A slight neck injury and ADCC beginners tournament

Okay, we did a lot of no-gi two weeks ago and the past week was just no-gi all the way, it was very refreshing to roll without the gi to be honest. I actually think I figured out a couple of details to some techniques because of the lack of control you have when rolling without the gi. The gi have forgiven me alittle, but rolling no-gi got me thinking about how to improve my control. I also started thinking that I need more submissions when rolling without the gi, because I use A LOT of collar chokes and also the lack of control in my submission made it much harder to finish them. So I worked on my brabo choke and guillotine a lot. Got a good vibe from them, I use the guillotine much more from mount then from guard or standing (as I'm rather short). But it made rolling even more fun that it normally is.

Most of you don't know the story behind our gym, but we used to train a little under 2 years ago at this other gym, but we split due to some differences in opinions and priorities (not gonna get into that). So the guys that were interesting in grappling followed us and the kickboxing, traditions jiu-jitsu and some MMA guys stayed there. Now during the past 2 weeks we've had some of the MMA guys visit our gym once or twice a week for no-gi training. It was very nice to get some new rolling partners, and I try to teach them a little extra every time I roll with one of them. Hopefully they will keep training with out too.

Last wednesday I was rolling with this huge guy, approx 230lbs and I was working on a Monson on him from north-south and then changed it to a guillotine from mount and managed to sprain my neck somehow. I really don't know how, as he wasn't even touching my head. I tried to strech my neck etc, but I wasn't able to turn my head to the left the next morning. So I didn't train very much for the rest of the week. I just prepped our guys that were going to this ADCC beginners tournament, I did some light rolling on saturday with one of the guys that I had worked with on a guard pass.

On sunday morning we started our trip to Tampere for the tournament. There were 6 guys representing our club, 5 guys that have trained under 8 months and 1 guys that has trained for maybe 18 months. The guys that was least experienced jiu-jitsuwise has been doing greco-roman for maybe 15 years, so he is top notch in his pedigree :) But he had only trained jiu-jitsu for maybe 10 sessions or so, hehehee...

Well two guys lost their first fight on points. Then two guys won their first fights, one by kimura and the other 8-3 on points. The kimura guy lost his second fight very fast and the other guy lost due to toe-hold, he was our most experienced guy, but they paired him up against two very tough guys. The guy he lost to won the tournament. One guy won his first fight on armbar and suddenly his second opponent didn't show up. His "third" fight stared well, he blocked a takedown and was standing in open guard and worked on a pass that we drilled alot, he was very close to passing but suddenly was caught in a calf-lock... and tapped... Our greco-roman guy did really great! We made our gameplan according to his strengths, wrestling! There are no points awarded during the first 2 mintues of the fights, she we wanted to keep the fights standing for that time. I kept informing him about the time all the time, and it was very nice to see how dominating his wrestling was. Immediatley as the points started, he suplexed his opponents. AUCH! The first fight he suplex his opponent, managed to pass half-guard and get to mount, he worked on a americana but I think the bell saved his opponent, but a clear victory anyhow. The second match was the coolest, his opponent was so stubborn about wanting to wrestle him. When the points started, he suplex the guy -2points. He was in open guard and I told him to stand up, and the opponent followed. It didn't take long for the suplex to come again, BAM! - 2 points. The opponent worked on a sweep that led to a scrable and they got up. Well, you can guess what was next, yeah, another suplex! BAM - 2 points! At this point the poor guy was pretty mentally broken after those slams, our guy passed guard, secured a sidechoke and jumped to the otherside to choke him out. Victory via sidechoke.

The last fight was very good, this opponent was a good guard player. He tried to work a flying armbar 4 times within the first 2 mintues without success. The time started and, you know what was coming, a suplex! They were on the ground for a while, but he got back up and the opponent pulled guard and got penalized with 1 minus point. It didn't take long and they were on their feet again, and you know what was coming again, yeah - a suplex! So our guy was up by 5 points and there wasn't much time, I was certain that he'd win by this point as there was just like 30 second left and it was looking good. But his ground inexperience showed and he got into a tight armbar. He was fighting it hard, but with 4-5 second left on the clock he was forced to tap out. It was a shame, I'd have loved to see some more greco-roman exhibitions :)

No medals to our guys as there were 51 people in the -76kg category (3 of our guys fought in that division, the greco-roman dude aswell). But I was very happy, we train very little no-gi, and our guys displayed very nice techniques and spirit! Better luck next time :)

Today I was back to training 100% again, it was nice! Only one blue belt at practise today and he had to leave early, so I didn't get to roll with him. But none the less, it was a good day of training once again. Tried to work on my closed guard alittle, as I do it so little nowadays. Always working my open and half-guard.