Well that went well?

It only took two extra weeks after my 'screw that, I'm going to class' post before I actually did. Some unavoidable weekend overtime shenanigans at work got in the way, and honestly who am I to say no to getting paid four times as much to do work that I'd just have had to do during the week anyway?

So it's a Saturday class. Looks like around 6 people as we start our warmup. Ryan is in charge. He's not even wearing a gi. Good signs. Solid warmup. Pushups, situps, sprints, jogging etc. Feeling OK. Pair up for some light positional rolling. Got a guy who was around in fundamentals when I was doing that. Pulled guard and then spent most of the next couple of minutes moving between guard / half guard / side control. Feeling OK. And then I stood up after we finished and practically passed out. Ooops. Maybe not feeling so OK.

Spent the next 15 minutes or so sitting in the corner with dark / blurry vision while class did takedown drills. Very surreal. I probably would have sat out takedown drills anyway, I don't trust my back that much yet.

The next drill up was a weird posture drill while you're sitting and the other person is standing attacking your guard. I didn't get a whole lot of this, but it looked reasonably straightforward. Still sitting. Feeling better though. Next trick after this was a guillotine variation that was apparently taught at an Anthony Perosh seminar a couple of weeks back. Looked nasty tight. Will have to grab someone to learn that at some stage.

Next up was an armdrag from open guard. Not really overly complicated either. Funny moments as I joined back in for this one. The only guy without a partner was an absolutely massive Maori guy (I'm talking like 150kgs massive). So here's me practicing armdrags on a guy who is most definitely way more than twice my weight. Perhaps not ideal. The first time he tried it on me he also decided to try to choke me. I'm not sure that was part of the plan and he most definitely did it wrong, because my left cheekbone is not the ideal place to squeeze.

People paired up to roll and I most definitely wasn't rolling with the massive guy so I sat again. Second roll someone paired up with Ryan and the odd one out was the only girl in class (Megan? Pink-gi girl. Whatever, I'm horrible at names..). She asked me if I was rolling. The correct answer at this point was almost definitely no, but I said yes anyway. I really was feeling OK by this point, which is just really weird. She played nice though and didn't beat me up much at all. Spent a little while trying to pass her open guard.. and if I knew stuff I definitely would have been past a couple of times, but I don't so I wasn't. Ended up in her closed guard after a bit and promptly tried to get myself triangled but for whatever reason she didn't really get it and we spent the rest of the round there with her trying to get it tight and me just doing my best to not let her.

Tired. But feeling OK, which is good. I guess my body is over the shock of "what the hell are you making me do exercise for??" by now. People paired off for another go and I considered sitting, but the odd guy out grabbed me. Said yes again. Brain is definitely not asserting itself today. He offered to start on his back because he's far bigger than me. Messing about trying to pass his open guard didn't work so great. I don't really remember the start this roll too well, but I know I got swept plenty of times and choked once. Got kneed in the mouth... note to self, get a mouthguard already. I have a rather swollen lip, but no bleeding so it's all good. He too tried to triangle me at one point and I thing I had my other hand in the way, it wasn't even remotely tight. After about 30 seconds he asked if I was OK, I said yes and he went back to trying to choke me. After about a minute he complained that "Well this isn't working" and I pointed out that my other arm was in the way and that I thought he should probably armbar me instead of choking me. He didn't do that either though.

Some people did one more round, but everybody looked about as tired as I was feeling, and I skipped this one. Wasn't too bad apart from the nearly passing out bit. I'll try to skip that next time. Back feels... OK. I suspect I might be very sore tomorrow. We'll see.