Back from injury

In the last 3 months, I have missed time due to needing a steroid injection in my wrist, a 2 week vacation, a badly bruised rib, and a week long business trip. Even though my rib is still a little sore, it's good enough to go over techniques without rolling.

After taking so much time off, I feel like I am starting all over. I did have the opportunity to test the more cerebral aspects of Jiu Jitsu. I spent 20 minutes everyday (well most days) visualizing previously reviewed techniques. After reading many articles on visualization techniques, I was admittedly skeptical. After my 2nd visualization session, I was convinced it worked. I could see myself from the outside looking in work armbars from the closed guard, and had a better grasp of the fluidity of the movements. In class, or while rolling, I would always look at each step as a sequence. First grab wrist, then place foot on hip, then hip escape, etc. When trying to execute the technique it always looked rehearsed. Now I am able to make the armbar look like one fluid movement instead of a series of steps I am going over in my head. It also changed the way I look at the technique. I can see past the steps and see a process, as well as contingencies and escapes.

While I was out, I managed to lose my Vulkan Gi top (still not sure how that happened) and purchased a geeky CTRL Jiu Jitsu tee shirt.

In class today we kept it simple with standing guard passes using a wrist grip. I also spent some time practicing the Galvao windmill sweep (slightly different than the standard windmill). I like the added options of switching to an armbar if your opponent posts up, or even take the back. 

The Galvao sweep to mount can be found here.