Day 99 on the Mat: Lots of Guard Passing

The dojo was full of blue belts and me the lone white belt last night. K-sensei showed us guard passing. I've seen them all before pretty much but it is always good to recap. They were all based on the knee slicing over the opponents leg then variations on whether you get the far side underhook or not. I like Friday night class. K-sensei is very laid back and always open to questions. I did armbar drills with him and noticed that his 4-step armbar drill wasn't as tight as F-sensei's who is the black belt. There was a lot of difference but K-sensei is very flexible and moves a lot on bottom so I guess that is his style.

I sparred with Kamiya, Fuji and Yoshida. Yoshida is fixated on the spider guard right now and it is a bitch to pass. I couldn't get past him. He is definately a thinking man and you can see that he is always studying moves. I suppose he has a good analytical mind, being a doctor and all. Sparring with Fuji, he is always heavy but I have found that he is also quite slow to transition. I caught him with an americana for the first time and his other arm was trapped under my legs. I twisted the americana and was shocked to hear a tearing sound and quickly let go. It freaked me out. He got up saying that he was ok but that he couldnt tap because his other arm was trapped. I asked him why he didn't shout or tap his foot but he just shrugged. God the sound freaked me out so bad but he insisted that he was fine but I also insisted that he put some ice on it. When I broke my foot I know how the body can trick you into thinking you are ok but later the pain comes. I don't think I cranked it on him. He is a big strong guy and I thought he would muscle out of it to be honest. Yoshida said to me later not to worry about it and said "Otagai-sama da" which means that it comes around goes around. I guess he believes it's just the nature of the sport. I will be extra careful. I especially tap fast when my arm is compromised but chokes I will wait until the last second.

Kamiya kept trying to kimura or americana me. It seems it's his favourite move. I kept trying lock down, whip up to old school stuff or standard half-guard sweeps. Didn't work so well except on one occassion. I did get to knee on belly and transitioned to an armbar on the far side which I can do fairly fast now. I just love the movement. Yoshida later went over the lock down stuff with me after I asked him to. I spent an extra 20 mins going over some drills.

I found out that one of the new guys that started our dojo has 4 years experience doing Sumo. No wonder that guy had a great base and was strong as an Ox. Apparently he was telling a story of how Konishiki (retired Yokozuna) had problems impregnating his wife because he was so overweight. The doctor's discovered that his bits and pieces weren't able to transport the sperm to do the business. I guess we will hear more weird stories about the Sumo world. It is getting a bad rep in Japan right now.

Sparring time: 6 x 6 mins = 36 mins