside leg is just clamping tight against them, rather than locked up into an orthodox half guard.

Grab their sleeve on the outside leg side, while also gripping their trouser leg on the inside leg side. Bridge slightly, then turn towards the outside leg, driving your knees in that direction, pulling on their sleeve and lifting with your trouser grip. Very simple, but effective.

That marked the end of the masterclass, which ran for about an hour. Geeza then sorted out the brackets for the internal competition. This is open to all Gracie Barra students in the UK. Previously, the competitions have mainly consisted of Gracie Barra Bristol and Gracie Barra Bath, but this time a number of students came along from Cornwall, Birmingham, Swindon, Wales, the main RGA school in London and Nick Brooks' school in Mill Hill. GB Bristol has a lot of mat space, so Geeza was able to have five matches running at once.

I wasn't feeling up to competing (perhaps I'll give it a shot in the future, as I couldn't really ask for a more convenient environment), so instead I helped out as a ref. Of course, that wasn't a very demanding job, given the rules of this particular competition. Geeza, as you may know if you've ever watched his TheRealGeeza YouTube channel, is a firm believer that you should aim to finish the fight, not play for points. To that end, the internal GB comps he runs are submission only.

That meant my job as a ref was basically to stop people rolling into other fights, avoid hitting the wall, pause the action if trousers or jacket were falling off (more common than you'd expect!), stop the fight once someone was tapping and then raise the hand of the winner. Some techniques were illegal, such as cervical locks, slamming and all leglocks except straight ankle locks, but nobody ended up doing them and getting disqualified.

It was cool to get some reffing experience, as that's something I'd like to get into, in order to become a better teacher: I'll often have students ask, "so how many points would that be?", and I'm not always certain when the situation gets a bit more complex. Submission only is a good way to dip my toes, as it is so much simpler than the usual IBJJF rules. Most of the fights were pretty quick, but there were a few monsters, such as the epic eighty minute white belt battle. Among the women, Maeve also had an impressively long fight, going for fifty-three minutes.

Finaly, it was great to catch up with some old training partners from RGA and GB Brum, especially Conor, who I hadn't even realised was here in England now rather than Belfast. There should eventually be lots of videos, either on TheRealGeeza or the official Gracie Barra Bristol channel, so keep an eye on those. :)

Meerkatsu Sighting: 13/04/10 - BJJ (Beginner)

Class #301
RGA High Wycombe, (BJJ), Kev Capel, High Wycombe, UK - 13/04/2010

Seymour of Meerkatsu fame was down tonight, so it was cool to finally meet and train with him (I'll talk more about that in the advanced class post). I may not be able to go meet all the great bloggers in the US yet, but I can certainly meet some of the great bloggers we've got on this side of the Atlantic. :)

The self defence section left you in knee on belly, so Kev added an armbar from there. As this results in a 'Japanese armbar' (one foot over their head and the other tucked under their side, rather than the more secure both feet on the other side), Kev noted that you need to be careful of your angle. If you fall back towards their head, that helps them effect the hitchhiker escape and turn their way to freedom. If you instead fall towards their legs, that's much more difficult.

Kev began the lesson proper with a baseball bat choke from knee on belly. He started from a side control where you have both your arms over to the far side, controlling their arm. Switch into reverse scarf hold, so that your hip is backing into their nearside arm, while your other arm is over their face, making it hard for them to see what you're doing.

Make space by shifting your hips further towards their head, then slide your knee over, as if you're going to mount. Instead of mount, you want knee on belly, grabbing their leg and a thumb inside grip on the far collar (rather than under their head, as you want to set up this choke). Be certain your base leg has the knee raised, so you can both resist their attempts to bridge and follow their movements. You also need to watch that the leg isn't close enough for them to easily hook, which would restrict your ability to move with them.

You can now grip their near collar with your other hand, close to their head. Drop your other arm onto their neck. This sets you up for the choke. To finish, bring your elbows together and squeeze, driving your weight through your top arm (I think: I always get confused with the baseball choke). You might find it useful to slide your knee off them once you've begun the choke, so you can drop more of your weight onto them. You could even drop your hip, moving into a sprawled side control for maximum pressure.

In an example of Kev's excellent class structure, the escape from knee on belly followed. Pressing on their knee with your hand is a cardinal error, as that will tend to leave a gap for them to thread behind your elbow, pull you onto your side and move into a submission. However, it is possible to do something similar with your hand, as long as your elbow remains tight to your side, leaving no gap for them to hook.

Start by pressing your nearest hand into their hip and inner thigh, so your arm remains on the inside of their leg. Bridge, and use that bit of space to immediately slip the other hand underneath their knee. This creates a frame, and also relieves some of the pressure on your stomach. Again, it is essential you tuck your elbow in tight to their side when doing this.

You can now bump them with your knee, then immediately shrimp out. As in the shrimp-to-knees drill (also relevant last week), bring one leg underneath the other and go to your knees, maintaining that pressure on their hip until you can secure a hold of their lower leg. You can now drive your shoulder under their knee and pull their lower leg towards you, taking them down and coming up in open guard.

Sparring from side control with Howard, I concentrated on cross-face pressure with my shoulder on top. I was also still looking to steadily transition to north-south, keeping my hips low, sprawling back once I got to the shoulder. I was reminded to use that shoulder pressure by a a great article Leslie linked, mentioning top pressure for small people, among a whole bunch of other tips. I'd recommend people check it out if they haven't already (especially women: it's written by Krista Scott-Dixon from stumptuous.com, and directed at her fellow female grapplers). That reminded me of the importance of the shoulder, and also driving your weight diagonally through them, rather than just straight down.

With Seymour, a few times when I should have switched to knee on belly (like Kintanon explains here), I instead just ended up losing side control. I really, really need to get more comfortable with knee-on-belly, especially as a small guy. Again, I was looking to be slow and steady, moving to north south.

Seymour attempted an escape where he bridges and turns to face the floor: I think the size difference came into play a little here, as if he'd been bigger, that would have worked every time. However, even though I'm only a little bigger, that probably helped me drive him back down once or twice (though he still completed that escape at least once). I also really wanted the step-over triangle, but Seymour could see it coming and blocked it easily every time.

Underneath Howard, I was trying to keep in mind that bridging should be at an angle, not straight up. I also attempted that Gustavo Machado escape from north south a number of times, and did a better job of first getting one hook, but still not good enough: I slipped off and fell straight back under side control. Still, better than what has happened with Callum, where my back is wide open to being taken after attempting that escape.

Defending against Seymour's side control, I found that if he managed to pop my elbow away from his hip, hooking the foot helped hold him in place while I dug my elbow back into place. However, that feels like a bad habit, so I get the impression hooking that far foot isn't generally a good idea. Still, it did seem to help in that specific situation.

Seymour was doing a good job of killing my movement with a grip on my collar. His arm was pressed against my face, so it was difficult to shift in that direction. That meant I started considering some less orthodox escapes, which I also tried against Howard, especially what Ed Beneville calls the 'x-hands' in Strategic Guard. Didn't work, as I only half-remembered it, so I need to re-read that book (re-reading all the Beneville books
would probably be a good idea, as there is a ton of stuff in there I never think to try).

At the end of the lesson, I got a third stripe on my blue belt: always nice to get the applause and handshake. I presume Kev follows the same time-based pattern for stripes as at RGA HQ, which I think is at six month intervals for blue belts (which would be about right, as I started at RGA Wycombe in late September). It would be interesting to know how many places connect stripes directly to ability: it definitely varies.

08/12/2009 - BJJ (Advanced)

Class #269



RGA High Wycombe, (BJJ), Kev Capel, High Wycombe, UK - 08/12/2009

I came across another great blog thanks to Georgette earlier this week, here (especially the excellent articles). As ever, Jo's blog has been added to the blog index, which now has an extra 'Added' column. That should hopefully make it easier to see new additions (presuming there are other people out there who are constantly searching for yet more blogs to stick in their Google Reader). Unfortunately, it seems that it is no longer possible to upload Excel sheets from your desktop onto Google Docs and retain links: hence why I've shoved in the whole URL instead (e.g., on the Black Belt magazine BJJ index).

The knee on belly attacks continued with an armbar from knee on belly, this time on the near rather than far arm. You begin in a low knee on belly (as in, your weight is low, torso down towards theirs), then attack with a kimura on the far arm. Your opponent can't ignore this, so may well bring their other arm over to try and prevent you getting the necessary leverage.

As soon as they do this, step your foot up towards their head, still threatening the kimura. Once you've pulled their arm up towards you and have your leg in position, switch your arm positioning to instead go for an armbar. It is possible to either have your foot over their head or your shin on their neck, hooking your foot for further control. In that situation, you might need to switch to a belly down armbar, depending on how much they try to turn away from you.

Alternately, you can go for a choke from knee on belly. Kev refers to this as a baseball bat choke, but he wasn't sure if that was technically correct. Either way, you start by gripping the near side collar (palm towards their gi), meaning you can use your arm to cross-face, preventing them from turning towards you. Your other hand grips next to the first, but this time palm up, thumb inside.

They will probably begin to turn towards you as you cross-face: once your arms are in position, you can relax that long enough to loop your first arm over their head. Bring your forearm into their throat, and the elbow of that arm down towards the elbow of your other arm. From here, apply the submission as usual, blocking both sides of their neck.

Kev followed that up with two escapes from knee on belly. The first was much the same as the escape we'd just done in the beginners class, except that instead of recovering guard, you switch one leg under the other and go to your knees. Grab their foot and leg, then pull it out from under them, yanking upwards so you can then move round to knee on belly. In the process, you can either stand for greater leverage (the recommended option), or drive your weight into them, leading with your shoulder.

The second escape from knee on belly is to use your arm opposite their pressuring knee to hook under the ankle of that leg. Bridge up and lift with your hand at the same time, aiming to lever their leg in between your own. That puts you in what is sometimes referred to as 'quarter guard': this is still a precarious position, as their knee is free to try for a pass.

If the knee is still on your belly, push with both hands, then establish half guard, getting up onto your side. If they start to pass with a knee slide before you can try that, bump them forward with your knee. This should enable you to slip free and get to your knees, escaping knee on belly. Alternatively, you could try and move into deep half guard.

In sparring, I found myself under what I think was a modified scarf hold (as they didn't have my arm). I always find this tougher to escape than side control, as there seems to be less space. Still, I did attempt to shift out for an armbar once or twice, which was entertaining, if not very effective. Definitely need to take another look at scarf hold escapes.

I also had the chance to spar a blue belt who hasn't been in class before, Sahid. I think he's taking the class on Thursday, as Kev has a family appointment he can't miss, so it was nice to meet Sahid beforehand. I think Kev mentioned he's a fairly experienced blue, and that showed in his measured style of rolling, always being careful to stay controlled. He also immediately reminded me to be careful where I put my arms if they go to turtle: I reached in too deep and was immediately rolled and armbarred, with a waki-gatame.

That roll also gave me a chance to put the defensive strategy of connecting your knee to your elbow into effect, to prevent them going to knee on belly. However, while that was slightly helpful in blocking the knee, it would have been better if I'd made a proper barrier with those limbs, putting my forearm to my thigh instead.

Tomorrow should be interesting, as I'm hopefully going to get the chance to train with an old friend. Looking forward to it!

15/04/2009 - BJJ (Beginner)

Class #218



Roger Gracie Academy Kilburn (BJJ), Jude Samuel, London, UK - 15/04/2009 - Beginner

The weather in Looe turned out to be pretty good, at least for the first three days. Lots of sunshine and no rain, though unfortunately that also meant it was busy. Swarming with chavs too, for some reason: I guess they like Cornwall. Despite that, Looe is a beautiful place, with a gorgeous harbour and plenty of pleasant walks around the area. There is also a Rail Ale Trail you can do, where you pop into various pubs near the train line to get your leaflet stamped, sampling real ale along the way. I'm not generally a big beer drinker (I prefer wine, and sherry if I can get it), but fun nonetheless.

While I was away, Oli G very helpfully annotated one of his videos: hopefully that's going to be the start of a trend. Best of all would be audio commentaries, but not sure how easy that is to do. Either way, here's the vid:



I'd been ill last Wednesday, so as I only got back to London this Wednesday, that meant I only made the one session. Class tonight kicked off with guard passing, both from the same standing break. First secure the usual grip on both their lapels with one hand, pressing the other into their hip, aiming to hinder their movement. Step up the knee opposite to the hand on the hip, then stand up, switching your double lapel grip to a single lapel you can yank up with you.

Next, reach back with the other hand, wedge it between your back and their crossed ankles, then twist forward to break their legs open. Jude covered two options from here: first, you can reach to grab their collar and press your forearm into their neck, keeping the other elbow back as you drive your hips forward, pushing their legs out of the way for side control. Second possibility is a stack pass, so once you've opened their guard, hook round their legs and clasp your hands, stack them and gradually walk round to side control.

Jude had a slight variation on that stack pass, which was to do with the position of your knees. Once you've got a hold around both their legs and pulled them towards you, go to one knee. As you pass, ram that knee into their side, bringing the other knee up as you do so. This keeps you tight, and also adds greater pressure, which should aid your transition to side control.

Finally, Jude showed a baseball bat choke from knee-on-belly. At least I think it was a baseball bat choke, going by the grip, but then I've never done that choke before. Anyway, starts as normal: hop up to knee-on-belly from side control, using a grip on their collar and hip then doing a push up.

From here, you want to get your far hand into their far collar, thumb on top and palm up. The other grabs their near collar, this time palm down: this is where the baseball bat reference comes in, as your hands are now in the same position as if you were grasping a bat.

Sprawl back from knee-on-belly, dropping the elbow of your far arm across their throat. Walk round towards north-south, which should cause the choke to tighten and result in a tap.

Guard passing was the same old story, where I went with a couple of white belts and relaxed, waiting for them to do something. Both of them were gripping as hard as they could, meaning that the first one still held on to a sleeve he'd managed to get under my leg as I passed to top half guard. Easy enough to just pause until they got tired, putting my weight onto their face.

While it was certainly restful, it didn't help me to secure side control. As ever, I left too much space when attempting to secure a kimura, and they managed to reverse and go into my guard. I had thought that bringing my knee to the head might help, but I must have left too little pressure on their hips.

The second white belt was a little faster, as this time I made some other mistake that resulted in them being able to sit right up and go for a single leg. Again, not controlling the hips properly: I should have just stood up to try and work the standing pass, rather than going into defensive mode.

Having said that, not expending much energy meant I wasn't too tired before free sparring, which was useful as I ended up doing four in a row. That isn't normally the case, as I'll almost always sit out a few, but I kept being asked by people I wanted to spar, so that resulted in only one rest. Very rare for a wimp like me! ;p

Started with one of the blue belts, where I had a play with spider guard, but wasn't able to control them all that well. They had a knee up, so I found it difficult to off-balance them. Or rather, more difficult than usual, as my spider guard is pretty bad. My main problem with it, I think, is that I don't normally have a clear aim, as I always forget the basic sweep from there.

I also spent plenty of time under knee-on-belly and side control, which along with bottom half-guard and under mount have constituted the majority of my sparring for the past couple of years. Saulo has some interesting ideas on escaping, which I've been trying to incorporate recently, but need plenty more work. Hip movement is something I want to improve, and also avoid ending up flat on my back, which I give up far too easily.

Ben, a white belt, was next. With him, it was almost entirely half-guard, using the lockdown to push his leg back, while trying to then open up slightly to shrimp and escape. I got back to closed guard a couple of times, but like my other escapes, I have to stop being so flat. Ben eventually got through to side control towards the end: I recovered half guard again, but really should be trying to go to my knees more often from under side control, especially as I'd already spent so long in half guard already.

Up next was J-Sho, somebody I think I've only done guard passage with before, so was pleased to get a chance to roll with him. Like me, he's a fellow internet BJJ geek, but unlike me, he can back that up with a high level of BJJ, given that he's an experienced purple belt. I again ran through the usual sequence of attempting to get to guard, fail, they pass to side control, then either I get into half guard or they go to knee on belly.

I presume he was taking it fairly easy, due to being way better than me. Also, if he hadn't been testing out some kind of submission that involves wrapping my gi around my arm, most likely I would have spent a lot more time under knee-on-belly. Instead, I was trying to gradually work my arm free and get back to half-guard, normally ending up under side control instead.

Finally, I was back with the earlier blue belt again, finding myself under knee-on-belly yet again. I tried to keep in mind the principle of getting my elbow to my knee when under side control to stop them getting the knee through. This helped, but they still got their knee through plenty of times, leaving me to squirm away trying to shrimp out. Saulo has some escapes for this I've been trying, but not drilled them enough yet: hopefully with more mat time I'll start to get the hang of it.

This month is unfortunately going to be my last at RGA Kilburn, as my sister is moving again at the start of May to Cobham. I've been looking around at alternatives, because Kilburn will be too far, and there appear to be three. Nova Forca is closest, at around 5.5 miles, but the timetable doesn't quite fit. I'd also very much like to stay with RGA, so I was pleased to see that contrary to what I'd thought at first, there was an affiliate not too far away.

RGA Wimbledon (which incidentally was the first club on fellow blogger Jadon’s BJJ Pilgrimage) is about 9.5 miles, so its worth the slightly longer journey to stay with the RGA family. There is also Andy Roberts' place in Farnborough, which would be cool as then I could train with Jadon, but that's more like 20 miles I think, so probably too far.

If anyone knows buses from Cobham to any of those, I'd be interested to hear what the best routes are: I'm currently going by trains, for which it looks like RGA Wimbledon would be a 10 minute walk to Cobham station, then 34 minutes to Raynes Park, and finally a 25 minute walk to Ray Stevens club. £69 unlimited sounds reasonable, as I could make three classes from Mon-Weds, same as I've been trying to do at Jude's in Kilburn.

Also, I should be doing a major overhaul of the BJJ map soon. Simon Hayes, who has been very helpful in providing information about the Carlson Gracie clubs, suggested I split it by county, as there are now so many schools. It’s a good idea, but will take a fair bit of work, particularly as I’ve always been really, really bad at geography. Fortunately for me, unlike at school, I now have Google Maps! ;)