We see these guys come and go and they are all different. Different sizes, shapes, personalities and background. They always travel in two's. The Missionaries are called Elders. Currently the Elders serving our area are from Idaho and Indiana. The Elder from Idaho is a big kid. Probably goes about 240 and is about 6"5' has some wrestling experience and is a pretty good kid. He has that personality that everybody loves. He seems like an easy going laid back kind of guy and people are attracted to him.
So we have them over quite a bit and I have a room set up for working on my BJJ. It has mats in it and I have showed it to the Missionaries and several members of my ward who have come over to work out with me.
So after dinner the big Missionary says he would like to see how he would do against a Jujitsu guy. He was pretty confident had about 80 lbs and 35 years on me and felt he could take me easily. So after Dinner we take the stuff out of our pockets go into the room and I tell him we should probably start from our knees because with him being a big guy we could have easily rolled through the mirror or wall if we started doing take-downs. (We went in just regular street clothes. I was wearing a hoodie sweat shirt and a pair of shorts and he took his tie off but was wearing a white shirt and slacks, in retrospect I wish I would have had a Gi big enough for him and we could have changed into Gi's. but I was thinking this was just going to be a demo of sorts).
So anyway we get on our knees and he asks me what our goal is. I say it is to get the other guy to tap by choking him or putting him or some sort of joint lock etc. I then said I will probably try to take your back so I can choke you and I started to move around his back to show him what I meant, when he grabbed me with a head and arm and threw me on the mat. It was on. He was very aggressive. I was not ready to start so he caught me completely off guard. (I was thinking that I was the old guy that should have been my trick) He was on top of me with a scarf choke and I had his full weight on me. I thought this was not my plan. I slowly worked out of it bringing my leg around the back and getting back was able to get a reverse triangle choke on him but it took me about 2 minutes to get there but he was exhausted after that. At that point he was totally worn out and as we continued I was able to get two armbars (I did not put a lot of pressure on them just enough to get the tap) and then finished him with a mount to Arm Triangle that I had in pretty tight. At that point we were done. I would guess about 10 minutes.
I asked him why he went so hard at first and he said he thought I was trying to get some position on him so he needed to react quickly. We laughed and he gave me a hug and said he has a new respect for BJJ. I told him to stop by and train if he had some free time. My wife told me I was an idiot and his companion from Indiana said that he recorded it on his phone to show the other members.
I learned a couple of things from this.
1. Never think your opponent is going to go slow. I remember once I was with Royler Gracie when I as a White Belt. We took a picture and I put my arm up on his shoulder and he pushed it off. He told me never let anyone get their arm that close to your neck or they might choke you. I bet he has had some idiots at Photo Ops try to choke him before. Always be ready.
2. Jiu Jitsu really does work for a smaller older guy against a younger much more athletic guy who is much larger then you. I am just glad it was not a real fight and punches were being thrown. He could have pummeled me.
3. I need to set some rules and pull out some Gi's before I just start sparring with people I don't really know at my house.
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