Mizblog

Greggo’s Thursday morning class started quickly. We had a good warmup because it was cold outside.

Then we got into the technique of the day (same as last night): Spider Guard!

We started with spider guard entry. Pull up grips on the sleeves. Hip out, get the knees inside the arms and the feet on the hips. Get the knees inside their arms and keep their elbows stuck to your shins so they can’t slip loose over the knee. Keep your hips off the mat so you can maintain mobility. From there, you can step your foot up to the shoulder, then the other foot to the other shoulder, then step the first foot to the crook of the elbow, then same with the other foot, and from there you can put your lower foot back to the hip to return to hip control.

There are a lot of things you can do from the spider guard. We learned a twisty sweep where you get a lasso guard and then start to let them pass on the opposite side. This traps their lasso’d hand between your legs, and you can then lift their hip over for the sweep.

Then we rolled. I started with Matt, with him in my guard. He wanted to practice breaking guard, but he couldn’t get out of my guard. I kept breaking his posture and attacking him. He was good at breaking grips, but I just kept getting other grips. We did the whole roll with him in my guard.

Next roll, we got stuck together again, so we started with me in his guard. I was able to pass to side control. He recovered half guard a couple times but I was able to finish the roll in side control.

My next roll was with Carlo. He was much harder to control, and I got caught in an arm bar eventually and had to tap.

Next roll was with TJ, who kept overhooking my arms and pulling them onto the mat, then holding them with both hands so I couldn’t get out. It was pretty frustrating. He’s also really good at breaking your posture when you’re in his guard.

Then Greggo called me over. I did the elbow grab from closed guard that we did the other night. I got on his back, and he coached me through choking him out. When we restarted, I got a leg cramp and had to walk it off. I was done.