January 11, 2015 was the first tournament of the year! This was a tough one to train through the holiday, stay healthy when it seemed like everyone had a nagging cough and cold, but those are all challenges everyone else had to work with getting ready for the tournament. The tournament was held in beautiful Santa Barbara Community College, with the beach jetting up right to the campus and tournament site. The view was spectacular!
For the ticket to the Abu Dhabi Pro tournament I was moved up into the 95kg+ division with more competitors. I faced up with Art from Paragon who had a great stand up game that fit his size and body. I had a really hard time getting into a comfortable takedown position, so instead used a snap down and a quick circle behind to score the initial takedown. I ended up scoring several more advantage points, thinking I had secured the knee on belly and mount, but apparently I had not fully secured the position for three seconds. That’s going to be an important area to focus on this competition season, securing the three seconds to earn my points. It seems the referees are being more conservative in their points and not starting the count until after the position has been settled into because I remember the same thing happening a few times last year. Needless to say, I can improve in securing the position.
In the semi final of the absolute division I met up with, the very handsome, Clark Gracie. I noticed he had gone for his patented omoplata attacks all day, but he was also doing a lot of kimura locks to secure positions. So I was on the lookout for both. I’ve been woking the over under passing with guys who play his type of game and it seemed to work very well. He was doing a really good job framing my face and keeping me from putting all my pressure on him. One thing for sure, Clark has incredible hip movement and flexibility. I found myself being forced back to the laso and working from there where he eventually got the sweep. It’s such a simple sweep from the laso, everyone needs to learn it! We recovered into my x guard where he locked on a kimura as I turned to sweep him back. Our positions moved from me being on top in the mount, to having his back with my hooks in, but since he had the kimura locked on until the end of the time all I scored was an advantage. It would have been really cool if I could have figured out a way to get my arm free.
Overall, I feel my performance was good and some of the things I was working on at the end of the year have really improved. I’m very excited to have qualified for the Pro Tournament in UAE and look forward to another exciting adventure in 2015!
Some great pictures on GRACIEMAG online.