holy shit standing arm triangle.
i dont train but would like to one day. the only gym in reasonable distance is all men(im a woman). may go for a free lesson to check the lay of the land. be happ to train with men. the werent rude on the phone but werent exactly encouraging. can imagine it being abit macho broey. i know every gym is different.
i like ebi, polaris etc
whats your fave sub or sweep?
will check yancy sanchez, cheers
I think you should at least give it a try, look what's available in your area. If you don't like it, at least you can say you tried. Sometimes a gym that's a bit further out of the way is also worth it. I'm lucky, mine's a 7 minute drive away but I'd happily drive 45-60 mins for a good gym with a good vibe. We have a guy that lives about 80 km away and still shows up at least 3x a week.
The gym I train at has a big focus on hard-nosed, heavy pressure based BJJ. We don't have too many girls, but our girls are daaaaamn good. When they drop in to other places, they usually run through the other girls with ease. Shit, I'm 6'1 205 and there's a few of our girls that can easily mop the floor with me. We are SUPER careful when training with women, safety is #1. I actually love rolling with women: I don't get to use my physical attributes (size+ strength + weight) and can focus solely on my technique. One of my go-to partners is a girl that's 5'6 125 lbs and she's real good, shit she almost put me to sleep more than once.
Do you know what affiliation the gym close to your place is under ?
Reason they might not have been super encouraging at first is simply because there's always a ton of eager white belts that show up, only to leave a few weeks later and never come back. It ain't easy and the drop-out rate is gigantic. Mine wasn't enthusiastic either, yet they're like family to me now.
Not all gyms are macho-broey, but there's always one or two meat heads. They're usually dumb but won't hurt you. Our meathead/roidhead is one of the safest guys to roll with. He's so fucking strong he literally makes sure you land safely on the mat after a takedown. No matter the fall, he will carry you and make sure you aren't hurt. Trying to hit a sweep on him is like trying to sweep a tree stump though.
As for subs, I'm an armlock guy, and I looooove a good gi choke (cross choke, loop choke, bow n arrow etc..). Leglocks are starting to come into play for me as well, yet I'm still quite green.
Fav guard pass is the over/under followed by the Matt Darcy "Death Pass". Pretty much anything from halfguard where I can cook you to the bone and tire you out with pressure.
Sweeps ? Depends if I'm in gi or nogi. I love a good John Wayne sweep (got 3-4 diff variations), scissor and flower sweep are paramount to your game and i've been toying a lot with the Jedi Mind Trick lately, although it's still it its early stages for now. I could talk about this all day, feel from to PM me if you have any other questions !