Training at BTT Slough

This Sunday me, Rach and Tolly drove up to Slough to train with Ze Marcello at one of his BTT schools. Unfortunately he wasnt there (he is quite busy, always doing seminars and travelling) so there was only around 10 people training. We try and go up to London to train once or twice a week as the level is very high and there are many more people to roll with. Not only that but there are at least 4-5 purple belts in every class as well as a good amount of blue belts! I always enjoy going up there to train as its so nice to be able to roll with different people with different gameplans. We left a little late, but the drive up there went smoothly with no traffic and it was a nice day with the sun out. We arrived there quite late, only having time to jump in for the sparring, which had just started.

Sparring with the Slough crowd is always great as I feel I push myself that little bit harder to get the tap. When we roll back in Eastbourne I always am trying to get a certain position, submission or try to acheive a pre arranged target. I think if you just constantly roll just to win your not taking advantage of what 'sparing time' is really about. For me, I like to decide before training an aspect of my game which I want to work and when its time to roll, work that position or submission as much as I can. But when we train in Slough, its all about the tap! Slough is like a mini tournament for me where I can test myself against new people and see where I stand and if what I have been practicing is working or not. I always try and roll with the blue or purple belts to see if my game works - if it works on a bluebelt then its probably going to work on a white belt! Anyway, today was a successful training session as I managed to tap 2 blue belts with my baseball bat choke from side (I must have been grinning from ear to ear as they jumped into side control!) and then got another blue belt with a north/ south choke. Not a bad day at all! I could have got quite a few more taps (I had around 7 rolls) with the baseball bat choke but a few got away by getting knee on belly and pushing away. Regardless its definitely a move that works and something I am going to keep working on!

Baseball Bat Choke

On Saturday I had a long, long training day! It started off in the morning with 1.5 hours at Canton Martial Arts. It was a good open mat session where we got to start from standing, giving me a good opportunity to work some takedowns. I got a nice north/ south choke a couple times (new move that my instructor showed me and I am trying out so no one saw it coming!)and got a triangle from transitioning from mount. After this me and rach went home and got some food. I decided to go to the next calss my instructor was teaching at a different gym. We went through a guard position which is the starting point of many submissions. One hand loops over the opponents are and holds onto their gi, keeping them very close to you. From here we worked a three finger choke, lapel choke, armbar and sweep. We then rolled for half hour and I got my north/ south choke again and another triangle, before I had to roll with my instructor and got my ass handed to me! Once the class finished everyone paid and left but Tolly asked me to hang around, along with one of his blue belts and a guy with loads of wrestling background. His two of the guys have up coming MMA fights, we rolled no gi for another 45 mins. Its great rolling with these guys as the level is so much higher and I learn so much more when I am tapping compared to submitting people. By the time I stumbled back home I was completely toast and ended up taking a nice bubble bath, making some good white chocolate cookies, and watching TV with Rach.

Anyway, I drifted a bit. In fact I havnt drifted as I havnt even said what I originally wanted to rant on about yet! In the last rolling session of the day, I got caught with a baseball bat choke a couple times before catching on to what was actually going on. When I got home I googled the move and found out you can do it by allowing your opponent to get side control! How cool is that?! Anyway, long story short, I got all excited and watched all the videos I could find and have decided I am going to try and work this move as much as I can in the coming weeks. It seems to come on super quick and catches people by suprise. I tried it out on Rach a few times an was suprised on how good it was! So tomorrow at class I am just going to try and catch everyone with the basebal bat choke, whether from standing, guard or half guard. Heres a video: