BJJ's North South Position

Man, I'm having a somewhat rough patch of Seasonal Affective Disorder or something. As soon as the sun goes down I start getting GRUMPY!

In some ways it's because my body is REALLY wanting to be out in the great outdoors feeling the sun - but it's COLD and DARK really fast now. Grrrrr. In other ways things just keep getting canceled or not happening, like yesterday's yoga class. THAT's why you get two BJJ Specific entries in a row!

At least I have other endeavors that still shine a different kind of light!

Today we worked on submissions and escapes from North South not to be confused with the British Television series of a similar name! (wiki)

1. If they push on your hips sit into their arm so their arm is up around your hips - trap their leg and get them with an Americana (or an armbar) - This video explains it pretty well, with a slightly different beginning. (This one talks about the basics of Kimura, Americana, and armbar - so it's a good supplement)
2. Same move can be done from cross body any time they have their arm underneath like the first escape from crossbody we worked on Tuesday - if they aren't quick and solid you can get their arm and sit it into the Americana - also it is useful that after trapping the leg lift the leg under their knee for a better submission.
3. From North South - push on one arm so the bottom person turns a bit, slide your hand under the other elbow and trap their arm in a figure four, lie back when they sit up follow and hook their leg, taking their back with seatbelt grip.
4. From 3 instead of them sitting up trap their opposite arm and lock your legs putting them into Crucifix.
5. From 3 scoot your lower knee up behind their back and your other leg over their head to put them into an armbar
6. From 3 when he sits up scoop your arm down over their neck (bicep down across their throat) flatten out into the Monson Choke 
   
   Monson is a scary crazy dude. I found a how-to from the namesake of the choke.
7. If you don't quite get the choke or he doesn't tap, overhook the arm and pull it back over your hips so you are back into #1, scoot down more to get the right leverage, hook the leg and lift with the other leg like before.
8. Escapes from North South - Most important is to make space and get away from the opponent
9. Just like the Crossbody escape we learned Tuesday, push away on the guy on top's hips, swing your legs around, trap their leg and put them in your guard (or take their back or whatever you can get!)
10. Pushing on their arms, make some space and bring your knees up through and backwards roll to put them into guard OR backwards roll enough to immediately take their back. (I could use some drilling on this!) If you get stuck on the backwards roll and are flexible enough you can hook their leg to help complete the movement.
11. if you can't roll you can also bring your knees/shins to their elbows, grab their wrists and push them down so they fly towards the ground with their face. Yeehaw!
12. If you can roll quick enough (again, drilling this somehow could be useful!) you can swing around and catch them in a triangle.

In Grappling I was pretty successful today actually! I was able to get one or two armbars, including a textbook mount to s-mount and armbar. Woot! Feels good to actually feel stuff kind of working. I still have a VERY long way to go. Unfortunately I crunched some knuckles and rolled funny on my bad shoulder, even though I was being careful to submit early if that arm got caught - and it usually does with Micah! I may add more videos to the techniques above later!

Next week I won't be coming into work - so anything I do will be at home. I will definitely miss the Yoga and BJJ classes - but it will probably good to let my right arm have a little bit of a break!

I'm trying to put together some comparison gifs of my torso muscular progress since starting Primal at the beginning of the year. It's kind of interesting to see!