Another BJJ competition at purple belt and another defeat. It's true that I was fighting somebody 10 years younger than myself. But I made a basic error early on and couldn't recover in time. It wasn't an age difference that was the issue here.
The thing is that a couple of parts of my game, namely full guard and two variations of that, are pretty decent. But I need to be able to get to those positions to be effective.
So there's a new game plan forming for starting matches and this is what I'll be focusing on for the next couple of months. I don't really need radical new techniques. I need to make the ones I am using badly work more efficiently.
So here are notes on things I need to add in:
- Use the guard pull from standing that Keenan Cornelius talks about. He sets it up like a sacrifice throw, but it adds additional torque to the off-balancing of the opponent. Also use this guard pull to go straight to Del la Riva and Deep Del.
- When on bottom in half guard and I'm getting passed, use the bicep overhook and the knee block to swing out and swing back into the Chronic position.
- When passing on top in half guard, use the knee-on-belly and head grab pass. Then switch to palm up and fingers in collar grab on the passing side of the opponent and turn the forearm to apply pressure to the jaw of the opponent to keep his head turned away and limit his movement. Also threaten the cross collar choke to distract the pass.
I'm no longer going to take notes on individual classes or techniques as I have been doing. I now only add a technique in if I can see it adding to my game.
