Flexibility and Arm Bars

I’ve struggled with arm bars.  You see I’m not the most flexible person in the world,  I can’t even touch my toes if my legs are straight,  both my hamstrings and back are really stiff.  So often I find myself in very uncomfortable positions well before most people do, especially when it comes to stacking. 

The thing with the stack for say Arm bar from guard is that I feel way to much pressure before they have over committed to the stack.  It frustrates me that such a large part of the BJJ is difficult for me because I don’t even have average flexibility,  I’m within the bottom 5% I’d say. 

Anyway, I’ve already vowed to improve my flexibility.  I wish I had a time machine as I’d go back to when I was 12 years old and tell myself  to stretch everyday. I know it will take awhile but I’m hoping I can at least touch my toes comfortably in 6 months time.

As for the arm bar stacking I’ve learn some good pointers so far.  Don’t cross your legs as you lose downward force, raise your hips and lastly rotate underneath them, creating a fulcrum point with my body when they over-commit the stack.   I don’t consider arm bars part of my game, I do need them though to generate threat from my true goal,  the choke.  Still two aspects let me down,  flexibility and timing.  For me,  both of which will take time to solve.

Dan

Training with non-likeminded Training Partners

One thing I’m struggling with is to get some consistent training in atm.  I find my motivation for training really does depend upon the training partners I have available.  I find I just don’t connect too well with people from my school – they have a different outlook on life.  Which is fine,  it’s just hard to find someone who is a details person, and likes drilling over those finer details.

I find most people (not all) from my experience, either look down on other martial arts or those concepts of respect, courtesy, professionalism.  Instead, they often are bealching, swearing bogans (aussie term) which frustrates me.  So I’m going to work out how to thrive in that environment, and hopefully I can find one or two others that are like me.

For now, cause they like to wrestle I will just pick the exact same technique everytime I go out there…try to get to the same position, try to work back to that position.  I have my basic game play, so I’m hoping I can refine that down to it’s pure elements.  I feel comfortable passing peoples guard,  I don’t feel comfortable obtaining mount.  So I might try a catch and release style of training when doing live wrestling. Get mount, hold, get off mount…try to get mount again.