Lovato

For a couple personal reasons I've driven to Oklahoma and am staying here for a full week. One of the highlights of this trip is that I get to spend a lot of time at Lovato BJJ.
I had actually dropped by the school once before almost two years ago when they were in a much smaller location than they are now. The new school is very nice and Sr.'s office is almost comically elegant. It is like the den of a Lord or Baron. I was shocked when I walked in there (to sign my waiver) by how nice it was. Without having been to every gym in the country I'm going to go ahead and say this is the coolest gym office in America and possibly the world.
Anyway...a little about the school:
The classes are structured so that there is a beginner and advanced class most days. On Thursday there is a special curriculum/review/technique class (from what I gather) and on Friday is boxing with open mat afterwords. Also, their belts are such that there are white belts with four stripes, then orange, yellow and green (I don't know the order) belts, and then blue. I've never seen this before so I'm not entirely sure yet what level the in-between colored belts represent. It may be that their blue belts are just very good and that one of the other colors is the level most other schools would first promote to blue.
It can be hard to get a solid answer sometimes on whether a class will be gi or nogi walking into it. They seem to structure more around the beginner/advanced than the gi/nogi, which is different for me. I've been told to always bring both just in case. There's a lot about this school I do not yet understand.
Now, the training:

Despite coming forward with how confusing this has been so far for me there is one thing that is very clear: the training is great. Jr. actually teaches the advanced classes and Rader (a rising brown belt star) teaches the beginner classes. I would be curious to see just how many top level black belts still teach regularly. I would bet it's not much.
Tonight began with the advanced class and started off strong with a very tough conditioning circuit. We began with a typical warmout (shrimps, walkouts, shots) and then on to armbar, triangle and omoplata drilling for a couple minutes each and then a tough ab workout. The ab workout was what killed me. All of this is done in an almost eerie silence. The little stereo off to the side is only barely showing life and people seem hesitant to talk or make any noise outside of huffing and puffing.
For the techinique portion of the class everyone sits along the wall and Jr. demos a technique, then we pair off and drill. We drilled taking the back two different ways, neither of which work with the style of back I play, but they are both very good techniques that I will have to work in when I can't get to where I prefer to play. They both begin from over-unders and you are more off the person's side. Jr. showed how to open and get one hook and then pull the onto you to finish the choke or finish the other hook. There may have actually been a third technique that I just can't remember. I don't think there was, though.
With only a little time left in the class we were split into two groups. The blue belts and above stayed out on the mat to spar and all below moved to the side to keep drilling. We only did one match before the class was over, unfortunately. Fortunately, it seems like all the upper belts don't do the beginner class and instead use that time as open mat. It's really great that there are so many people staying to roll although I personally like doing beginner classes too since I need work everywhere. But rolling with new guys is a little more important and I'm sure I'll get around to taking a beginner class soon enough.
Their guys are very good and I had four or five good matches. Except one where I was 100% ruled but even that is a good experience too sine I get to see my faults and another person's use of technique. He's very good. Maybe I'll have more luck against him in the gi...but I'm not holding my breath.
I'm very, very excited for the rest of the week.