So much has happened!

Long over due post, I'll skip trying to remember what's happened in the past near 70 days and instead just cover the highlights:

1. I've been going to BJJ a lot! My school offers class 5 days a week and open mat 2 days. I've made it to near all of them - maybe out of those 70 days I've missed 5 days of class either due to injury or other obligations. Outside of that I've trained a few times with friends and also gone to their schools a couple of times.

2. I earned my first stripe!

3. I learned I weighed 30 pounds more than I expected which changed my game unexpectedly. It's weird because you'd think it wouldn't, it's not like I suddenly gained the weight but still I find my application of pressure and center of gravity different. That said, I look more lean, well, more defined at least. My BJJ stamina is greatly increased from when I started.

4. I've learned how to soft-roll, mostly. Or rolling without going all out or being over tense. Which is in part because of:

5. Starting to get over my fear of being crushed or whatever.. when you're on bottom and it's hard to breath it was common for me to to freak out. I did some core exercises to help, learned how to better control my breath and also to sit through the uncomfortable. I'm much more concious of tapping out when I wasn't under durress and learned to somewhat accept that being smothered and having difficulty breathing was part of the game and something to be trained.

6. People have started to comment on my technical-ness. I still feel pretty lost but I highly doubt there's a conspiracy to compliment me into thinking I was technical. People often say that my skill difference from when I started is 'night and day' but that's usually after they've quickly dispatched me ahaha

7. I realized I have feet, wonderful feet. Hooks & pushy things. One day it dawned on me that I could control people with my feet and do things like hook them around someone's hips so I could pull myself onto them and also keep them controlled.

Things I've progressed at:
Keeping my hips facing opponent - blocking neck & pulling lapel - hand defense - hip control - submissions, I can do a couple now.

Things I need/want to work on:
Sweeping - Escaping from mount - pinning the arm near my neck while transitioning

Fun:
I told my good friend who's a purple belt that I was told I was progressing greatly to which he challenged me to show him and I could not >:(