Grails Transaction Issues

I have a Grails service that is marked as transactional and it does a lot of things.

I add code to this method and do not get the results that I expect when I pass it:

• I have code that calls .save()that cannot be seen in the MySQL backend until the whole method is completed. This is what I expect, given that the service method is transactional.
• I have other code that calls .save()that can be seen in MySQL before the service method completes. I do not understand this, and I do not understand the difference between this and 1.
• I have more code that I use groovy.sql.Sqlto insert into the database. I assume this goes beyond Grails transaction processing, so the fact that this happens before the method completes makes sense. Can I get Grails to manage this inside a transaction?

Please forbid me any errors in my assumptions. Here is the code:

Main service method

public void updateDb(Date date) {
        // Create the results
        if (createResults() > 0) {
            createA()
            createB()
        }
}

createA

A a = new a()
a.user = user
a.week = week
a.save()

createB

userWeek = new UserWeek(user: user)
userWeek.number = 1
userWeek.save(flush: true)

createResults

String insert = "insert into ..."
Sql sql = new Sql(dataSource)
sql.execute(insert)

I added flush:trueto make it flush, but now I understand that it’s easy to merge sleep mode, but not actually commit the transaction, since it is transactional. What am I doing wrong?