I'm an Orange Belt!!!!

Arrived a little late to class last night, but just in time to get promoted!  I had a sneaky suspicion going in since Caleb tested me on a few things last week and Mom came in behind me instead of leaving to run errands.  When he pulled out the tape, I thought he might just be giving out stripes, but after Jarod got a stripe on his belt, Caleb sent me to one side of the mat and everyone else to the other.  Uh oh.  This could be...(Bad? Fun?)..interesting.   He dropped my orange belt at the far side of the mat.  "Okay.  You have to butt-scoot all the way to the belt if you want it."  And by that, he meant the one where you pick up your hands and feet and waddle on your hips.  It took just long enough to get a good burning sensation in my legs and abs.  The belt is not my actual orange belt (it's on back-order), but it was really cool to see a new color around my waist.  Looks like we'll be seeing a lot more color here shortly as we have two guys ready to test for blue around December, and two more sometime in the spring.

Anyway, moving on to class.  Tonight was bigger than normal; eight students plus Caleb!  Paired up with Jarod to work a spider guard entry, a sweep, and a basic triangle.  Four rounds of rolling after that.  Jarod and I rolled a bit lighter than normal since his calf cramped up pretty badly during drilling.  Rolling with Caleb was awesome as usual.  For the last minute he said he would go full purple belt.  Heehee.  It was pretty funny/awesome how quickly he submitted me.

On the ride home, I noticed the beautiful calluses that have begun to form on the top knuckle of each of my fingers.  It seems they get a little tougher every time we work spider guard or something similar.  I might need to start taping them up again.

Monday, October 7

Felt really good last night!  Quick warm-up and straight into drilling.  We are working guard passes this week for the most part, so obviously we drilled one.  The particular pass we were doing, however, involved driving your elbow into your opponent's sternum, which caused a bunch of partner-switching to avoid awkwardness.  Caleb also had us work on a new transition from the kimura from the top.  If they defend by grabbing their other hand, you bring both legs to their back and roll them to a position where you can complete it from the bottom of guard.  I think I might have been missing a step in the middle as when I rolled, I always felt like I was smashing my face against the mat.  Either way, I made it successfully from point A to point B.

I had a really good night of rolling.  We went five rounds, which is a little longer than we usually have time for.  For once, I actually felt like I was getting somewhere in my rolls.  My guard passing needs a lot of work, but I think my defense is getting stronger.  Plus, I even managed to get in a few good submission chains!  I feel like my rolls are starting to flow more, like I finally know enough to figure out what my position is and what my options are.  It's a good feeling.

Normally, I would have had class again tonight.  However, today was my sister's birthday (Happy Birthday Bella!), so we went out to dinner instead.  I have to admit, it felt pretty strange to be eating frozen yogurt while class was going on.  I'll be back next week though.