Mizblog

TJ taught the last morning KM class of 2016, and I was there! Standard warm ups, then round kicks to thai pads with Josh. We practiced high round kick blocking and low round kick checking. Then we put on shin pads and had some round robin kick sparring.

At the end, we moved to the back room and practiced gun defense from behind.

TJ’s Saturday morning class was my first taste of Krav Maga this month after a series of infections and illnesses kept me off the mat for weeks. I felt awkward and heavy, but TJ was surprised to hear that I was free from injury coming in.

Started with shadow boxing and shoulder tag. The usual. Went to some thai pad stuff, some front kick stuff, and at the end we did gun defense from the front but with a redirect that left us on the live side. Control was with straight arms and tucked chin. Counter attack was kicks to the groin. Take away levers the gun back toward the elbow to break the grip.

EDIT: I was very sore for 4 days afterward, but sustained no injuries!

Third class in 4 months, right? Teaching the class today was Cody, who’s a beefy brown belt. We did a pretty standard warm-up with shrimps, rolls, and hip walks. Then we got into the guillotine drills.

I teamed up with Jarred for the whole class. Starting with arm-in guillotine as a response to a take-down attempt. They key there was to dip the wrapping arm’s shoulder down to shrink the space. Then we went to arm-in guillotine as a response to a half-guard sweep attempt. I kept having trouble getting the arm to go in, because Jarred was using it across my neck for the sweep.

At last we got to arm-free guillotine, which lets you take that wrapping arm’s hand and pull it up with your other hand, lock the pulling arm’s elbow and forearm over the back of the choke-ee, and that’s a wrap. Still tuck your shoulder down over the wrapping arm, but that pulling arm locked over the back is the killer.

I left early before I got my picture taken.

TJ’s back, and he taught the Saturday morning class. Warm up was the usual shadow boxing and shoulder tag, but we also added in calisthenics like 20 push ups and 30 squats. Had some all-on-one shoulder tag as well. Then stretching, then focus mitts.

Focus mitts were jab, slip, hook, knee to start, then jab, slip, hook, liver shot, cross. Or something like that. Then we swapped out the left focus mitt for a kick shield, and did jab + round kick combos. We even practiced simultaneous punch + kick front/back.

Christian taught this class, and it started with mouth guards in. We paired up and punched each other slowly, relying on our inside defenses to keep us from contact to our vulnerable areas. Jeff reminded me implicitly that I need to make my abdomen shorter while in my fighting stance, because he hit me in the stomach several times, and my elbows did not extend low enough for the inside defense to block them.

We added focus mitts to this little process, and it was hectic. I ended up briefly in a 3-way group with a guy named Matt, whose mouthpiece was so big he could not talk at all.

After that, we got kick shields and did front kicks with ball of foot. First from fighting stance, then from neutral stance, then from neutral against an advancing opponent.

Finally we did defense against downward knife stab. 360 block while simultaneously punching, slide the blocking hand to a wrist grab and keep it pressed behind their back, establish standing side control and deliver knees and groin kicks, then turn the knife under, in front, and towards their body, wrapping their wrist forward towards their chest, and using that leverage to disarm the knife.

Christian taught my first class back after an absence of over a month. I was very apprehensive, feeling out of shape and weak. My few short attempts at exercise have resulted in a tweaked back, so I’m expecting an avalanche of pain. But my previous injuries have mostly healed overPeople were generally glad to see me after my long break.

Christian had us pull out a heavy bag, a medicine ball, a kettle bell, a jump rope, and a kick shield. We then started class and got busy on the equipment. We were throwing odd combinations of punches, which I felt super awkward throwing. 2 straights, 2 hooks, and 2 upper cuts. Then jump rope, then left straight, hook, upper cut, followed by right straight, hook, and upper cut, then back to the left. AWKWARD! Anyway, jumped more rope, then … blablablah. It sucked. I hurt my toe trying to climb the heavy bag with my feet while my hands were on the ground. Ouch.

We stretched, then gloved up and did multi-punch combos with focus mitts. Jab, slip, cross, liver punch for the first round, then jab, slip, cross, liver punch, hook, elbow strike, and pivot.

Then we got a tombstone and did 2 kick combos. Left groin kick and right round kick, then right groin kick and left round kick. Next combo left push kick right round kick, right push kick left round kick.

Did some inside defenses and 360 defenses. Hurt my left thumb a little on this one.

Did gun from behind. I accidentally elbowed Ronnie in the face.

Saranya got her green belt last night.

TJ’s Saturday morning class was not one I approached enthusiastically. After a week of neck and shoulder problems, I was very apprehensive. But I had to take Saranya to her BJJ class so I suited up at the last second and took my place on the line.

I knew I was in trouble right away. My cardio wasn’t there anymore. The early jog around the mat was causing my left ankle to twinge and complain. I felt unbalanced during shadow boxing. Unbalanced and awkward. We pulled out the bags and did a circuit, moving from one bag to another, landing a variety of strikes on each before moving to the next. I did okay but was seriously gassing out on the second time around. Then we stretched, and I sweated all over the mat.

We gloved up and did Thai pad work. I teamed up with Thor (Eric) and had a good learning experience. Again, I was gassed. Very low energy reserves.

Gloves off, we learned ridge hand strikes. We also learned mouth hand strikes. These essentially both strike with the injured part of my right thumb, so I had to use my left, and it hurt my elbow and biceps. Very awkward.

We did vertical forearm defenses against high kicks and straight punches to practice for knife defense. Straight knife, and backhand knife defenses. Ended with a drill.

When I got off the mat, I just leaned my head on the TRX post to relax my strained neck muscles. Saranya was sitting on Ivan and crying because she’d hit herself in the eye with her own knee. We were both hurting. Eventually she wiped her face and calmed down enough that we could go home.

Mark’s Saturday morning class started with warm ups that almost killed me. I went nuts on the shrimping, and wanted to quit before I was done with them. Finally they were over and we got a long talk about Friday no-gi classes are cancelled, and instead we’re going to have 2 weeks of no-gi-only training. Mark said “Out of 14 days, you should be able to make 8 or 9 of those.” Haha, yeah. If I make 6 I’ll consider myself wildly successful, even if I can’t train for 2 weeks afterward. He also talked about the JJM Christmas tournament/camp in Marina Del Rey, which I have no plans to attend.

So the technique drills were attacking someone in turtle position again, apparently building on what they went over yesterday in the final no-gi class. I didn’t go to that class (I was at work) so I had no idea how it related to the no-gi stuff, but whatever. The first technique is to jump up to the cowboy mount, which is knees-on-hips. Grab the back of the collar, step back off them, and pull them into your lap. Get hooks and lapel grips, go for a quick choke with an arm across the back of the neck, and if that fails, reach that back-of-the-neck arm around to pull the lapel down for a standard lapel choke. It’s easiest to get when the choking arm is on top, and when your thumb isn’t weak and unable to grip the gi.

The second technique started from cowboy mount, but this one involved grabbing the belt, dismounting forward, lifting the turtle so you can get your hooks in, then rolling them. Chokes as before.

The third technique is when the turtled opponent instead flattens out on their bellies and hides their elbows and head. Just lift them up by their belt and you can get your hooks in, then roll them and go to town.

Rolling started early. I rolled with a blue belt guy whose name I asked twice and forgot twice. Howard? Larry? Anyway, he started sitting and I stepped to half guard, and spent the entire 5 minutes there. He tried to sweep me and I defended successfully most every time. It was a very slow and easy roll.

Second roll was with Shabbar, and he’s big and heavy and smashed me, took my arms and bent them until I tapped. I jammed my thumb sometime in the vain attempts to defend myself. That was my only injury, except for what are going to be some exceptionally sore muscles.

TJ’s Saturday morning class started without Saranya, as she’s at Gigi’s house for a sleepover.

TJ got us running while he showed off his swollen cauliflower ear. Ouch. We did shadow boxing, shoulder tag, team calisthenics, and stretching. Then we geared up and did Bas Rutten combinations (the Thai Boxing tape) on our geared up partners while they defended. I did a poor job of defending against old man Mike, but at least I improved as the session went along. He defended well throughout, and his combinations were crisp and fast.

After a few rounds of that, we got into boxing sparring. I started with Mike, and immediately landed a good body blow after a jab to the face was blocked. He thought that was so good, he did it back to me a few times, and I did it a couple more times to him. We were pretty even.

My next sparring partner was Alex, who’s starting to warm up to me. Last time, he lit me up from the outside, but this time I had far better head movement and made him miss a lot of his punches. I was able to land quite a few of my own, and I felt I got the edge on the contest.

Finally I sparred with Ray, who had a sore ankle. A couple times I found myself standing on his right foot. I wasn’t doing it on purpose, it’s just that he’s a leftie and so he stands with his right foot forward, next to my left foot forward, so an advance means I’m standing on his foot. He stepped on my foot again later, and I did his once also. I found I was able to pressure him and get him dodging too much, but he was able to land a few good punches to get me to back off. I felt bad later for standing on his sore foot, but I did tell him it was unintentional. I didn’t want to hurt him.

After sparring was over, we got down to gun defense. Mike and I reviewed gun from the front and from behind, then we did gun pressing the back of the head and gun pointing to the face. We also went over gun to the side, both in front of the arm and behind the arm. Mike started bleeding out of his little finger, dripping all over the mat. He joked with me, saying “You animal!” and I retorted with the not-so-witty “I didn’t do that!” Anyway, it was little and he got a band aid, but it took time to clean the mat and we just moved into a drill with A’s and B’s, one group closing the eyes while the other group came around and did gun threats, and the threatened had to open their eyes, assess the threat, and make the defense.