Great success! (AKA baby steps)

So tonight I worked something out for myself. Well, not really, I worked out something from reading stuff any applying it myself. I still think that counts. Success story further down! Read on!

Warmups! Warmup run by Dale, who wears a white belt but appears to know what he's about. He also gets to play training dummy for John (who runs the class). Anyway, a few brisk laps around the mat, 20 pushups / situps / squats. Stretches. Bridging. Hip escapes (Dale forgot the single leg ones.) Stand ups. Laps down the mat of hip escapes / standups.

Not tired yet. Good. I must be getting just a little bit tougher. Make a point of stretching troublesome left calf while we break for water.

Standing up stuff? What up with that?! Pummelling drill (basically swapping underhooks). Awkward. Partner's shoulder is approximately level with my nose. Spend most of drill trying to get him to get a bit lower so he's not smashing my face.

Takedown? ooh ah! Simple one, get double underhooks, get good grip behind his back, yank his hips towards you and drive forwards to take down. Partner is trying not to get taken down. How inconvenient.

Another takedown? Get one underhook, shuck his arm upwards with it, duck under to his side / back, lock arms, lift with your hips and take him down. Partner is starting to relax. Hooray.

... Live takedowns? Seriously? Have you seen how crowded this mat is? Well Ok! This was actually pretty fun. Partner is a few inches taller and probably 10kgs heavier, but I managed to keep one underhook at least pretty much the whole time, and while I couldn't get anything going myself, I managed to stay off my back until the very end of the round when there was a 3 group collision and everyone fell down.

Intro to SIDE CONTROL. Woohoo. That's not mount! I don't even know the speech. Although I'm sure it'll be identical on Wednesday. Position drill (Person on top walks around through North/South, into side control on opposite side, switches base and mounts, then dismounts off the other side).

Kimura from side control? Not much new here, it's just like the one from mount, except not on mount. Training partner is on his first lesson, so I have to talk him through actually doing the Kimura because he doesn't know how, and nobody helpful is nearby. Eventually he does a couple of good ones.

What to do if they hook the arm you're trying to Kimura over your low side shoulder? Underhook with that arm, yank them up onto their side, step over and sit on their head, use your other arm to hold the arm you have while you find their wrist with that hand, form Kimura grip and fold it backwards. A little more complicated and neither of us managed to do a good one.

Specific position sparring. Yay. I elect to start underneath side control, because last time I tried that I ended up mostly dead. So. Goals.

• Try to not stay flat on my back.

Nobody told me this yet, but I've read it, and it makes sense.

• See what happens if I bridge. See if I can create enough space to get a leg under partner for guard or something.

Same deal. I'm thinking for myself if they won't tell me anything.

Goal number 1 went good with first partner, but I wasn't able to get enough space to do anything except survive. Can't say he ever looked like getting the Kimura. Switching to on top I figured I just wanted to try and hold the position. That proved quite difficult with partner who pretty much bench pressed me. Gotta work out what to do with that.

Swap partners. Found an Asian guy called Lee (wow I remembered a name) who's a bit taller, but probably not much heavier. Started underneath again. Much easier to get up on my side with Lee. Pop my hips out a bit, and damn look! Space! Slip a leg through and manage to capture one of his for what I gather is half-guard. Woot. Now what do I do with it? Oh wait, we stop and re-set. Second time out and I almost manage to sneak a leg through again before we run out of time.

On top for the last bit of class. Controlled this position pretty well, and eventually started to push his arm off towards the Kimura as time runs out.. and then at the last moment I suddenly find myself on top of mount. Wha... ? how did that happen? Kinda happened without me thinking about it, and it wasn't one of the things we were going for, but I'm going to assume that automatically taking a good position isn't a bad thing.

Really happy with class tonight. Some things seem to be sinking in.