Jiu-Jitsu/Muay Thai/MMA Techniques and Training Log

Muscle Milk’s root beer float flavor was a bit of a disappointment, and this is thankfully a little bit better.  However, like the Muscle Milk version, this tastes a bit like a root beer Sweet Tart.  It actually reminds me a bit of the last few sips of a Wendy’s Frosty float.  Of course, if it tasted exactly like a Wendy’s Frosty float, I’d be in set for life, but it’s really only a passing resemblance.  Not bad.  I’d consider a tub if I got sick of double chocolate.

The taste is pretty heavy on the “cream” side with very little distinguishable “cookie” taste.  Not terrible, and it would probably be a lot better in milk, but I’m fresh out.  Seems to be about on par with the Cytogainer cookies and cream flavor I had a while back.  I was looking forward to trying this one, and I suppose it could be worse, but I’m still a little disappointed.  It actually tastes a bit like a subpar cookies and cream protein bar.

The toffee is definitely the overwhelming flavor here.  I’m not a big fan of toffee, but this isn’t bad.  It tastes a bit like a Werther’s Original.

Fruit flavors are tough to do in whey.  Syntrax does a decent job with their lemonade and fuzzy navel flavors, but everything else I’ve tried has been pretty awful.

When I opened up the Tropical Punch packet, I noticed that the powder smelled like cleaning agent - like Windex, particularly.  Not a good sign.  The actual taste wasn’t as bad as the smell, but the taste of anything fruity or tropical is very faint, at best.  It’s got kind of a chalky taste to it, as well.  Not overwhelmingly unpleasant, but certainly no pleasure to drink.  The best comparison for the taste itself might be old bubblegum.

I figured I’d hate drinking this one at 10PM, but it tastes fairly similar to an iced coffee - maybe not the best iced coffee on the planet, but definitely a passable iced coffee.  I like it a lot.  I’d actually consider picking up a tub of this stuff.  It would be really useful for a morning protein shake.

By the way, today’s no gi class was drilling all takedowns from a wrestler’s clinch including grapevining a leg and a no gi drop seoi nage.  We then drilled a slight variation on the kimura from half guard.

Optimum Nutrition is one of the better supplement companies out there.  Their double chocolate whey protein has been my whey of choice for a while now.  They have a lot of other flavors available, but it’s always a gamble buying a 2.5lb tub of protein knowing that, even when it comes to companies with an excellent reputation, there’s still a good chance that you may end up with 2.5lbs of terrible tasting stuff.  So I was excited to see that ON now offers a variety pack which includes sixteen single serving packets of various flavors.  Hoping that I may discover a new favorite, I bought one of the variety packs from Amazon.com and figured that I’d share my findings here.

Day One
Chocolate Mint

Chocolate and mint is one of my least favorite flavor combinations.  When I was a kid, my house was always full of Andes mint candies, and it was one of the biggest dickteases ever.  It was candy, so I always wanted to eat it, but it was mint chocolate, which I think is revolting.

Anyway, this had the potential to be my least favorite flavor based on alleged flavor alone, I tried it first.  I was surprised to find that the mint is pretty subdued.  It really seems like they just added some fairly subtle mint flavoring to their already awesome chocolate flavor.  It actually kind of tastes like I was sucking on a mint maybe 45 minutes ago and am just now drinking a regular ON chocolate shake.

Not bad, but I’m still not a fan of mint chocolate and I certainly don’t plan on buying a tub of this stuff.

Let’s start with a scenario in which you’re standing and your opponent is on their back.  They utilize a De La Riva guard, bringing their right leg behind your left and their shin across your right thigh.

Start by immediately sitting down and attempting to tightly trap their leg.  Make sure that your left shin is pointed towards their head/face area, and not towards your right.  If your shin is not facing in this direction and tightly pressed up against their hamstring area, the move will not work.  Keeping your shin exactly where it is, place your left arm over their right leg and by your thigh.  Place your head on the mat in between your opponent’s legs as if you were going to do a forward roll, but instead turn yourself upside-down without doing a full forward roll.  Now figure four your legs, reach your arms over your opponent’s right thigh, clasp your hands together and pull down as you stretch your legs to complete the muscle crush on your opponent’s right hamstring area.

The Guillotine, in all of its forms, is my absolute favorite submission.  The Flying Guillotine is especially great because, even if you can’t or have no intenion on finishing it, it is a great way to open your opponent up for a takedown or, at the very least, disrupt their rhythm and throw them off their game (at least for a little while.)

The best way to approach the Flying Guillotine is to first think consider your stance.  I’m right-handed and primarily a striker - a Muay Thai guy - so I lead with my left leg.  Many people from wrestling backgrounds will lead with their strong side, so right-handed wrestlers will often lead with their right legs.  Whichever side you lead with, you’re going to use that hand to control your opponent’s head.  For example, since I lead with my left leg, I use my left hand to control the head.

In either case, you place your “lead hand” on your opponent’s head as you’re leaping and push your opponent’s head down and over to the opposite side of your body.  In my case, I use my left hand to push my opponent’s head down and then towards my right armpit.  My right arm will then come around my opponent’s neck, with the blade of my forearm across their throat.  As I land from my short leap, my left hand will come and lock up with my right hand.  The most important thing here is that I don’t have an arm trapped.  That’s going to make it more difficult for me to finish the guillotine and presents my opponent with more options for escaping.  Once you’ve joined hands with the preferred grip (a ten finger grip for this variation,) you can pull either full or half guard - your preference.

The counter:

This isn’t really a “counter” in the traditional sense.  The goal here is to react fast enough to avoid being pulled into your opponent’s closed guard (full or half) as that makes things much more difficult and really presents you with much fewer options.

What you need to do (and of course it always helps to drill) is; as soon as you feel your opponent’s arm come around your neck, you need to prepare yourself to react.  Timing is everything for this counter.

If your opponent grabs your head and begins to tuck it under their right arm (which is generally what I would do if I were performing the move since I lead with my left leg,) you will need to escape to your opponent’s left side.  If your opponent begins to tuck your head under their left arm, you will need to escape to their right.  Whichever side you’re escaping to, you will need to wait until the moment your opponent starts to pull guard, at which point you will actually begin your counter/escape.

Rather than make this any more confusing, let’s just use an example.  Your opponent has your head trapped in their right armpit.  You need to escape to their left, so as they start to pull guard, you will use your right arm to hold down their left leg and you will hop your legs - one at a time, starting with your right - over their left leg.  You should land in side control, but your opponent will most likely be holding onto your head for dear life.  The best way to get it out is to wriggle and pull your head clean out.  If you’re unable to free your head this way (which is very possible and probably likely,) you will need to use whichever hand is not under your opponent’s head to grab their wrist and pop their grip.

I was just poking around my stats for the first time in a while when I noticed that #2 on my top countries list (a few hundred visits behind the U.S.) is Thailand.  Any connection to one of my favorite places on the Planet, no matter how distant or virtual, is always appreciated.

Laew phob gan mai!

Assuming, as always, that you’re working with your strong side and it’s your right leg that’s trapped in your opponent’s half guard.  Arm and hand placement is extremely important in order to control your opponent, so your left arm should be under their head and your right arm should be under their left arm.  Your hands should meet by their left shoulder and they should be clasped together with your left hand on top of your right.  Use your shoulder to create pressure and make it uncomfortable.  Anything to distract your opponent from the pass.

Without removing your left knee from the mat, hinge the lower half of your leg over and place your instep on your opponent’s right thigh.  While applying downward pressure, shake and bring your leg up and out of your opponent’s half guard.  You can either bring it out and over to the right in order to obtain full mount or, if you’re more comfortable in side, cut your right knee hard to your left.  Make sure that you keep your hips heavy at all times and you don’t allow your opponent to roll out over by moving your weight around too much.  Your arms and hands should not move during this process.

If your opponent is smart or more experienced, and the switch their hips in order to make it difficult for you to pass, just use your left foot to walk them back into a better position for you without moving your upper body.