BJJ 9/7/2011 + Teleport Guard Pass

A little bit late with this update, been very busy with work.
Ended up having a lot of people show up for the Wednesday class which was awesome. Warmup was more no-handed armbars, then triangle and omoplattas. Technique was all from failed scissor sweeps. Super fun stuff. The knee lift sweep that I use all of the time was the first one. You go for the scissor sweep and your opponent bases out, putting one hand or forearm on your ribs, anywhere that lets you cross grip the sleeve and pull his arm across. Next you pin that arm with your body and reach around his back to grab under his armpit. Now you just roll back and lift with your knee, spinning your opponent awesomely in the air and landing in side control with the near arm pushed across your opponents chest.
Second technique was same setup, but your opponent bases on the mat behind your back instead of on your side, so you overhook their basing arm and reach through to secure a grip in their collar/lapel area. Then shift back to full guard, grab some fabric with the other hand and execute a very nasty collar choke. Third technique was again your opponent basing on your ribs, but this time you pull their arm across, post on it, and pop your leg free and swing over to their back. KEY POINT: Keep your sleeve grip THE ENTIRE TIME. Pin their hand to the mat and use it as a platform to base with. That keeps them from scrambling. Fourth Technique, Omoplatta. Opponent bases out with their arm over your back again, so you pop your leg free back to guard, but at a 90 degree angle from your opponent and push your opponents head away as you kick over to secure the Omo.
Fifth Technique, Again, opponent bases on your ribs. This time you grab the sleeve and pull across as you hip out on that side, then reach over the back of their neck and grab their wrist or sleeve to secure the gift wrap, then complete the gift wrap sweep.
Sixth Technique, Opponent bases on the mat, you use your cross collar grip and upward elbow pressure to make space, execute a technical stand, and then immediately snap down and across your body as you move to take their back.
BONUS MOVE: Same setup as Tech 6, but instead of snapping them across to the back you pop your arm over their head and roll for the loop choke.

Drilling was from guard, I made sure that all of the new guys I drilled with got an opportunity to hit at least one of the Techniques of the Day as well as working on it a lot myself. Spent some time working with Antony since he's trying to recover his old guard which he let languish over the summer.

Rolling paired me up with Ian (about ~190, blue belt) and Justin (~220, white belt). Worked inside Ian's guard for him since he's also working on guard retention. Teleport pass worked quite well. I still need to work on my defense against the North South choke. Whenever I end up on bottom of side control I tend to give up the N/S transition, and then I tend to get choked by the bigger guys sliding into that N/S choke with good base. That's definitely a point to work on for me. I spent the entire time working solely baseball bat chokes from various places. Got to it on Ian, but should have rotated more and didn't finish it in time. First roll with Justin I played around with open guard, just letting him work so I could evaluate him a bit since he's been gone for about 6 months. He eventually passed my guard to side control shortly before time ran out. The other rolls with him I put him on his back and dug for the baseball bat choke. Finished it a couple of times. I'm getting much more proficient with setting it up and finishing it. Which is my goal.

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Ok, I promised BJJ GRRL that I would do a writeup on my favorite and highest percentage guard pass, which I call the Teleport guard pass, but which is really just a slightly modified basic knee through pass. The ONLY person I have seen demonstrate it is James Clingerman on this video here. In fact, I highly recommend everyone watch that video. It's just pure gold for guard passing. The pass I'm talking about is at the 5 minute mark. You'll see that he presses the knee down, and his NOT postured up. He's controlling the upper body and he CROSSES HIS REAR LEG OVER before he moves his lead leg. What that does is give you a 100% pass percentage if you get to that point. From there all you have to do is pop that rear knee straight up and you're passed. People will feel like you just teleported through their guard once you get good at it. I now set it up the second I have any space in inside their guard, I just hook my rear foot up as I move my lead knee forward and all of a sudden I pop through my opponents guard. This is far and away my highest percentage guard pass and I can not recommend it enough. Hell, everything Clingerman shows in that video, and in the follow up video is just awesome.
It also helps that he's about my size, so his game is readily adaptable to my body type, AND he's not from a freakin Capoeira background, so his stuff isn't as insane as Cobrinha or some of those other guys. It all is just really tight, fundamental moves with a little bit of spice on top to make them extra awesome.