>Congratulations man
>
>sounds very grueling.
>
>What were some of the most advanced techniques you felt like
>you mastered that made you feel like you were ready as you
>were taking the test?
>


Not necessarily techniques, but concepts. The chief one was pacing myself, which if you are mastering BJJ as an "art" is paramount. The whole point is to use as a little energy as possible to submit someone so you never get tired (keep in mind this is still thinking of it as an art form, and an entirely different mindset from when viewing BJJ as a sport/competition). So even when I was "losing" so to speak, I had to show/tried to show I wouldn't panic, and I would stick with using technique, and not rely on athleticism. I worked hard on this in preparation for the test, but also for the past 4-5 years.

In relation to that was I worked really hard on the efficiency in my movement and in my defense of attacks.


>Was there anything unexpected / psychologically overwhelming
>he threw in?
>
>For our JKD Phase 2 test our instructor had us grapple with
>two people at once (did not have any jiujitsu experience at
>that point) at the start to get rid of the nerves and excess
>energy, and we also did the u-drill blindfolded with a real
>knife lol. Was there anything like that in your black belt
>test?
>
>
>


No, nothing crazy like blind grappling with knives. Haha. I was definitely caught off guard with the number and breadth of techniques I was supposed to be able to demonstrate when asked, and to demonstrate them repeatedly. Some techniques I may have done as many as 10-12 times. I had no idea what techniques he was going to ask me to demonstrate. Some of them were no-brainers (triangle choke, hip bump sweep, that type of stuff). But some of them were fairly uncommon (I think 4-5 ways to escape North/South, 3-4 ways to escape turtle with opponents' hooks in, 1-2 ways to escape flattened out on stomach with opponents' hooks in, that kind of stuff).

We were also put in full-on armbars and triangles by different people, and told to escape over and over for maybe 15 minutes total.