Sharice's BJJ Blog

ouch - man-handled again

2011-04-27T23:10:00.000-04:00

I went to our traditional class last night. It's not really that traditional really but we do a lot of judo. I can't seem to get to the gym before 6:30 so I was about 35 minutes late for class. When I got there John had the guys working on a guillotine. The guys that are training at the gym right now are from a different gym, which is transitioning to a new space now, and they all fight. So the class was no-gi, even though on Tues. it is usually a gi class.

Anyway, when I got there I initially worked with this guy who is really good at judo and that was fun. Then I worked with another fighter, which was alright but I was learning a new technique and he was giving a lot of resistance even though we were supposed to just be drilling. It was pretty frustrating. We were doing a throw off a failed guillotine. It was pretty sweet, although I almost never end up in this position.

We rolled for about 3 rounds. The first couple of rounds went alright. I rolled with some pretty inexperienced guys so I got to work on a few things, like sweeps. Then I ended up rolling with a guy that was definitely more experienced than me and of course a lot stronger. My shoulder still hurts. I would have thought that because the guy had some experience and could clearly tell that he was more advanced than I was that he wouldn't feel the need to crank every submission like it was going out of style. I don't understand why guys feel like that have to get all fucking hard core I mean I tapped almost immediately and he still basically ripped my arm off. It's just frustrating.

Then I went over to brazil academy and did jiujitsu. The regular instructor is in brazil right now so a brown belt taught class. It was cool because we got to drill a bunch of armbars and no one likes drilling armbars more than me. I think armbars will end up being my go to move.

We rolled 3 rounds in that class also. I got to roll with another female blue belt, which is nice because we are similar sized and experience. Then I rolled with Ninja, he's a purple belt and he's really technical. Finally, I rolled with a new guy, which I was really nervous about. He wasn't all spastic, I was so relieved.

OMG Travel and Work

2011-04-22T02:36:00.000-04:00

It's hard to believe but I haven't gone to jiujitsu class since my fight. I was out of town for a few days during the week after my fight. I have been traveling way too much for work lately. I suppose my trip to Vegas recently was not for work and I did stay in Albuquerque for fun over the weekend, after a conference. But that's beside the point. Work is taking away all my training time.

I knew what I was getting myself into when I took a job at a big law firm though. I suppose they pay me a good amount to be at their beck and call for these first couple of years. I have been training long enough to know that I am not going to stop training, which I think is what most people worry about when they don't get to train for a while.

I got to roll for a few rounds tonight. It was fun. I find it hard to believe that just 3 weeks ago I was in fight shape. Anyway, I didn't make it up to the studio until close to the end of class. I got to drill two techniques and then I rolled 3 - 3 min. rounds. The first guy I rolled with had a little bit of a smell, I really wish the guys would pay a little more attention to hygiene, although I'm sure they don't care as much about rolling with someone who smells all sweaty. There wasn't anything particularly memorable about any of my rolls tonight :-T. Anyway, I plan to go up to the studio and do some training with Shawn and his guys. I am really looking forward to it.

I hope that I can get in some kind of groove now that I am done traveling for a while. I just had a couple of conferences to attend. I'm kind of racking up the frequent flyer miles, maybe I'll get upgraded next time. :-) haha not likely. I can hope though.

3 - 1

2011-04-11T06:48:00.000-04:00

I have an MMA record of 3 - 1 now. I had a fight on April 1, 2010. It was amazing. The woman I fought was so tough and she had good clean technique. The fight lasted all three rounds. I am not going to lie, I was surprised. I gave my opponent everything I had and she just hung in there.

One thing that I was disappointed about was my ground game. I got in dominant position a few times and was unable to capitalize on it. I took her back at least twice and I got the mount. When I had the back I just couldn't finish the rear naked. I really need to work on my subs with the MMA gloves on next time.

That's all I have for now. I just pulled an all nighter to get some research out to my new supervisor and I have to hurry and get my sh*t ready for work, oh yeah and go running.

Oh Geez

2011-02-09T00:10:00.000-05:00

I think I pulled my groin muscle. I didn't realize I had done anything until I took a break for a bit to drive from my judo class to my jiujitsu class. As soon as I got out of the car I knew something was amiss.

Aside from the groin thing classes tonight were really good. In judo we worked on a failed osoto to a harai goshi. It was pretty cool. I really like working on these throws. I just wonder how long it will be before I can actually get a throw on someone in sparring. I have yet to get someone but I know one of these days I will get it. The cool thing is that every time I train I get a little closer.

I rolled with my friend Nick for a couple of rounds. He has a big fight coming up so hopefully I'll get to train with him a bunch because he should be at the gym a lot over the next couple of months. I almost got him in an inverted triangle. I was on his back and managed to get my legs locked when he tried to go out the back door. It feels pretty good to get stuff like that, even though Nick's skill level is so much higher than mine that I know I only get the sub attempts that he lets me get haha.

I rolled with a couple of other guys for a few minutes. One of them took a heel to the face while we were rolling and there was blood all over the place. I felt kind of bad. It was not intentional and that sort of thing happens but I still felt bad.

We worked on butterfly sweep and passing the butterfly guard off the sweep attempt. I was really glad we worked on the butterfly sweep today. I really want to have good sweeps and I never work on them enough. Also I noticed at least one detail of the sweep that I knew but I am pretty sure I don't do usually. I think I almost always pull the person over me instead of falling more to the side. I love when I leave class and see a mistake I have been making.

Ahhhh my groin muscle is so sore. I'm taking some motrin and hitting the hay.

Finally Signed Back Up

2011-02-05T19:52:00.000-05:00

I finally signed up for jiujitsu classes again at Brazil Academy. I am really going to enjoy taking classes up there.

I went to class on Thursday night and it was awesome. We did one throw, I thought it was called Morote Seoinage but the instructor said that it was called something else because of the starting grip. The way I had initially learned this throw a little while back was by grabbing the collar straight across but this was a cross collar grip. I'm not very knowledgeable about judo so I'm not really sure. Anyway, this type of throw is one of the ones I really like and I want to get good at it.

The second thing we did was a De La Riva guard sweep. I know absolutely nothing about De La Riva guard so it will be awesome to start to expand my knowledge base of the various guards. I have been trying to work on X-guard but so far I haven't had much success with it.

We finished off class with a fun tournament style game. We separated into teams and there were four of us in each bracket. We just did 3 min rounds because of the number of people there. I ended up rolling with two white belt guys. The first guy was really strong and had pretty good technique and the second was more squirly than the first so we were moving a lot more.

Bottom Line - I'm really glad I signed back up for jiujitsu classes. I'm only going two days a week but I think it will make a big difference.

Fight in April

2011-01-30T11:00:00.000-05:00

I told my instructor that I want to fight in April. I am hoping that they can find me an opponent who puts in as much time training as I do. Although I haven't been training as much lately as I would like to. I'm getting back into it though.

I went to 1 5:45 a.m. class last week. I think I will start going at least 3 times a week while training for the fight. I haven't been as busy at work lately so I am fairly positive I can make it to most evening classes.

There is a black belt BJJ guy that is teaching in KC for the next 6 weeks. I am pretty excited, I am going to sign back up for the classes at the Brazil Academy, in Olathe, again. So I'll continue to train BJJ up there even after the black belt leaves. I really like the atmosphere up there, the people are nice and no one is trying to kill anyone when we roll.

I just tried out my first class with the black belt this past Thursday. It was pretty cool we worked on a take down off an ipon seonage (sp?) attempt. I will definitely have a lot more time to train now, which I'm pretty excited about.

Winter Wonderland

2011-01-13T08:02:00.000-05:00

Last night was the first time this week we had regular class. Mon. and Tues. we got snowed out. It was a dosey. I only made it up to the gym for X-Camp, which is like a boot camp class but it's usually a bit more intense. Anyway, it looked simple enough on the whiteboard but it was sooo hard and I think I pulled a muscle in my shoulder haha. Here's what we did -

1 - 20
Start with one and one then go to two and two and then three and three, so on and so forth until you get 20 reps of each exercise. After you hit 20 reps of each exercise set you move on to the next exercise set.

Dumbells ( I used 10 pounds for this workout)
Squats / push-ups
Sumo high pull / push press
Bent rows / bicep curls
Narrow squat jumps / tricep extensions
sit ups / leg lifts

It doesn't really look that bad but trust me it will give you that wabbly (I don't know how to spell that) feeling in your arms. My legs didn't really feel it that much.

I'm hoping to hit up traditional judo/tkd class tonight and then do at least some of the jiujitsu class. We will see if it's in the stars.

Getting Back Into It!

2011-01-06T07:55:00.000-05:00

OMG I can't believe I have been getting up at 4:50 to get to my morning workouts. Last week I only went 3 times and this week I will have only gone 3 times, provided I go tomorrow morning. It's really hard to train a bunch when Noe is not here. She went to Hawaii for a month basically. I just have too much shit to do. At least I haven't been as busy at work lately. I am able to work normal hours, which has been so nice.

I went to our traditional judo class the other night. It was awesome! I got to drill throws with Kevin pretty much the entire class, you know after the warm-up and before randori. We had an older guy, who is a black belt in judo I think, work in with us a few times but he has an injury so he didn't do too much. I really like the traditional judo class. I wish we had more days of traditional judo, with the gi. On tues. it's with the gi and on thurs. it's without the gi. A bunch of the guys like the no-gi class because they think they want to do MMA or something, I think.

I might end up fighting MMA on Feb. 4th but if I don't then I want to try to get to that Houston Open. I am torn between wanting to fight MMA and doing only jiujitsu tournaments.

Tournaments

2011-01-02T20:54:00.000-05:00

I have decided I want to participate in more tournaments. I am looking at the IBJJF Houston International tourny in Feb. I think I can get ready in time for that one.

It has been so hard to get to the gym with my new job taking up all my time. I have been working a lot of hours. Usually the problem is that I get done too late to get to the gym in time for class. I have been able to do the beginners bjj class that Shawn teaches on Tues and Thurs a couple of times.

This past week John wasn't having normal evening class so I went up there in the evening and drilled a couple of times with my buddy David and also did Shawn's class a couple of times. I think if I can get up there as much as I went last week I will be ok in the tournament. I don't know if it will be enough to win but I think I can make a good showing.

I also went to the 5:45 am fitness classes 3 times last week. I am going to try to get up there 4 times in the coming week. We will see how that works out haha.

Some BJJ, Kickboxing and Conditioning

2010-11-22T14:51:00.000-05:00

I went to BJJ on Friday. It was really fun. We mostly just rolled. We did work on a collar choke from technical mount. Then a bicep slicer from the same position, in case they block the collar choke. I guess it seemed like we just mostly rolled because I was like 20 min late to class. Ooops. I hate when I am late.

Anyway, I rolled for a good hour and 15 min. or so. It was just what I needed.

On Sat. I did the hard core class, which is specifically focused on the core muscles. By the way, I don't know how I have managed to get away with having such a weak core all these years. I really need to start working on my abs and such.

Kickboxing is after hard core and it was great this weekend. I did some light sparring with my buddy Jason. I think this is the first time I have done any sparring in about a month. I miss it. Although, after I got Jason in the solar plexis with a knee that put him out for a min. I had to work with John and I didn't miss sparring during that. John kicked me in each of my legs once and one of them still hurts. I need to do some more conditioning.

X-camp was pretty crazy. We did a shit ton of stations and I was tired as hell. The really hard ones were the burpies with a jump to a chin up, the #400 wheel barrow down the hall way and those damn ropes. It felt good to work out really hard though. I'm enjoying being back in the swing of things. Now I just need to get my weight back down. Especially if I am going to try to fight in Feb.

Sore as Hell

2010-11-16T09:57:00.000-05:00

I cannot believe how sore I am. I did kickboxing and X-Camp last night. It was pretty rough but I still cannot believe the hurt I am feeling right now or how I felt last night.

Even thought it was kickboxing class I got to roll a little, with the mma gloves on. One of the fighters at the gym, Nick, is fighting on Nov. 20th. So basically everyone has to beat up on him. Hahaha. Lucky for me, Nick likes working with me, even though I am like half his size. He fights at 170 but he walks around about 190ish. With the way a lot of the fighters are there aren't consistently enough people to help Nick get ready, you know people close to his size. So anyway even though I'm like the smallest person there, the guys that are there are really only good for muscling him and don't know any technique on the ground really.

Nick alternated with a rather large man who doesn't have any ground, who was instructed to just try to hit Nick as much as possible, a pretty good Muay Thai guy, who only did stand up with Nick, and me, who basically got to be on the positive end of the worst case scenario and just try to ground and pound.

I was so gassed after the second or third time I went with Nick that it took me like a full 7 minutes to recover, meaning really start hitting the bag again. The people who rotate in on Nick just do the kickboxing class on the bags when not working with Nick. Anyway, I was dying. John kept asking me where my cardio was at and all I could do was shrug my shoulders and try not to vomit.

X-Camp didn't feel much different. We did a circuit with 9 stations I think. The stations were only 30 seconds each but when they are that short you have to do a full sprint speed pace the entire time. Then we ran stairs between the circuits. We did that 3 times.

The circuit exercises were: tire flips with jumps in and out of the tire after each flip, 2 handed kettlebell swing, power ball (slamming a ball back and forth over your legs while in a seated position, L pull ups, something like a curl over (it was some gymnast stuff), wall ball (just throwing the medicine ball as high up the wall as you can then squating), push ups on a suspended chain, and reverse flys on a chain.

Open Mat

2010-11-14T18:29:00.000-05:00

I went to the open mat that Shawn has on Sundays. There were 7 of us there. I was the only chick of course but the guys there today were all people I like to work with so it didn't really matter.

I got to roll for about an hour and a half. I rolled a few times with Nick. He's a pro fighter and he has a really good ground game so I really like rolling with him. He catches me with stuff that I don't usually see. It's good to change it up and roll with someone who isn't a jiu jitsu practitioner. He hasn't spent too much time in the gi. He still knows so much that I know I will get tapped a number of times whenever we roll. I feel like I learn a lot every time we roll.

I also got to roll with Anthony a couple of times. He's one of the other amateur fighters at the gym. He's gearing up for a tournament in Dec. that's taking place here in KC. He wants to get his blue belt so he's working pretty hard. I like rolling with him because we have trained together for long enough that he knows pretty much exactly how rough he can be with me, without hurting me but giving me a really tough time.

There were two newer people there that I rolled with. It's nice to work with the newer guys, as long as they don't just try to crush me, because I get to see which moves I am really proficient at and which ones I have to drill some more before I can try them on a more advanced person.

I am still up in the air about whether or not I am going to participate in the KC Grappling Challenge. It's the tournament that Anthony is going to do. It's on Dec. 4. I am not sure if I want to pay $60 for probably 2 grappling matches. 1 in the gi and 1 no-gi. I think it will be good to have as many people there representing our school as possible but $60 smackers is a little steep for me right now. We will see. I'm just going to keep training. I like being back in the swing of things.

Going Through the Motions

2010-11-09T11:49:00.000-05:00

I am going to be starting my new career as a lawyer in a couple of weeks. I have been spending a lot of time trying to relax and have fun.

I feel like I have just been going through the motions with my training lately. I have only been working out 1 time a day recently. Which to a normal person I think sounds like a good amount. I have been trying to get used to it, especially because that is probably what I will be doing after I start work.

Last night I started to feel like I could train for a fight again. Before that I had just been feeling unable to devote that much of myself to training again. I think the let down after my fight has finally started to wear off.

I suppose I am going to head to the gym now to do the mid-day traditional class. I wish I could train in the gi more often.

Bar Exam

2010-09-16T23:40:00.001-04:00

I just found out I passed the Missouri Bar Exam. I am so glad that experience is behind me. I am looking forward to getting started on my career in the law. I am not looking forward to sacrificing so much of my training time. It's all about balance. I just have to find mine.

Noe Got What She Deserved

2010-09-11T10:44:00.000-04:00

Noe recently got promoted to BJJ blue belt. I am so happy for her. She missed the testing in Syracuse due to injury, otherwise her and I would have gotten our blue belts at the same time.

A Week of BJJ

2010-09-11T10:40:00.000-04:00

Noe and I took a trip to Maryland to train jiujitsu with our friend Danny Ives. He has a black belt under Lloyd Irvin. He also owns and operates an awesome school in Severna Park. Here is a link to his page - Ivey League MMA. He has a complete program out there that includes BJJ, Muay Thai and a kids program.

Danny was such an awesome host. He let us stay with him and he drove us all over the place, including dunkin donuts so I could drink coffee a bunch. Noe and I lived it up while we were there. We ate food and slept in. It was amazing.

The Training
We were there from Monday afternoon until Thurs afternoon. This gave us the chance to do about 10 sessions of training. Not all of it was BJJ there was a stand-up MMA style sparring session. Here's the breakdown of classes/sessions that we did.

Monday -
Shortly after we arrived I lifted weights with Danny and one of his fighters, also named Danny haha. Noe didn't get to lift with us because she didn't have any tennis shoes.

4:00 p.m. - Drilling session - this was awesome because Danny asked Noe and I what some trouble spots were for us and we worked on those. We primarily did some guard breaks.

7:00 p.m. - BJJ class - this was the regular bjj class Danny has in the evenings. We got to work the some of the curriculum that he had for the month of August. Then we played king of the hill for a little while, I have also heard it called king of the guard. We finished up class with some rolling.

Tues -
Afternoon - Danny was nice enough to take us with him to a private lesson he does once a week. The student has a bunch of matspace in his basement. Noe and I got to work on all the stuff he was showing the student. It was awesome because I am sure it costs a pretty penny to get privates with Danny and we got to participate in the fun.

Evening - We went with Teresa, Danny's girlfriend, co-manager, and bjj enthusiast, to the main Lloyd Irvin academy. Just as we were leaving Danny's gym to head out there someone said we were going to the advanced class and Noe freaked out a little because she was a white belt. Then Teresa assured her it was ok, that Danny had already spoken with Master Lloyd about us coming to visit.

Anyway, the class was awesome. I think the advanced class means that it's more focused on the individuals who really want to excel and are trying to put in that extra effort and time because there were other white belts there besides Noe. Also, there were a ton of accomplished tournament BJJ people there.

I have to leave to go train. I'll have to finish with another post later.

Too Much

2010-09-11T10:16:00.000-04:00

I think I will probably have to write a few different posts about all the stuff that I have been up to since my fight.

I have to admit, I have been taking it easy. I am still training almost everyday but not with the intensity as I was leading up to the fight. I am thinking about doing another fight on Dec. 3rd. I have some reservations about taking a fight at that time though because I am going to start my job at the law firm on Nov. 29th.

Taking the fight then scares me because when I lost my second fight I had a lot going on. I finally got my bachelor's degree after a long 8 year journey the weekend before my fight. In some ways this seems almost like the same thing. I will finally start working after this long journey through law school and the bar. If my first week this time is anything like my first week last summer then I will probably be completely exhausted at the end of each day.

Aside from just the fear about whether I will be drained everyday, I am also nervous about whether I would have a hard time with my weight because I will be in a completely different environment than my usual routine. Finally, and probably the thing that makes me most nervous is that I am really nervous about it. I think that, given a good opponent, if I am scared or feel insecure about my ability then I could lose. My mental state for the fight I just had was the opposite. I had no fear of losing because no matter who they put in there with me I knew that no one was preparing as much as I was and that there was no way I was going to lose.

That sort of mental state comes from training so hard and so many hours that you just have total confidence in all your moves and techniques. I do not know if the time to train that much will be there when the next fights in KC come around.

This is all just ramblings anyway until I talk to John and the promoter to see about getting on the card.

Fights!!!

2010-08-29T22:05:00.000-04:00

Noe and I both won our MMA fights on Friday.

Noe's fight!! Watch this one, it was awesome. Noe really got to show off some of her skills on Friday. I was so happy and proud of her. Look out 145ers Noe's comin for ya. :-)

My fight was a little anti-climactic. I won by TKO in 27 seconds. I trained really hard for this fight so it is somewhat disappointing to only get a short time in the cage but I am very happy that I won. I am not sure what my opponent's game plan was. I stuck to mine and that is all I need to worry about I suppose.

Anyway here it is.

Noe and I are leaving at 5 in the morning to go train with Danny Ives at Ivey League MMA in Annapolis, MD. I am so excited. I will try to put some updates about training BJJ with black belt Danny Ives over the next week. We will be there from Mon - Fri. I expect we will learn a ton of BJJ. :-)

Las Vegas Open

2010-08-17T16:17:00.000-04:00

I am home from my trip to Vegas for the IBJJF Vegas Open and the American Nation No-gi Open. I didn't win very much but I was still very happy with how I did. I won my first match then I lost 4 matches.

I won my first match in the gi under 129 division. I lost the second match. The woman I went against managed to get side mount and then I basically couldn't move for the rest of the time. I missed the score so I'm not sure how many points she beat me by.

The open division of the gi division was pretty tough for me. I went against a woman who was about 20 pounds heavier than I was. She also has a lot more tournament experience than I do. She said she had already done 6 other tournaments this year and she and her husband get private lessons every Sunday. That made me feel better about losing by points because I managed to not get submitted.

The first no-gi match I had was against a purple belt in the under 135.5 division. She beat me by one point. I was really happy because the jump in skill level from a 4 - 5 months blue belt to a purple belt is pretty substantial. Also, afterward I was talking to her and she told me that she won her division and the open division at the Pans this year. That's freakin huge. I was very pleased with not getting submitted and being able to actually attempt some subs on her during the match.

My final match was against a much larger purple belt who had just won her weight division in the no-gi a couple hours earlier. She beat the blue belt who beat me in the open of the gi division and she beat the blue belt who won the open gi division. She was a lot bigger than me maybe around 155 or 158. I was weighing 126.5 for the tournament.

Overall, although I didn't win much, I feel like I learned a lot. Also, I have a little bit of video of the matches so I am able to watch what happened and evaluate where I need more work. I mean I need work on everything but this will give me some direction at least. I was a bit surprised that I wasn't more upset about my losses. I think it's because I know I tried my hardest and that I am motivated to train to get better, not just by winning. But winning will be nice.

Rough Training

2010-08-11T13:31:00.000-04:00

Holy crap this has been such a long couple of weeks. Noe and I are really gearing up for this fight on Aug. 27th.

My opponent got changed but I am very happy about it because I am now going to fight at 125 lbs instead of 118. I was scared about trying to cut down that much. When I was hitting 122 after workouts for a few days people were starting to comment on how small I was looking, ripped but small. haha.

Tournament This Weekend
I am going to be leaving for Fri. for the IBJJF Las Vegas Open and the American National Jiujitsu No-gi Tournaments. It is technically two different tournaments but they are both in the same place on the same day and I was able to register for them both at the same time. Anyway, I am doing the under 129 for gi and under 135 for no-gi.

I still have to be careful not to eat that much because I will probably be right about 125 or 126 on Sat. I have to weigh in with my gi on. The gi I have weighs about 2 or 3 pounds. I hope I don't have to sweat a bunch the morning of to make weight.

I am also going to do the open division for both the tournys. I am a little nervous about going against some pretty large women but I think it will be a good experience.

Fight Training
Noe and I have been kicking the crap out of each other in our sparring sessions lately. It's good to have Noe as my training partner though because I think I don't get as mad about getting hit when it's her rather than when it's one of the guys. I think Noe is the opposite though, LOL.

My body is sore and I really want to eat some sandwiches and pizza but I am feeling awesome and I am ready to fight.

. . . and we are back!

2010-08-03T12:11:00.000-04:00

I finally finished the bar. I cannot believe how much time studying took up. I am glad the timing worked out the way it did though because I think if I had to do one more week, I would have gone crazy.

I have been working out like a mad woman since the bar ended.

I got a little crazy the day after the bar. I ran 3 miles around 10 am. Then, at noon, I did traditional Judo/TaeKwonDo class. Noe had to be back at the studio to teach kids TKD at 4:15 so I did the stairclimber for 40 min. during that class. Afterward, I ended up doing the climber again because our traditional class for the evening doesn't start up until 6:30. Noe wanted to get some cardio in so I did the climber on a low setting, 5 I think, while she did her cardio.

Then I did the traditional class again. After that I went over to the Brazil Academy and did jiujitsu class. I went ahead and signed up for classes 2x a week. I think I need to have jiujitsu people to roll with more often, especially since I am planning on doing tournaments.

I signed up for the IBJJF Las Vegas tournament on August 14th. That is about 2 weeks before my MMA fight. I should be in great cardio shape and I have been doing a lot of no-gi grappling. I haven't been working on the gi as much but I am hoping the new jiujitsu classes will give me enough work.

I am well on my way to getting my weight down for this fight. I have to be at 118. I weighed 125 after my workouts yesterday. I think I will be able to do it. Changing my eating habits has been so hard. I also have cut down on coffee, which anyone who knows me knows that coffee is my second greatest love.

I'm about to head to the gym. I'm tired and sore from yesterday. Noe and I basically kicked the shit out of each other all day. :-T I'm glad it's traditional classes today.

Too Long

2010-07-04T17:57:00.000-04:00

It has been too long since I posted last. I have been very busy with studying for the bar exam and training. It's pretty hard to find time to blog.

I haven't been doing that much jiujitsu lately because I am getting ready for my MMA fight in August. Although, I am planning on doing the jiujitsu tournament in Vegas two weeks before my MMA fight, I have been concentrating on MMA related training mostly. I think I have done 1 jiujitsu class since I went out to Ninja's class. I have been really working on my stand up, lately. We have been doing quite a bit of sparring.

We usually do about 45 min of stand up sparring on Mon. and Wed. and I did like an hour and a half of sparring yesterday (Sat.). We have been doing the traditional class (Tae Kwon Do / Judo) on Tuesdays and Thursdays, followed by X-camp, which is a crazy ass workout. I am glad I am working on my stand up quite a bit, even though I really feel like I miss BJJ right now, because the fight is going to start on the feet. If I can finish standing that would be cool, though I am sure it will go to the ground.

I am planning on going out to the KCBJJ school again tomorrow. Hopefully, the black belt will be there this time, since he wasn't there last time due to a family emergency I didn't get to take a class from him. I will probably decide after that who's class I will start going to after tomorrow. I need to be doing more BJJ to prepare for the tourny in Aug. At least I know my fitness level will be great during the tournament.

Tried a New JJ Class

2010-06-24T15:48:00.000-04:00

I got the chance to go out to the Brazil Academy the other day and try out their BJJ class. It was awesome. I really enjoyed the atmosphere. We got to work on some basics armbar drills and some mount escapes. We did an escape from mount that I had never done before, so that part was really cool. I only rolled two rounds at the end of class, even though they did 3 rounds. I was so tired from doing Judo and X-Camp at the studio already.

I worked with a woman who is also a blue belt and seemed to be about the same weight as me. Then I rolled one round with her and one round with Ninja. Ninja's transitions were awesome. I really enjoyed rolling with him and I think if I go up there more often I will probably learn a lot.

The class is lead by two purple belts. Ninja, the main instructor, is also a Contra Mestre in Capoeira. I have known him through events and other capoeira events for many years. Overall, I was very excited about the class. I think when I start working, not till September :-(, I will probably go to class there about twice a week.

We did Judo and X-camp before I went to the Brazil Academy. Judo was pretty good. We did the step in warm-up, which I really like. Then we worked on an Osoto set up. We finished off the class with a refresher and update on how to do straight ankle locks straight from the guard.

X-Camp was freakin crazy. My ass still hurts and that class was two days ago. I think it's getting worse by the day. Anyway, we did 3 min rounds of drills. We did bear crawl around the perimeter of the kickboxing area, then flying bananas, advancing burpees, walking lunges, mountain climbers, reverse pushups, hops on one leg then the other while holding the non-hoping leg up at 90 degrees. We did a ton of push ups and sit ups too but I can't remember it all. It was crazy though.

Sparring

2010-06-22T01:08:00.000-04:00

I did stand up sparring for almost the entire workout tonight. It was good practice. My cardio really needs some work. We were doing 5 min. rounds though. I will only be doing 3 min rounds for my fight in August. There was a guy named Jordan there tonight who weighs roughly the same amount as me, 130. It was cool going with someone about the same size as me. I mean he is still a man so he's strong but the rest of the guys I was sparring with tonight were all at least 180 I think. At the very end, for the last 3 min of sparring, I sparred with Sara. She trains a lot of muay thai so it was fun.

I rolled for a few min with Sara, until her band aid came off and she had to go grab some tape. I rolled with Jordan for at least 6 minutes, it might have been longer. Neither of us tapped the other. I sure was getting tired, but instead of making sure I used technique I think I ended up muscling a lot. It's weird when you get tired and end up doing the opposite of what you should. I was just laying there letting him squish me some of the time, when I should have been trying to scramble a little more to stop him from being able to squish me and make me more tired. Oh well maybe next time I recognize it before I am blogging about it and be able to swish it up a bit in training. :-) We will see. BJJ tomorrow night!

A Little Extra Cardio

2010-06-16T14:20:00.000-04:00

I don't think I blogged about class on Monday. Josh and I showed up about 30 min before kickboxing so that we could run the loop. It's a roughly 3.4 mile run close to the Studio. It took us a little less than the 30 min. I think we ran a little more than the 3.4 miles because we went a little further down the road than usual. Anyway, about 10 minutes into Kickboxing I was thinking "oh shit, I think I shouldn't have run before class." After the initial exhaustion went by I was good though and we had a great class. I got to work on my head kicks some more.

No one showed up for the women's class on Monday and we had someone over for dinner so Josh and I left pretty quick after kickboxing finished.

On Tuesday, Noe and I were both there by 5 because Noe helps with the children's Tae Kwon Do class. While she was doing that I did 25 min on the stairclimber on level 10. I didn't think I was going to make it. Then I just lifted weights for about 20 min., until traditional class.

We worked on two different throws. I think we started off with osoto gari (I'm not sure I am putting the right names of the throws). The second throw we did was harai goshi. The harai goshi was off the failed attempt at osoto gari. My footwork is in serious need of some help. I didn't get to try that many times because the first time Noe threw me on the harai goshi technique she messed up her finger. I wasn't sure what she did but she left the mat. When she came back her finger was all swollen up. She dislocated her ring finger. This morning it was still pretty swollen but she has been icing so hopefully it won't take long to get healed up.

I did the jiujitsu class last night. We drilled butterfly position, the armbar drill where you swing back and forth, working on the hip movement, and a kimura/bump sweep sit up position. After that short warm up we started working on passing the guard. Shawn had us working on getting the posture and then going to the pass. It was good to drill some posturing because usually when working on passing the guard we always start with posture established.

I rolled with Shawn for two rounds. He tapped me about 4 times. It was fun. He is much bigger than me but he is good at letting me move around and try stuff. I am going to try another class, probably next week that is taught by a purple belt, who also does capoeira. I just want to have a good number of people to roll with. When I start working I will probably pay the fees at the other gym I tried out KCBJJ so that I can train with the black belt up there.

Tension

2010-06-14T11:28:00.000-04:00

We worked on the bags on Sat. for the first 30 min or so. Then we got in the cage to help one of the Muay Thai guys get ready for a fight he has coming up. We all sparred about 3 rounds, without clinching, and then did 3 rounds with clinching.

My elbow is still a bit stiff from being hyper-extended again on Fridday night. I think I was protecting my elbow too much and I ended up making my back to tense and by the end of the stand-up work I basically couldn't move. My whole right side of my back was very tight and I spent the next hour laying on my back trying to relax. I watched Noe and Josh roll and work on sweeps and kimuras. :-( I hate having to just watch class.

On Friday night I showed up to the gym for Shawn's class but I guess no one showed up so Shawn left around 6:30. I did some cardio for a little while then I ended up rolling with this guy Justin, who usually does Shawn's class. He and I rolled for about 15 min. Then I got to roll with Jeff. Justin and I worked with the gi and Jeff didn't have a gi so we worked more MMA style grappling. I really need to work on my spider guard sweeps and some attacks from there. I always get spider guard but it makes no sense because I don't have any moves from there. I can usually control the other person somewhat but that is not a good reason to be in a position. I really need to work on stuff from there.

First Women's Class

2010-06-10T16:52:00.000-04:00

Last night I did John's Kickboxing class. :-T I always feel like I'm in shitty shape when I do that class. We basically did a very similar workout to the Monday workout. The only thing that was different was that my mom was over on the eliptical machine working out like a mad woman. She just signed up for the fitness challenge that we have going on at the gym right now. I am excited that my mom will be at the gym with us. It's nice to have more family members up there. The burn-out, which is the last bit we always do at the end of kickboxing was rough. We had to do 100 punches, any combos, 100 kicks and 100 push-ups.

While we were doing the last part of the kickboxing class, I had the two students who showed up for the women's class get started on the warm up. I had them do 20 sets of stairs, with the hall way. I think that might have been a bit much, upon further reflection, which means after talking to Noe.

We basically only worked on basic positions for most of the class then we did the most basic armbar from guard. We started off by doing shrimps. I really wanted to make sure they got the details of the shrimp down because it seems like no matter where I have gone, I always see tons of people doing shrimps with pretty bad form. I think it is one of those things that people kind of over look because it is so basic but that is precisely the reason I think it is so important. It is the basis for a number of escapes and it helps develop the hip movement necessary for so many positions.

Anyway, after we did shrimps, we worked on just shrimping with someone in your guard and then the same thing but with a safe get up. I mostly wanted them to get comfy with the feeling of being in someone's guard, with good posture, and having someone in their guard. We moved on to the arm bar after drilling variations of shrimping movements and getting up. We ended up working on the arm bar for about 35 - 40 min., with the two women just going back and forth doing arm bars on each other and on me. We initially planned on the class going from 7 - 8 but I am thinking now that we might end up going until 8:30. We'll play it by ear and see how the students like it.

I started a meet up group for the women's class. We are planning on making some fliers, I just have to find the time. Until then Facebook, face to face, word of mouth, and this meet up group are going to have to do.

Here's a link to the meet up group. Join the group if you want :-)

Women's MMA / Self-defense Meet up Group

Hard to Keep Up

2010-06-08T16:13:00.000-04:00

It's harder to keep up with blogging ever time I workout, now that Noe and I only have to drive 20ish minutes to get to the gym.

On Sunday, Josh (my brother) and I went to the jiujitsu class at the studio. Normally, a purple belt comes up on Sundays to teach the class. This week Shawn said that the purple belt had a family emergency, so he couldn't come teach. I am thinking it doesn't pay to teach classes I want to try out, when I went to try out the class the black belt in town teaches, he had a fam. emergency (his wife got in a car accident).

Anyway, this was Josh's first official jiujitsu class. Shawn gave him a gi to wear, which was cool because Josh ended up buying the gi. Fugi, awesome gis in my opinion. We always work on very basic stuff in that class, so I am glad it was the type of class Josh tried out for the first time.

We worked on
- scissor sweeps
- armbar from guard
- sweep from armbar attempt into armbar

It was a good class. I didn't roll, I just worked on the things we did in class with Josh while people rolled.

Yesterday, Monday, I did the kickboxing class. Holy shit. One would think I am in shape because I can roll for like an hour and a half and be fine. I am not in kickboxing shape though. I thought I was gonna die after the first 3 min. round we did.

As the warm up we ran around the mat punching each bag as we ran past it. It is a good warm up, we have about 16 muay thai bags that go around the outside of the mat space.

1st round - 3 min. - 2 jabs, back leg kick, switch foot head kick
1 min full squats in between round (full squats = but touches your heels)
2nd rnd - 3 min. - 2 jabs, hook to body, hook to body, uppercut, hook to head
1 min full squats w/ a jump
3rd round - the first two combined
1 min full squats

I can't remember the rest of the stuff we did but I didn't think I was going to make it.

After we cooled down for a min. Noe, Josh and I worked on armbars and sweeps for a little while. Then we went home and I studied for the bar some more. :-T

Fight University Wins

2010-06-05T22:56:00.001-04:00

I am so happy Erin won her fight last night. It was awesome. She got to do exactly the stuff John had her working on the lately. Anyway, Erin won in the first round by rear naked choke. Here is a link.

Erin Brown MMA Win by Rear Naked Choke

Noe and I were also able to talk to the organizers of the Blue Corner promotion and we let them know we are looking to fight in August. There was a woman on the card last night that is in Noe's weight class and they are in talks now to get Noe set up with her.

We told them that I am looking at fighting at 125 next time. This is because I am planning on going to the Las Vegas IBJJF tournament on Aug. 14th. I hope this one doesn't fall through too. I hope I can get some tournament wins in so that I can get some sponsorships and get to go to more tournaments. I am excited about getting back in there and having another MMA fight. August is going to be an exciting month. I'll keep my fingers crossed that I actually get to go to the Vegas tournament.

Tomorrow I am planning on going to a bjj class at the studio. On Sundays a purple belt comes in and teaches a class. I am pretty excited.

Unintended But Needed Break

2010-06-04T11:11:00.000-04:00

I didn't train or workout at all yesterday and I probably won't do anything until Sun. I am not injured or anything but as usual real life comes up. I am feeling very overwhelmed by studying for the Bar Exam so I only studied yesterday and I am planning to do the same over the next couple of days.

I am not working out tonight because some of our teammates will be fighting here in KC.

I'm pretty excited to see Erin fight again. We have all been training really hard with her and I think she is going to do awesome tonight. I might be able to get some youtube footage up tomorrow depending on the rules at the venue.

Kickboxing Workout

2010-06-03T13:49:00.000-04:00

I only did the kickboxing class last night. The first half hour we did a recorded workout, similar to the Bas Rutten workout, except John made it. It was awesome. I was so tired when we finished it. We did a lot of combos.

Some of the ones I remember are:
- the usual - Jab, Cross, Hook, commonly referred to as 123.
- Jab cross Right hook, left hook - 1234
- 4 straight punches then 3 - 5 knees
- sprawl, knee
- sprawl, upper cut
- jab, cross, hook to the head, hook to the body

There were also various combos including leg kicks and such.

After we did 30 min of that we started doing 3 min rounds of specific combos. With 1 min of squats or burpees with jumps, in between. It was rough but a great work out.

Oh yeah then we did 50 push kicks on each leg, 50 leg, head and body kicks with each leg to finish up class.

3 Day Weekend

2010-06-02T13:57:00.000-04:00

I went to Wisconsin for a Pow Wow over the Memorial Day weekend. We left on Friday night and didn't get in to Black River Falls until Sat. morn. at about 5 am. My brother and I were going to try to do a 5K run on Sat morning but we just couldn't bring ourselves to get up at 8 am. So I basically ate like shit the rest of the weekend. Haha.

I got to meet a dude from my tribe, who does MMA and has won a couple of belts with organizations up in Wisconsin. It sounds like he is movin on up. His name is Eddie Larrea. I'll keep my eyes peeled for info about him and keep you updated.

Yesterday, Tues., was the first time I had worked out since last week. I couldn't really do anything over the weekend because my knee was bothering me. I guess I lifted weights for a little while in the hotel gym, just upper body.

I got done really early with my bar review class yesterday so I was able to go to the noon class at the studio. We mostly rolled with Erin, her fight is on Fri. night. It was good we did worst case scenario drills with her. We took the mount and she had to escape. I was trying to work on getting into technical mount when the person bucks and almost goes all the way to their side but I couldn't quite get it. I need to continue to figure out the smaller details of that movement, I'm almost there. At the end of the class we just had to do 100 kicks with each leg on the bag to finish up.

I went to study for 3 hours and then headed back to the gym for the night class. I love being able to train a bunch. Although my body is pretty sore. Anyway, Tues. night class is traditional Judo/Tae Kwon Do class. We have mostly just been doing Judo lately, which I am happy about. We worked on a sacrifice take down set up. It is a two handed sleeve grab then drag. As the person moves to square up you go right into a sacrifice throw and end up in kesa gatame. This is the second time we have worked it so I am starting to kind of get comfortable with it. We worked a few different subs from the kesa and then did some randori, which is the term for sparring or free-style practice. It was good, I got to go with Noe first. Then I went with a teenage boy who is about my size. Finally, I went with Kevin, he's one of the black belts. I wasn't able to take him down, which doesn't surprise me. We went twice. That took it out of me and I was really tired by the time the next class started.

The next class is a BJJ fundamentals class that a blue belt, Shaun, teaches. I like going to that class because we drill for a long time. We worked on scissor sweeps. Then I rolled two times and called it quits.

Tonight will be our first all female martial arts class. I am hoping at least a few people show up. We are working on getting the website updated with the class info but here's a link with Noe and I, and some bio info.

rEvolution Bio Page

Taking It Easy

2010-05-28T00:19:00.001-04:00

I guess I got a little crazy last night. Today, my knee and my elbow were really bothering me. I basically took it really easy this evening. We started off the traditional class by doing a judo exercise where you stand in front of a wall and do judo step ins, like a set up for a throw. It was really good, we did 50 on each side. I feel like I should work on those more because one of my biggest problems on my throws is that I get too timid on the step in and I end up not getting the person over the hip.

Then I basically did 1 round of the technique that John had us doing tonight. We did an open guard pass where you grab the pant with both hands and a spin into kesa gatame. It sounds crazy but it was good. Then John had me working with a woman who normally does the Kickboxing class. It was interesting because it gave me the opportunity to get a feel for how to explain things to beginners.

The second class was supposed to be X camp but no one showed up. Since it was just the fighters there, and my brother (who doesn't fight or do jiujitsu but I'm trying to convince him otherwise), we ended up just rolling. Josh rolled with one of the black belts from Tae Kwon Do. Since my elbow is messed up John just showed us some arm bar stuff from guard. He told us if we wanted to start bringing our camera and recording the moves we could. So last night we recorded most of the stuff John showed us. We also showed Josh the flower sweep and then all of us just drilled the flower sweep and some arm bars.

Noe and I are going to start running a women's MMA type of class. I hope people start coming to it, I think it will be awesome. I have been trying to spread the word at my bar review classes. John is making some fliers so we are going to start posting those up everywhere. Even if we only get 4 or 5 women it will be so cool.

Rolling with the Punches

2010-05-27T00:23:00.000-04:00

Did lots of MMA style rolling tonight, it was awesome. I rolled a bunch of times with Erin, who has a fight coming up. Then I got to roll with a guy named Nolan, who also has a fight coming up. It was cool because they are both very close to my weight.

It is so different rolling and having to worry about getting punched in the face. I enjoyed myself tonight. Noe said I rolled for like an hour and a half. I don't know if it was that long but I wasn't really that tired because I was having so much fun.

Erin and I worked on some situational drills, which I am loving right now. We kept starting with me in side mount and if I got the full mount we would start over and if she got up or took my back we would start over. It was good.

I'm sleepy and I have to get up early to study before class tomorrow. I am not doing so hot with the Evidence portion of the bar review materials. I'm getting there though.

The Good Kind of Sore

2010-05-26T00:13:00.000-04:00

Well yesterday was the most working out I have done all in one day, in a long time. So today I am really sore. I like being sore from working out a bunch though. This morning I ran for about 10 min. I woke up a little late so I only had a few min. At least I got in a little over a mile.

I got to the gym a little after 5 today. I had my bar review class until a little after 3 then I went to a coffee shop to study for a little over an hour. It was nice. It was pretty funny though because I was sitting there just reading my book and at like 4:55 a group of people came in and the barista said they closed at 4. I basically sat in the coffee shop for like an hour after they closed. LOL.

Anyway, I lifted weights for a few min before the class started at 6. The Tues. / Thurs. schedule is traditional class - traditional tae kwon do and judo - then an X-camp class. There is also a jiujitsu class that a blue belt runs. Tonight I did the trad. judo class then the jiujitsu class. On Thurs. I think I will do the judo and X-camp class.

The judo class was great because I got thrown a bunch and I got to do a bunch of throws. I am so nervous about throws because I am not used to it. There are some really good mats for throws at the studio. The throw we did was like a sacrifice throw, straight into a kesa gatame, then we just did a bunch of different arm bars and stuff from there.

The jiujitsu class was great because we got to drill a bunch of scissor sweeps. We did arm bar drills and then we did guard passes, followed by armbars again from a failed scissor sweeps. Then we rolled. I only rolled twice but they were really fun rolls. I got to go with Shaun, he's the blue belt, he's the one who teaches the class.

Last night I got tapped like 4 times. It was really good to get tapped a bunch so quickly because I got to see some holes I have in my game.

So I'm not gonna have a fight on the 4th. I am a little disappointed but I guess this gives me more time to train for the next one or the next tournament.

My Face Is Jacked Up - HAHA

2010-05-25T00:09:00.000-04:00

Welcome back!!!

Noe and I went up to the studio today. Our usual home for training martial arts. We did some MMA training today. Mostly we sparred. We were helping our friend get ready for a fight. She is fighting on June 4th. She fights at 135 so we are pretty similar in weight. I am walking around at about 132 right now. I think she is going to do well, she was hitting pretty hard. I got hit a few times and I was like "oh yeah, this is what it's like to get hit." I forgot.

Well, while we were there John brought up me taking a fight at 125 or 130 on the June 4th card. I told him to go ahead and put a call into the matchmaker. I guess depending on whether they have someone for me I will do it. As long as she's not some chick who's about to go pro or something. I feel like I am in good enough shape. I would just push it really hard for the next week and then do some light technical work the few days before. I have to say, I am pretty excited about not having to weigh in with a gi on.

I tried out a new jiujitsu school tonight. It is called KCBJJ. The class tonight was taught by purple belt because the usual instructor, a black belt, had a family emergency. I liked the class. It runs longer than the classes that were at East West, so we got to drill stuff for a lot longer. We worked on standing guard passes. I need to work on everything so I was excited to work on the guard passes. Plus, when you do tournys everybody seems to pull guard.

Here's a crappy pic of what my face looks like. I got a few marks on my face from the sparring with Erin at the studio and then I got my lip busted and my nose all jacked up while I was rolling tonight. I think most of the guys just aren't used to rolling with a woman, who weighs like 30 - 50 pounds less than they do.

Well you can't really see the marks on my face but they are there.

The Slope

2010-05-20T16:47:00.000-04:00

Josh and I finally got to do the sprints on Cornell's slope. We only did 6 but, man, they were tough. After the hills Josh and ran home. I think it must have been a little under 3 miles. OMG I did not enjoy running the hills but I am glad we did it.

Moving - Last Class at East West

2010-05-20T10:47:00.000-04:00

We went to our last jiujitsu class at East West last night. It was basically just a normal class. The warm up was hard for me for some reason. Also, when it came time to do partner work, Noe said the area around my eyes and my mouth was kind of green. I don't know why I wasn't feeling good. Anyway, we worked on some good stuff, basics.

Part of the warm up was some collar grab breaks. Then we worked on butterfly sweeps, we drilled that a bunch :-). Then we did situational sparring. The first two rounds were half guard, the next four were spider guard. If you got a sweep or passed then you had to start over. I love doing those kinds of drills.

We finished up with 2 5 min rounds. The first round I went with a guy everyone calls Roy Nelson haha. Then Guybson said it was going to be the last round so I asked him if he would roll with me because this would be our last round at EW. He added a min and rolled 3 min. with me and 3 min. with Noe. It was really good. Guybson is so light when he rolls with us.

We will have to make sure we try to schedule a seminar with Guybson, so he can come to KC.

Big Weekend

2010-05-17T14:52:00.000-04:00

I have been pretty busy the last couple of days so I haven't been able to blog about working out. I have been running a bunch with Josh. Yesterday (the day before now because I was too tired last night to continue to type) I got to go to open mat. Noe didn't go because she hung out with my mom and my other brother, Matt. They went hiking around Ithaca.

Open mat was really good. We did the usual warm up and then went into basics drilling. We did a bunch of arm bars and then did a bunch of butterfly sweeps. It was really good. Then we did 5 5 min. rounds. I rolled with James (4 stripe blue), Jake (3 or 4 stripe white), Guybson, Z (big huge beginner), and a brand new guy whose name I don't know. It was a really good workout. I got to work on some of my sweeps.

Yesterday was my law school graduation. Josh and I started off by going to the slope on campus to run some hills. We picked up my friend Carlos, on the way. He is still in his first year and has 1 test left so we told him the workout would be somewhat quick. We just planned on doing sprints on the hill for a little while.

During the warm up, which was just one short jog up the hill, a man pulled up in a church van and took our stuff. We were about a fourth of the way down the hill, when I noticed the man and asked Josh and Carlos if that man was digging around in our stuff. As soon as we realized he was, I started yelling and running, but it was too late he was already walking back over to his church van and took off. I chased him for a while but even though he stopped at the stop sign at the end of the street I didn't catch up to him. He made off with some weighted gloves, resistance bands, a t-shirt, 2 workout towels, and my car keys.

Josh and I decided we would just start the 3 mile run home because we weren't sure if Carlos would be able to get ahold of Noe. Plus we had to make sure we got home in time to start getting ready for my graduation. We ended up getting home at the same time as my mom, Noe, and Matt. They brought my car back to the house.

At least we still got a workout in.

Workout With My Brother

2010-05-13T23:28:00.000-04:00

My family is in Ithaca for my graduation this weekend. This means Josh and I will be doing a lot of working out. It's great for getting those last couple pounds off. Unfortunately, I ate a bunch of food after we got done working out. Well not a lot really. I had a salad with mixed greens and steamed broccoli and squash and a turkey and swiss wrap (with nothing else on it). Also I don't put any kind of dressing on my salad. A handful of peanuts, about 2 pieces of beef jerky, and protein shake. Well it felt like a lot of food for the evening meal.

Josh and I ran about 2 miles to start. Then we did a total of 4 sets of sprints. We did 2 sets at 40 meters and then 2 sets at 70 meters. Each set consisted of 1 sprint with resistance bands, where one of us held the other while they were sprinting and then we just did a regular sprint. Those were really hard. Josh is a lot bigger and stronger than me so it was really hard to sprint when he was holding the bands for me. I felt like I was barely even moving. Anyway we were going to do 5 sets but I wimped out. It was really hard to breath correctly because I can't completely breath through my nose yet. So instead of doing the resistance sprints we just did a few more regular sprints.

We also tossed an 8 pound medicine ball around. We did 3 sets of 20 (except one time I accidently did 25) lunges. The first time we just did regular step lunges with a 15 pound kettlebell. The second set we did the lunge twists and the 3rd set we did regular lunges again but holding the kettlebell out in front of us parallel to the ground. Then we had to come inside because some friends were going to be at the house soon. Just did some stretching and a few abs on the stability ball.

Sick WTF?!?

2010-05-11T18:53:00.000-04:00

Not that I was going to be able to go to class tonight anyway but I cannot believe I am sick right now. I have 2 finals over the next two days. Tomorrow I have a 4 hour financial institutions exam and Thurs. I have a corporate tax exam, only 3 hours.

Well anyway, I didn't get to wear my new gi to class last night because we decided to send it back and order the next size up. The sleeves were the perfect length. I was really nervous that after the first wash it might shrink too much to wear in competition. Noe mailed it off for me today so hopefully we will get it back sometime next week.

Class last night was fun we did both the bjj and muay thai class. Bjj is first on Mon. and Wed. We did some conditioning stuff at the beginning that was a little different than the usual warm up. We got to carry each other around a few times. I was with Beth this time. I think she weighs about the same as me right now. Guybson wants to work on butterfly guard all week. I won't be back into the gym until Fri. so hopefully he can catch me up on some of the movements then.

Muay Thai was fun we basically did conditioning the entire class. I like classes like that sometimes. We just did a massive circuit.

Surprise Gi!!!

2010-05-09T22:28:00.000-04:00

My birthday is coming up but we will be on the road back to Kansas City on that day - so Noe surprised me with an early birthday dinner with some close friends. They all pitched in and got me a brand new Vulkan lite gi. Wohooo!! I am so excited. I will wear it to class tomorrow to try it out. :-) Here's some pics.

Other side - patch on the pants.

Here's me checking out how much I weigh with the gi on. Let's just say I shouldn't have eaten that small slice of cake and those french fries at dinner. :-)

Haha. Class tomorrow is going to be exciting. Plus I am planning on getting a SAS patch to put on my gi for the tournament next month.

Weekend Workouts

2010-05-09T15:49:00.000-04:00

I went to open mat yesterday. It was good. I got to study for my finals for a little while on the drive out there. I can't believe I get car sick so easily. It's really annoying.

Anyway, there were a good number of people at open mat but not too many. I like it when there are about 8 people in class. We did a pretty light warm up followed by the usual question and answer session Guybson does. I didn't ask any questions this week. It was a bit overwhelming listening to everyone else's questions though, it seemed like everyone had some questions.

I have been feeling not so hot when I am rolling lately. I think I am just in a funk. The sweeps I usually use and the control positions I can usually use have been hard for me to pull off this week for some reason. I feel like it is because I am in the middle of finals and my brain just doesn't have enough power to concentrate on my school material and jj as much as I need right now. This just tells me that most of my moves are still not ingrained in my muscles yet. Good to know.

I only have 2 finals left in law school. I am so happy to be so close to being done. I am a little sad to be leaving East West because we just got to start going to classes there.

I took a short break from studying Financial Institutions today to do a very light workout. Here's what I did:

About 10 min. of Capoeira - Ginga and various escapes as a warm up.
150 squeezes with the pilates circles - for my closed guard
75 reaches with the 8 lbs. medicine ball - where you hold your legs up in the air and reach up and touch your toes.
60 - 30 on each side - lunge squats w/ 2, 15 lbs kettle bells
30 total curls during the lunge squats
300 squats w/ 20 lbs weight vest
Stretch for like 10 min.

I didn't want to do too much but I feel like I should have done a little more. Maybe I'll get some work in tonight after we get done with all the School related stuff. Graduation celebration for the University LGBT Community and a dinner with some close friends.

ps. I weighed 126.4 after my workout. Then I had a protein shake and some puffins (great tasting organic cereal).

Awesome Workout

2010-05-08T08:14:00.001-04:00

Last night was the first time that Noe and I have done Muay Thai since they finished the renovations at East West Combat Club. They basically expanded the mat space, put up about 8 or 10 heavy bags and removed the locker rooms. It was nice having a place to change but we have 2 bathrooms and a shower so it's not that bad.

Muay Thai class was a great workout. Noe and I were a couple of minutes late because of the worst traffic we have ever seen in Syracuse. So we missed a couple min of running and a few sprawls. We jumped in during the sprawls though so we still got to do some. I need some work on those sideways types of sprawls, I always hit my legs on the floor funny when I try those. Anyway, we had a pretty good warm up after that we just did a bunch of push ups sit ups running, the usual.

For the technique portion of class we partnered up, I worked with Noe of course. We were the only two women there, plus the only time I wouldn't work with her is if Guybson told me to work with someone else. We just did a right hook, left hook, the other person escapes both then switch. Then after we did that for a few min. we went over to the heavy bags. Noe was on an actual boxing heavy bag and I worked on a muay thai bag. I like those, we'll have to get one for our house when we buy one. We did one round as hard as we could, like as powerful as possible, then one round with speed.

We did the same thing with jab, cross next. Then we did the same thing with kicks. We did just right leg kicks, alternating kicking each other then we moved to the bags and then after that we did left leg kicks and moved to the bags. OMG the kicking really took it out of me. I'm not sure which one was worse, kicking as hard as I could or as fast as I could.

Finally, we finished off with some conditioning. We each got on a bag and punched, as much as we could without stopping, then he would yell and we would go to the center of the mat and do pushups, then we got back on the bag and punched again. After that round we lined up facing each other, each line on the opposite end of the mat. We basically did sprints. I didn't have a partner so I just "sprinted" the whole time. I need the extra work.

BJJ class was really good too. I did pretty much the whole warm up for that. It was good, so many of us that did MT did BJJ so the warm up was pretty short and we got to get right into positions. He showed us a take down bait into a crucifix choke. It was pretty sweet. Also he showed a movement to take the back and do a choke. He only showed those two positions because he wanted us to roll more. We usually do 3 - 5 min. rounds during regular class but we did 5 - 5 min. rounds last night. It was pretty fun. I did the techniques with a guy named Paul, he's new but he trained somewhere else before and has purple belt. I also rolled with Noe (twice), Maggie, and a guy named Dave.

Overall class was awesome. I thought for sure I was going to be about 128 when we got home. I might have been except I begged Noe to take me to Wegman's so we could buy some fruit. I basically ate a ton of fruit on the way home. I ended up weighing 130.6 or something like that. :-(. It's because I broke down and ate pizza. It's true I have no will power and I ate 3 slices of whole wheat vegan "meat" topped pizza in the last two days. I can't believe how much of a difference that makes.

I reserved a hotel room in Long Beach for the Mundials. The IBJJF has a link on their website for the Marriott close to the airport, they have a special $99 rate. I am pretty nervous and excited and a bunch of other emotions too. I am really glad I'm not doing the open class though I think I wouldn't be ready for that yet. I just need to stick to the good eating habits.

Losing weight

2010-05-06T10:18:00.002-04:00

I am planning on doing the under 129 division at the Mundials. I weigh 133 pounds with my gi on right now. I have been watching what I eat for the last 5 days or so. It's pretty difficult to not snack on junk food. I don't usually eat too much junk food but I do love me some Kettle brand salt and pepper chips. They are organic but they are still potato chips. Anyway, I don't think I'll have a problem shaving off those few pounds over the next few weeks.

Last night we went to bjj class. Our friend Marina came with us. It was really fun having her in class. I got to work with her. We did work on a somewhat complicated sweep but she got it right so that was cool. The only thing I was worried about when I saw the sweep we were going to be working on was that Marina has never done anything like jiujitsu and that she hasn't learned how to fall correctly, yet. It worked out though.

We basically did a sweep from de la riva guard. I probably won't really use it though because I am not that comfortable with the de la riva guard yet. I will need to do more with it before I start trying sweeps from there haha. We also rolled 3 - 5 min rounds.

I am helping Noe with a group training session today. We are going to be doing a bunch of Capoeira movements. A lot of Ginga and a ton of esquivas. I bet my legs will be sore because I haven't really done any capoeira movements in a long time. It will be good though because I don't feel like I have been working my lower body enough.

Hopefully tonight Noe and I will be able to work on some positions. I'm not sure how likely that is though because I have my first final tomorrow and then I have two finals next week. I remember when taking a test only required a few hours of studying, if that. Now, in law school, I study for days for a test. Ridiculous.

Sprinting :-0

2010-05-05T09:49:00.000-04:00

I decided to work on the cardio a bit yesterday. I just did some sprints in front of the house. I'm not sure of the length of the sprints because I used mailboxes as the markers. I tried out this runners website to check the distances. So I have an approximation.

40 Meters
4 x total of hops with my feet together -
10 x sprinting

60 Meters
10 x Sprinting

I was wearing some weighted gloves, I think it adds 5 pounds. I basically just started at my mailbox and sprinted to the neighbors mailbox then turned around and sprinted back without a rest. Then after I did 2 I walked for like 10 sec. and did it again, on the 40 Meter sprints. Then when I did the 60 Meter sprints I did 3 at a time, except the last one I did 4. That stuff was hard. Plus I hate to run.

Oh yeah and I did like 75 squats with 20 pounds. Some curls and some overhead press.

A few hours later I went over to Danny's house and we worked on some positions for a little while. He showed me some of the stuff I missed at the second day of the Sazinho Sa seminar. It was cool. Basically, on the of the moves is a modified bump sweep and the other was a reverse armbar and then you can roll the person into a regular armbar if you want. We also worked on the chokes we worked on in class on Monday.

We finished off by rolling for a little while. Usually when Danny and I roll at his house we don't do timed rounds we just roll to our hearts content. Really, we roll for a few then he taps me and I ask questions and then we go again for a little while. I like it because I get a really good workout. One thing we talked about, as far as mistakes I am making is that I keep my ass to high in the air and it makes sweeping me very easy. Noted.

Danny also started throwing some ankle locks in there because those are allowed now that I am a blue belt. He said I need to be ready for all that stuff because the women at the World's are going to be ready for everything. I got really nervous last night about going to the Tournament in June. I am working out a decent amount but I know that my competition is probably able to spend more time on the mat than I am right now, because of my finals. I am just going to go and try my best - That's all I can do.

Same Old Same Old

2010-05-03T23:42:00.000-04:00

I went to class today. We only did the bjj class tonight. Usually on Monday's we would do both the bjj and the muay thai class but I am right in the middle of studying for finals.

Class was good, we did a little bit of a different warm up. We worked on osoto gari and stand up grip sparring. After several one minute rounds of each we drilled two chokes from side mount and rolled three five minute rounds. The second two rounds I rolled some teenage boys. Whew they were strong. One of them has the first juvenile belt because he is still 15. OMG I couldn't believe how much he was muscling me. The second boy was probably about the same age, maybe 17 at the most. He is a wrestler so he was crazy strong too - also muscling me a bunch. I got a good workout out of it though so that was nice.

Yesterday, there weren't any classes anywhere b/c it was Sunday. So our friend Carlos came over and we had a great workout. We did a few things. My legs were sore today, so I know it was a good workout. Here's what we did:

Medicine ball warm-up
3 sets 10 each
  - chest passes
  - side passes, right
  - side passes, left
  - overhead passes

3 x 10 each lateral slides w/ a 20lbs weight vest
3 x 20 jumps starting on the knees jump to feet then jump w/ knees to chest
butt scoots

Then we did curls, shoulder presses, & bent rows. We just did 2 sets of between 12 and 20 reps.

The last thing we did was work on some arm bars, we did a lot of those. Then we did an armbar to triangle transition. Then it was time to eat the stew and chicken fried rice Noe made. It was delicious.

Mundials

2010-05-02T09:16:00.000-04:00

I keep forgetting to post about the Mundials. I am pretty sure I will be flying out to Long Beach to compete in the World Championships in June. Our good friend is fighting in an MMA fight on the 4th. I am really crossing my fingers that the women's blue belt weight divisions are scheduled on the first day like they were last year.

I have decided that I am going to cut a few pounds so I can compete in the under 129 division. This will only require that I lose about 4 pounds so I think it's definitely do-able. I have also decided not to do the open division. It seems like too much for my first tournament at blue.

I'm nervous and excited about doing this tournament. I hope everything works out.

Sore Neck

2010-05-02T08:45:00.000-04:00

Well I was trying to come up with a post about what my goals in BJJ are but I was failing miserably. Because although, I have been thinking about it for a little while now I am still unsure about what exactly my goals are right now. The only thing so far that I have come up with is - Goal 1 - train as much as I get the opportunity to.

My neck is hurting right now. My neck got tweaked during open mat today. I'll deal with that later. I actually asked a question during the question portion of the open mat. I think I have really been trying to pay attention to what happens when I roll and when I practice techniques now. Not that I wasn't paying attention to things before but I think I am finally able to think past just the immediate thoughts, of grab this arm and then that lapel, now move your right leg. It is nice to be able to really think about what I am doing on more than one level. Anyway, I asked Guybson about the technical mount. I only just heard it called that like a month ago. Anyway I know I had learned it a long time ago but I was very shaky on the details and when I tried it live on Friday I kept losing my position. I wasn't distributing my weight correctly.

So we only went through two questions then we rolled 5 rounds. I probably went about 4.5 rounds because during the 4th round my partner did something funky and my neck got a little messed up. The first round I went with this guy who was gone for like a month, so it was nice to see him back in class. Then I rolled with Beth, who is very similar in size to me and a female, so I really like rolling with her because she is trying to use techniques, whereas some guys are usually using a lot of muscle. The I rolled with this huge guy, who's name might be Zek or just Z, it's hard to understand when Guybson, with his accent, is saying a person's name from another country and its a name that I haven't heard before. Anyway, I will call him Z, I really like rolling with him. He is very strong but he really concentrates on using technique. The the next round was when I hurt my neck.

Wait I just realized that I am confusing open mat w/ friday night class, fri. is when I rolled w/ Z. The third round I rolled with James. He's a four stripe blue belt and he has been training for a long time. I enjoyed rolling with him because he has good technique. I got to work on some side mount escapes from bottom. I need to do more. Then, I hurt my neck. Finally, I got to roll with Guybson, for the first time in like a month. I couldn't pass that up even though my neck was still a bit stiff from the round previous. The awesome thing about rolling with black belts is you really get to move around a lot and see where you stand on different techniques. He tricked me and got me down with an ankle pick, even though I was looking for it because he does that all the time haha. It was awesome. I was tired though and my muscles are sore today.

Hopefully, I can get enough studying done and Carlos and I can work out tonight. Stupid law school finals.

Back to Basics

2010-05-01T09:38:00.000-04:00

Last night was a great class. Well let me start with the Muay Thai class. I was like 27 min. late for class. I'm not sure what happened. I only left the house 3 min. late but then I had to get gas, which I only put like $12 in, which equal 4 gallons these days :-(. Anyway, I was disappointed to miss out on 25 min of exercise, especially when I am driving so far to get there.

So when I finally arrived, they were working on a 1 2 combo. I just warmed up a bit on the side, then worked on the heavy bag b/c there were an even number. We did that for a while, then we added in an escape after the 1 2, the person holding the mits did two hooks to the head. We did a few more rounds of that. Then we sparred. I went with Maggie, who lost her mouth piece, we had fun. Guybson went with this huge guy and then they actually sparred during the warm up for JJ.

Mike lead the warm up. We worked on a basic arm bar and a basic butterfly sweep. I have to get ready for class - more later.

Seminar Sazinho Sa

2010-04-29T08:43:00.000-04:00

Noe and I got to participate in a great seminar last night. There was kind of a scare when we first arrived at the gym. Apparently, Sazinho had missed his flight from Newark to Syracuse. Which normally wouldn't be a big deal, except he doesn't speak english and he doesn't have a cell phone. I was so worried he wouldn't arrive until really late and I would miss the only night I was able to come to the seminar.

The seminar was awesome. We went over by about 1.5 hours, haha. I have been to enough capoeira workshops, batizados and other events to know that there was no way we were getting out of there at 8:30 last night. I was happy that he kept us the extra time because I had to pay $75 smakers for one night - ouch. Luckily, Noe and I figured out our money situation and were able to pull things together to participate. We are blessed to have nice friends and a lot of support for our passion to train.

Anyway, we started with a light, I mean really light, warm up. We basically moved our hips around and stretched our arms a little bit. Sazinho took the approach of just teaching us a bunch of techniques instead of only teaching a few and working us out real hard. After the "warm up" we started with lapel defenses. He had us do about 3 different lapel defenses. Then he had us do a trick, or set up, where we bait the person with our forearm, so they grab your sleeve and you can break the grip and go straight into a single leg or high crotch. It was pretty cool. Then he had us work on a modified version of the fireman's carry. Which was pretty cool and I think I might actually be able to use that one with a little more drilling, it seemed very comfortable for me.

We did so many techniques. Actually before the fireman's carry we did an Osoto Gari defense. It was really cool. I will definitely be working on that one because the timing is so important it will take a while for me to be able to use that one. It would have been nice to know about it earlier, like before I got taken down hard core in my last tournament. LOL. It was a little bit scary working on throws with so many people at the seminar, the gym isn't tiny but it's not that big.

We moved on to guard techniques. First he had us do a basic choke from guard. Then he showed us some techniques to choke with the lapel, where you undo the person's gi and wrap the bottom of the lapel around the back. Then he basically showed us a bunch of variations on those chokes.

He finished up, by that I mean the last 40 min., by taking a question or two and breaking down some techniques that people don't usually understand.

One of the things that I really liked about the seminar was that he showed us a bunch of different options from each position we worked on. Although I am not going to remember very many of the options, I think this is going to help me with learning concepts. I feel like I am starting to understand what concepts are out there. I don't understand the concepts yet but I am actually starting to see them. It's like they always say you don't know what you don't know.

Sazinho Sa Seminar Tonight

2010-04-28T10:39:00.000-04:00

I'm so excited about the seminar tonight. I am only disappointed that I will not be able to go both nights. Last night Noe and I went to class even though we don't normally make the drive on Tues nights because I have a tax class that runs until 6. We figured with the seminar coming up though we should just go to class because we couldn't go on Monday night.

Class was pretty fun last night. We basically rolled the entire class, except the usual warm-up. We started with situational rolling, which I am loving right now. We started with each person in side control. I am glad I got to work on my side control escapes. I worked on a reversal and on pulling the person in to my half guard. The one I really wanted to do was the escape to turtle position that Danny Ives helped me and Danny with during the last seminar. Unfortunately, I couldn't remember all the details so I kept messing it up. Hopefully I'll be able to get it next time.

Then we did the mount. I tried a movement that I saw on the Saulo Ribeiro JJ Revolution 1 dvd the other day. Again, couldn't remember the details and I wasn't able to use it. I was able to do my usual escapes successfully a few times though, with a much larger partner. I also was able to work on my armbar from the mount, positioning, when it was my turn to be on top.

Then we just rolled a couple of rounds.

I hope I get to see Guybson and Sazinho roll tonight, that will be so cool to watch.

Finally a Return to the Mat

2010-04-25T19:50:00.000-04:00

I was finally able to return to East West after what felt like an eternity away. It is a sad sad thing when you can't remember the last time you were in class. After getting past all the traveling, being sick, and dinners being hosted at the law school, I got to train again.

Sat class is supposed to be an open mat so we get the chance to ask as many questions as we want, instead of Guybson picking the moves we will be working on. Open mat also means we get the chance to roll more than we would during a regular class. We always start with the usual warm up though. Guybson said yesterday that he is going to start adding different things into the warm up so that we don't get too used to the warm up exercises. I am happy he said that because I was starting to feel too comfortable during the warm up. It seems nice when it's going on, because I don't feel too winded but when I reflect on it I know that I need the extra push.

Only one person asked a question, which I was really happy about because I don't know if I would have been able to absorb any more information that what Guybson gave. Guybson basically talked to us about using one movement to fool the other person into thinking we are going for another movement.

Anyway, then we rolled 5 X 5 min rounds. I actually only rolled 4 of the rounds because I was turning green, literally, and I was sure I was going to vomit. I got to roll with a guy named Mike, he's one of the main guys I like to roll with. Then I rolled with a couple of guys who are newer. I also rolled with Noe. I was glad that we managed to roll with each other without me hurting her. It seems like I always end up catching her with my knee or elbow or something crazy. I thought I did an ok job of transitioning yesterday. I was trying to concentrate more on positions yesterday. Although there are a few times during each roll where I forgot and was only concerned with trying to go for a submission.

Last night we watched the WEC fights. But before we did, we watched like 1.5 hours of Saulo Ribeiro's Jiu Jitsu Revolution 1. The stuff he covers in those instructionals is awesome. I can't get over how cool these videos are. I would really like to go out to Cali and train at his gym.

Lucky to Have Noe

2010-04-20T08:35:00.000-04:00

I am lucky to have Noe for so many reasons but as it relates to this blog, I am lucky to have Noe because we can work on and talk about jiujitsu. I think she might get tired of it sometimes.

As I was going over my schedule this morning I realized that I might not be able to go to JJ at all this week. The Law School is hosting a very controversial speaker, one who advocates against gay marriage, tomorrow. Then on Thursday our good friend is going to be having a concert. Friday, Noe and I are going to two events, which are for the graduating law students this year - I can't miss that. Basically, I am feeling a little bit bummed about missing so many classes but I am still very excited to be graduating.

Last night Noe and I were talking about the guard passing we were doing earlier in the afternoon. One thing I noticed was that I get tunnel vision. I was watching some matches on youtube the other day and I kept saying that both the ladies were getting tunnel vision and that they were missing great opportunities to go for subs or to change position. So I think I already had it on my mind but I definitely get tunnel vision while I am rolling. I think I will try some more of the JJ chess, that seems like an exercise that will help me to see more than just one escape or pass while I am rolling.

No Tournament for Me

2010-04-19T17:49:00.000-04:00

I have had unexpected car problems and due to the cost of the repairs I will not be able to participate in the NY Open International Tournament. Needless to say I am very disappointed. These car repairs will also make it impossible for Noe and I to participate in the Sazinho Sa Seminar at the end of April.

I haven't really been able to train BJJ in over a week. Being sick and traveling has really put a damper on my training. Noe and I just got done working on some guard passing. It was fun but Noe is still trying to recover from her injury and so she is still taking it kind of easy. I am really glad we got to work on the guard passing stuff though because we have been watching the Saulo Ribeiro instructional dvd and Noe learned some stuff over the last couple of weeks. I have been eager to try out this new stuff.

I got to go to the gym this weekend and lift some weights. Man I felt so weak because that was the first time I had really done any exercise in like 7 or 8 days. I am very sore today. We went to Boston to visit our friends, Kaci and Tom. Tom and I went to the Boston Sports Club. It was a really nice facility.

We warmed up by jumping rope for about 5 min. Then we checked out our pull up chops. I did 7 pull ups, 6 or 7 chin ups and then about 6 modified chin ups, it was the ones with the grips like a rowing machine. Then I did:

  3 sets of 20 reps of curls w/ 12 lbs barbells
  3 sets of 25 reps of squats w/ 25 lbs barbells - I alternated between this one and the one above.

  3 sets of 15 reps overhead press alternating with
  3 sets of 10 backward then 10 forward circular shrugs w/ 25 lbs

  3 sets of 20 w/ 50 lbs on the circuit trainer of tricep pulldowns with the rope. I'm not sure how else to describe those.

  100 cruches with my legs up in closed guard position

  20 narrow push ups
  20 wide push ups
  10 spiderman push ups

I stretched my legs a bunch in between all the sit ups and push ups.

Then I finished up with 10 min on a stair climber. It was the kind with actual steps that just rotate around.

Overall it was a good workout. I was beat afterward.

Still Sick

2010-04-14T11:07:00.000-04:00

Well I didn't get to train last night. I only did a few things while I watched Danny and Noe work on guard passes and stuff. It was good to watch them work on things though, even though I would have much rather worked on my guard passing as well. I rode the stationary bike for a little while and then started lifting some weights. Luckily Danny and Noe started giving me shit about not knowing how to be sick and I finally sat down, after doing a some sit ups, and relaxed.

On a side note - Noe went to visit Kansas City last week. While she was there she got some short clips of my brother doing some of his Capoeira moves. I wanted to share because they are cool and he is my bro.

Josh Video 1

Josh Video 2

Josh Video 3

This was after he did like a 2 hour capoeira class. I don't know how he does it. I didn't put the videos up in the right order or give them the right titles but you can figure that out when you are watching them.

Real Life Interruptions to Training

2010-04-11T12:07:00.000-04:00

I am headed back to Ithaca from Albuquerque. I have been on the road for the last 4 days. Let's just say I haven't been doing much to get ready for that tournament coming up. :-T I did manage to do a little bit of weight lifting during the trip and I also played a little basketball. The basketball was actually pretty difficult, for one thing I suck at basketball and for another the altitude out here is ridiculous. I was breathing heavy from running out onto the court. The altitude combined with the realization that the game I agreed to play in was an actual game with referees and everything, which I incorrectly referred to as umpires when we arrived.

I got sick on the second night of my trip. I think I either have strep throat or a sinus infection. I am not sure but I have not been feeling very good. Also, lucky for everyone traveling with me I have had very limited speaking abilities. My former roommate, Mark, just kept saying "oh sweet freedom" the whole weekend. Haha not really but I'm sure he was thinking it.

I thought I was going to get the chance to roll with a friend of mine this weekend but that didn't happen because of my illness. So basically I have lost out on 5 days of training. Plus I am sure I will not be able to go to class tomorrow. Actually I would like to go to watch, as long as Noe is going to participate that will work but I'm not sure I can spend 3 hours in the car if at least one of us is not participating.

It's so dry out here, I need to drink some water. How did I survive two summers in Albuquerque?

Adding in Some Extra Conditioning

2010-04-06T08:39:00.000-04:00

Yesterday morning, I worked out at home for a little bit, then I did both muay thai and BJJ. I was thinking I could add just one or two conditioning type work outs to my week to gear up for the NY Open tournament on May 1.

Morning Workout
I didn't do anything too crazy in the morning. I warmed up with high knees, jumping jacks and mountain climbers. I just alternated through the three until I was breathing really heavy. I did some bjj individual exercises, the first was like this butt scoot thing I saw on a video of Saulo Ribeiro and the second was a movement where you start on your stomach and swing your legs all the way around so that you go from your stomach to your ass back to your stomach.

Here's where I saw the Saulo stuff. And this is the link for the Rickson Gracie moves.

Then I did about 50 safe get ups with an 8lb medicine ball. I added an extra scoot at the beginning, so I just scoot my butt back and then get up. Followed by 3 sets of 30 reps of 30 leg reaches with the medicine ball, where you hold your legs straight up in the air and reach for your feet. I did 2 min. of ginga, the basic capoeira movement, in between each of the 30 reps.

Then I just did some side crunches - 4 sets of 25 each, right and left = 1 set, so 100 side crunches. Then the last thing I did that was hard was 10 reps of abs on the stability ball. I started basically in a push-up position with my feet on the ball. I pushed the ball out to the left then to the right and then rolled it backwards, I don't know if that has a name, that shit was hard though. I only did 10, with all three motions together counting as one.

Evening Classes
I was late for BJJ, it sucks living so far away from the gym because if I am like 5 min late getting on the road it makes me like 10 min late for class, don't ask me how that works. Anyway, they were warming up when I got there. We usually do the same warm up. I don't normally get really winded until we get to the shrimps. I don't know why shrimping around the mat makes me sooo winded and tired. That's why I did some shrimps at home the other day, I figure I need to work on those muscles getting used to the motion.

We did a butterfly sweep. I worked with a guy who has only been to maybe 2 BJJ classes. He wasn't too big so that was nice. I rolled with him after we did the positions. He was a pretty good partner to work with. I had to roll with another guy who was a beginner, but this was his first class. I got pretty nervous as soon as we started moving because he was just using every single muscle in his body. He wasn't a huge guy but he was really strong so I was kind of scared that he was going to end up hurting me. He was totally gassed when we got done and I was barely breathing faster than a usual rate so I was glad, because then I know I wasn't just trying to fight his muscle with mine, I was using technique.

The last person I rolled with was Maggie, she is going to be coming back until the end of April. I'm glad she was there, it's been a long time since she was in class. Soon Noe will be back and there will be 4 women in class again, until Maggie moves. Haha and then we are moving. It kind of stinks for Beth because she will be the only woman until someone new starts or until one of the junior girls starts coming to the Adult classes.

Muay Thai class was good. I wasn't tired during the warm-up at all. I actually didn't get tired until after the warm-up, basically once we stopped moving, then my body just started feeling really tired and ready to sit down. I didn't sit of course. We worked on some jab cross escapes and then hook escapes and some thai clinch. Then class was over. MT felt like it went so fast. It was a good workout though.

Conditioning by Myself

2010-04-04T22:26:00.000-04:00

Since there wasn't class yesterday and Noe is gone and I didn't have any friends who could come over to work out - I had to work out alone. It was all good though because I got some good conditioning in.

I warmed up with 3 rounds of 30 second intervals. (1) High knees to (2) jumping jacks to (3) burpees. That totaled about 4:30. It got my heart rate up and I was sweating.

Then I moved into 100 shrimps.

I put the weight vest on, 20 pounds man - whew. I basically did lateral slides. I faced one direction (we'll call it left) and went down and back, the length of my living room, which is HUGE, just kidding it's about 12 feet I think. So I went down and back and that counted as 1. I did 10 of those then went straight into 100 squats. Then I faced the other direction (right) and repeated, including the squats. I tried to move my feet as quickly as I could and keep my knees bent so that I was staying low. Anyway, I did 5 sets. 1 set = 10 reps going each direction, so 20 total lateral slides, with 100 squats after each, so 200 squats.

I basically thought I was going to throw up after that, and during most of it. Plus the weight vest just felt like it was crushing my body. I couldn't move any direction without feeling a bunch of pressure. It was good though because the position I felt the least pressure in was when I was standing straight up, which is the best way to stand if you are out of breath.

So then I stretched for close to 25 min.

Then I did 100 thigh squeezes, holding my legs up like you have someone in your guard and flexing the way you would at the top of a crunch, with a pilates magic circle. Those things are really cool because you can really get your inner thighs.

The last thing I did was this jumping thing. I had initially planned to do 3 sets but I only made it through one. My legs were so wabbly (if that's a word). Basically, you start on your knees and jump up to a standing position, then you jump up and bring your knees to your chest, like when you do a burbee. I did 20 of those and went straight into 25 pushups. I took the weight vest off before I stretched so I wasn't wearing it when I did these leg exercises.

Then I had to hurry up and get ready to go pick my friend, Marina, up because we went out to a bar called Bar. LOL. So I had to hurry and feed the pets. I ended up taking off without making a protein shake. I think that I am much less sore when I have a protein shake right after I work out. It usually seems that way, but I'm not sure if that is true or not. If anyone has some insight I would appreciate it.

Nothing Special to Report

2010-04-03T11:46:00.001-04:00

Our school didn't have class yesterday and there is no class today because of Easter. When Guybson made the announcement at the end of class on Thurs. I felt very deflated. I know I should be excited that this means I have more time to study but I was so disappointed. I have a lot of tax reading to do and I am really behind in Financial Institutions. Well I'll be studying all day today and all day tomorrow.

I went to both No-gi and traditional BJJ class. We always have these awesome wresting coaches there for the no-gi classes. One of them works with the Cornell wrestling team and Coach Mills, is really good but I'm not sure about his background, I do know that he was on the Olympic team in the 80's. I don't know that much about wrestling but through doing martial arts over the last 9 years or so, I can tell when someone knows what they are talking about.

Anyway, he had us work on counters to single leg and high crotch takedown attempts. I also learned the difference between the two the other night. I don't know if I am remembering this correctly but a single leg is when the person has their head on the inside, on the person's midsection, and a high crotch takedown is when the head is on the outside of the body. The mechanics are very similar between the two and they each have their own advantages.

I had to work with the hugest guy there. When we initially started he and I looked at each other and then both looked around the room and everyone else was pared up already. Then I said "well this doesn't make much sense does it" and he just kind of blankly stared at me. Come to find out a little bit later, when he spoke for the first time, that english is not his first language. Ha ha so I'm thinking he didn't even know what I was saying earlier. Anyway, he was a really good partner to work with. He doesn't seem like he has done wrestling or JJ before but he was really good at controlling his body, he didn't throw me around like a rag doll, even though he easily could have. He obviously lifts weight because he was so huge, like at least 6 ft. tall and buff as hell, maybe 230. I'm not sure, when they are that big I am really bad at guessing their weight.

I ended up rolling with him for the situational rolling exercises we did at the end of the class. When we were about to start I was a little scared but this was probably the best experience I have had rolling with a huge guy. Well maybe except with a few of the guys I rolled with from Kansas City, but they were all more experienced. Anyway, I got pretty winded and tired during the rolling so I was pleased about that.

The BJJ class was pretty normal. We worked on the an escape set up to a sub. We were escaping the position where the person who was in your guard ends up with your legs over their shoulders and they are controlling you by holding your belt and usually they can just throw your legs off to the side and take side control. Anyway, guys do that to me a lot so it was helpful.

We rolled 3 rounds but I sat the last round out because I think I bruised my one of the bones by my elbow and I smacked it on someone's knee or shin or something. It was hurting so I didn't want to make it hurt even more. Being in pain during the hour and a half drive home, especially when I'm by myself, is no fun. I'll be glad when Noe gets back :-)

Instructional video

2010-03-30T19:41:00.000-04:00

OMG I just watched 17 min of Jiu Jitsu Revolution. It is an instructional DVD by Saulo Ribero. It is awesome. I had to stop watching it because he had already covered too many details. I felt like I wouldn't be able to retain very much of the information I had just seen, if I continued to watch. I am excited to continue to watch this DVD.

I am not going to class for the next two nights and I didn't go last night. Noe just left to go out of town, so we just hung out last night. I can never go to class on Tuesdays because my classes at school go to late. Tomorrow we have a speaker coming to the law school for the Native American Law School Association. I guess this is the kind of real life stuff that gets in the way of training.

I kind of need a few days to rest anyway. My back has been bothering me. It's not an injury or anything I just get a lot of tension from reading and then going to JJ sometimes makes it a little worse. I think taking days off to just reflect on training and get some extra studying in really helps though.

I am really up in the air about whether I will try to go down a weight class for the May 1 - NY Open tournament. I am not sure I have the discipline to lose like 7 pounds. I feel like if I can get down to that smaller weight though that I would be really fast and that I would be a lot stronger than most of the other people in my division. I know I'm not supposed to really be counting on strength in JJ but it will help me make it through more matches without being as tired. Plus I'm not good enough to not really muscle some moves yet. Oh but I am looking forward to the day that my technique is that good. :-)

5 - 5 MIn. Rounds?

2010-03-27T10:04:00.002-04:00

Class last night was great. We got to work on some throws. I need to work on throws so badly. I get so uncomfortable when I practice throws and when I get thrown. The first time I got thrown last night I kind of tightened up and I ended up landing really badly. The more I practice my throws and being thrown the more comfortable I'll be.

We started of with the usual warm up. The warm up is not as difficult for me anymore, I think my body is starting to get used to it. I still get really winded and tired when we do shrimps. We basically do a lap around the mat, shrimping. I guess it should make you tired if you are shrimping correctly because the movement involves a lot of muscles but shit man, you would think I would start to get used to it at some point. We have been doing 100 more sit ups than before, which I am glad about. Here I come 6 pack.

We only worked on throws last night. Noe and Danny and I worked in a group. I was less nervous because I got to work with them, I knew no one was going to get all crazy and hurt me. The beginners got to use the crash mat but everyone with color in their belt had to just work on the regular mat. I didn't care though because in a match when someone throws me I am not going to be landing on a crash mat. We worked on Ippon Seoinage and Uchi Mata.

I found a really cool website that shows these take downs with animation and with animated pictures.

Here's the Ippon Seoinage:
http://judoinfo.com/images/animations/blue/ipponseoi.htm

Here's the Uchi Mata:
http://judoinfo.com/images/animations/blue/uchimata.htm

After we worked on the throws we did the usual rolling. Normally we will do either 2 5 min. rounds or 3 5 min. rounds depending on how much time we spent drilling techniques. Last night we did 3 rounds and lined up to bow out. Then after we bowed out Guybson said we could stay and do some more rounds if we wanted. About 6 of us stayed, which is nice to see, I like it that there are a good number of people who really want to train at the gym. We stayed and I rolled another 2 rounds. I got to roll with Guybson last. Man it is such a crazy experience when I roll with him. 1) He is a black belt and 2) he is freakin huge. I had a ton of fun though. When I got done with everything it took me about 20 min to stop feeling like I was going to vomit. I didn't even realize until we got home that I had rolled 5 - 5 min rounds, that made me not feel so bad about feeling pretty worn out after class.

I am not going to open mat today because of my tax paper. I am pretty disappointed because I feel like I haven't been able to train as much as I would like. Last night I was thinking about how excited I am to get back to KC. I can work on my throws with John when I get back.

Spring Break???

2010-03-26T08:26:00.003-04:00

I wrote down all the class times in my planner for this week because I am on spring break. I thought I was going to do twice as much training as I do during a normal week. That has been far from what has actually happened. I don't know where my days have gone.

I am working on a tax paper for Mergers and Acquisitions Tax (M&A Tax). I have papers to grade for Real Estate Transactions, I'm a TA for that class. Those two things don't seem like much and actually they haven't taken up too much of my time until yesterday. I didn't get to train at all yesterday.

I read an article in GracieMag a little while back about a guy who was a medical student and a black belt, who helped teach classes. It made me rethink the excuse, I'm in law school, for why I have not been training as much. He said if you can't find an hour a day to do something you love there is something wrong. I have thought about that quite a bit since reading it a few months ago. I do love training, right now it is mostly BJJ but I also love training taekwondo, MMA, and Capoeira. Right now the problem with training BJJ for Noe and I is that it takes an hour and a half to get to Syracuse. We will go to the Cornell BJJ club sometimes but it's not the same as going to a class with a black belt.

I said it earlier but I didn't do anything yesterday. I did go to class the day before, on Wed. Danny and I carpooled out there. I am glad Noe and I have someone to carpool with because it is so expensive filling up the car all the time. Anyway, the class was good we worked on some sweeps from guard. I got to roll with a woman that is actually smaller than me. Usually, the only female that I work with, who is smaller than me, is a girl who is 14. It was cool, we rolled all three rounds together. I got the opportunity to check my technique, because I was concentrating on not muscling every move I did.

Tonight we are planning on going to class in Syracuse. I better get to work on grading these papers.

Day Off - From Regular Class

2010-03-24T14:37:00.006-04:00

Yesterday I didn't go out to Syracuse for class. I figured this was a good day to work on some resistance training. I lifted some weights in the morning. I didn't get to do that much because I started later than I had planned. I basically only got to work all my shoulder muscles, my biceps and some legs.

I did a pretty short warm-up. Then I did, bicep curls to press with the kettle bells. Normally, I would do 4 sets of 25 but I was in a hurry so I only did 3 sets of 25. In between each of the curl/press sets I did 30 squats with a weight vest, that I'm pretty sure weighs 25 pounds. I like to go straight from one exercise to the next so that I basically feel like I'm not going to make it during the whole workout.

Then I did bent rows and some shoulder exercises that I don't know the name of. I did the same routine with those and the curl/press. I ended with some push-ups, shrimps and candlesticks (to work on the armbar motion). Then before I knew it I had to get ready to go so that I could go with Noe to her PT.

Noe and I went over to Danny's last night. He and I worked on some problem spots that I have been having. I have recently learned the bull fighting technique but I wasn't exactly doing it right the other night when I tried it so we covered that. We also went over one of my throws. I really need to get better with take downs, I just haven't worked on them that much yet, so I am going to make it a point to do some work on my takedowns before the tournament in May.

First Class After the Belt Promotions

2010-03-23T15:30:00.003-04:00

On the way out to Syracuse last night I was wondering how many people would be in class for the first class since the belt test on Saturday. There weren't really that many people there, who participated in the belt test. It was pretty nice getting back to the usual training. We have been gearing up for the test for the last week and a half or so. We primarily worked on specific types of techniques we needed to perform on the test.

We worked on a new sweep from half guard. I really need to work on the half guard sweeps too so I was very excited. The sweep went straight into taking the back. I like being on the back. I feel like I have a decent amount of control.

We rolled 3 rounds. I went once with a guy who started very recently. I believe this might be like his 5th or 6th class. Then I rolled with my friend Danny, formerly D. I really like rolling with Danny because he has been training for a while and I think he is really good. Then I went with Mike. He also was promoted to blue belt at the Long Island tournament. I really like rolling with Mike too because I don't feel like he just totally muscles me like some guys do. He uses a lot of the techniques we learn so it's always nice to get to roll with him.

I was so gassed after I rolled with Danny and Mike. I don't know what was wrong with me. It was like I hadn't eaten or something. I think some times that just happens. I suppose I might have been a little tired from staying up too late during the whole time my family was here visiting. Plus I ate like shit the whole time they were here. Note to self: don't eat like shit for 4 days in a row.

Belt Test - Blue Belt!! Officially Officially

2010-03-21T12:05:00.005-04:00

We had our belt test yesterday. My mom, brother, and our good friend Marina came to the test. It was so nice for them to spend so much time there, watching. The test lasted around 4 hours. :-0 That's a long time for people who don't do jiujitsu to watch a bunch of people they don't know doing jiujitsu.

The "warm up" was actually a conditioning test. Guybson kept saying he was trying to see if he could make some people quit. lol. I never thought I was going to quit but it was pretty tough.

It was kind of like our usual warm up but on red bull. We started off with the usual running. We did a bunch of side steps, high knees, heel flips, jumping with our feet together, running and jumping as high as we can on Guybson's count, finishing off the running type stuff with sprinting. Then we moved on to the shrimping, arm crawls (military crawls), wheel barrows. We usually stay in a big circle for the push ups and sit ups but today we lined up, in like 5 lines. Today we did a bunch of push ups, I'm not sure why I started off with knuckle push ups because I don't normally do knuckle push ups. We finished the first set of push ups and I switched to regular hand push ups, and then for the last set he made up do knuckle push ups, lol. We did a bunch of sit ups.

Thank goodness Maggie came to the belt test. We did all of our positions together. I am glad I worked with her because we have worked together a lot in class and so I am familiar with how she moves and everything. I have some pictures from the test that I'll add later.

Belt Testing T-minus 2 days

2010-03-19T19:53:00.003-04:00

My mom and my brother, Josh are here visiting. Josh joined me at the gym last night. It was nice. Josh did the no-gi class but decided not to do the BJJ class. I was disappointed that he didn't participate in the BJJ class. He was nervous about the number of beginners in the class. We are not even close in size so I probably wouldn't have been able to work with him.

I really like it when other women come to the no-gi class. Our friend M was in class last night. Since Noe didn't come to class last night I was especially happy to see M in class. Josh had to work with a young man that just started classes a few months ago. Josh really hasn't done much grappling type of work yet so I was pretty nervous that he was working with such a young and fairly inexperienced person. Josh did great though.

We worked on some single leg take-downs and some submissions from there. I get so nervous that I am going to hurt my knees when we are doing take-downs. I don't know why I have never gotten hurt doing take-downs before. I always take extra precaution when working on take-downs.

We got to work on the take-downs in live rolling at the end of class. I was glad because usually when we are rolling we start on the ground and consequently we don't get to work on take-downs much. I definitely felt like my take-downs were lacking in the Long Island tournament. I don't want to always be pulling guard when I'm competing.

The BJJ class was pretty good. I ended up working with a guy who was there for the first time last night. He wasn't very big so I was not that nervous about working with him. I get scared sometimes when I have to work with men who are huge when they have only been to 1 or 2 classes. We used to always talk about how beginners are the ones who can really hurt you, when I trained capoeira. I think that must translate to all martial arts. Anyway, I did get nervous when I was going with the new guy after I asked him if he had done any type of wrestling or martial arts before and his response was "I streetfight." :-T LOL

Guybson has been having us, the blue belts, show new people how to do some techniques. He says its part of his evaluation of our skill level. It feels weird because so often I feel like I am in no way qualified to correct or show anybody anything.

Club training

2010-03-15T21:57:00.004-04:00

I decided to go to the Cornell BJJ Club tonight instead of driving out to Syracuse. Actually, I ended up having a meeting with a student in a class I am a teaching assistant for so I'm not really sure if I'm the one who decided that I couldn't go to Syracuse. I am kind of glad Noe and I didn't make the trek all the way out there though. I was not feeling myself tonight.

I am sure it happens to everyone sometimes. I felt very lethargic and just had a lack of motivation tonight. Sometimes when I start moving around that feeling goes away but it didn't tonight. I didn't roll with anyone after the technique portion of club tonight.

We worked on some basic techniques from the mount. We did an arm bar after the person does upa and gets an elbow in, then the person on tops switches to technical mount. Second, we worked on an americana from mount. Then the scarf choke from mount. I like working on basic movements, especially at the club. Sometimes at the club I have noticed we work on things that are a little too advanced because most of the people there don't really know the very basic positions, like how to properly be in guard.

I think I am just where a new blue belt should be. I am starting to notice some smaller details that I never noticed or paid attention to before. I think I am also feeling a little intimidated I guess. I am not sure if that is the right word to use but I am feeling probably like a lot of newly promoted people feel. I know I deserve my belt but I am just going through the initial stage of insecurities.

Danny Ives Seminar Day 2

2010-03-14T22:26:00.002-04:00

I got the opportunity to do a semi-private lesson with Danny Ives. My friend D and I worked on a short list of issues he felt like he was having. I was really glad D had a list of things to ask. I didn't think that far ahead. I should have also came with specific questions to ask. I don't really feel like I am even in a place where I would know what I need to specifically work on, because I need to work on so many things. I think that I am going to be getting to the phase of my training where I start being more introspective soon. I am trying to think more about what I am doing each time I train, where am I always getting caught, what positions are always eluding me, that sort of thing.

Anyway, our semi-private lesson was so amazing. We went over how to break a spider guard. He showed us about 3 techniques, two breaks and one sweep. This was a completely new concept for me because I haven't had too much experience with the spider guard yet. Then we worked on side mount escapes. The side mount escape was also very helpful because Danny gave me a whole new insight on how to get out of side mount. I had been focusing on the usual upa.

The seminar ended up starting about 15 min. late because the wrestlers were on the mat. I have to admit I was kind of glad to have a min. to catch my breath after our private lesson. I worked with my friend C, the one who comes over to work out with me sometimes. It was interesting because he is like 6 ft. tall and weighs 190 pounds. He has good control though and I wasn't scared at all of him hurting me or anything.

Man that 2 hours we spent working on techniques was so intense. My brain hurt after the seminar on both days. Danny went over so many techniques. I am really glad that he lets us record the entire seminar and all the participants get a copy. He covered some awesome guard passes. We worked closed guard breaks, open guard passes and half guard passes. I was so tired and hungry by the time we got to the last technique I didn't think I was going to be able to roll.

I did end up rolling one round. I went with a guy from the club who slightly outweighs me. I really like rolling with him because we are so similar in size and I feel like he is very technical. He and I had a pretty good roll, he has improved a good deal since the last time I rolled with him. He is planning on doing a tournament this weekend. The Grappler's Quest in NJ I believe. I think he is going to do very well.

We got to go to late lunch with Danny after the seminar. It was really cool to pick his brain about various BJJ and non-BJJ related topics. Also, we got to talk to him about our trip to Brasil. Noe and I are planning to go to Brasil for about 2 weeks after I take the bar exam. We, mostly me, want to train a ton while we are down there. I am very excited to train at schools where there are a bunch of more advanced students. I want to get to roll with them and watch them roll with each other. Anyway, overall the seminar was a blast. I think we will go visit Danny Ives school before we drive back to Kansas City.

Danny Ives Seminar Day 1

2010-03-13T08:58:00.000-05:00

I was so tired last night after the first day of the Danny Ives Seminar, hosted by the Cornell BJJ club. The club hosts about 2 seminars a semester. It is awesome because the school pays for the seminar, or at least most of it, I paid $10 this time. Anyway, Danny Ives is awesome. He comes in from Maryland. Here's a link to his website:

http://www.iveyleaguemma.com/

The seminar so really cool. We worked on a ton of positions, but they were related so it didn't seem overwhelming. We started off working on a basic armbar and then did a triangle and then worked the two of them together. It was a chain, I love doing chains. Person A attempts the armbar, person B pulls the arm out, then person A goes right into the triangle. I like that combo, I don't use it as much as I used to.

We also worked on 2 sweeps. OMG I need to work on my sweeps. I know everyone needs to work on everything but I think I might concentrate on my sweeps for a little while. Anyway, the sweeps he showed us were pretty sweet. One was from full guard and the other was from half-guard. I tend to get stuck in half-guard a lot so this portion was of particular interest to me.

We did about 3 variation that ended up with us doing a take down. I really suck at those. For some reason I don't use angles as well as I used to. When I first started training for MMA I think I used angles better than I do now but I was still doing capoeira at that time and I think that made a big difference.

I rolled with my buddy D and with Danny Ives last night. Geez I got so gassed when I was rolling with D. I don't know why I get so gassed when I go with him. He is a blue belt, I think he is very close to being purple, but I feel like when I roll with him I tend to get overly excited. I think its just because I think he is really good and I know he's going to pick up more on every mistake I make and that makes it more fun to roll with him but it also makes me feel like I have to work harder. I still haven't figured out how to work harder, where work harder doesn't mean use more muscles. LOL. I tend to try to muscle more when I'm rolling with him, I noticed last night.

I had a good amount of time to recover before I rolled with Danny Ives. It is so funny rolling with black belts because they aren't even close to being tired when you are done going with them for 10 min. I am excited for that day. Anyway, he was awesome to roll with, he opened up some good positions for me to get submissions. He would give me pointers at the perfect time, like when he could tell that I didn't know what the hell to do from a certain position. That's one of the main reasons I like rolling with advanced people, because they aren't going full blast trying to submit you, to the point where you aren't even learning anything. At the end of it I was tired as hell, thought I was going to vomit but overall happy with how the round went.

We are training from 12 to 3 today. I'm looking forward to it.

Time Off

2010-03-12T09:17:00.000-05:00

I guess I needed a few days to recover after this weekend's tournament and the lead up to it. But, I don't feel that great about not training for the last two days. Last night Noe and I watch some TV and just hung out, which was great. We basically did the same thing on Wed. night also.

On Tues. night I went to my friend D's house. We did some really light work. We played a game that was really awesome. Basically, each of us was only allowed to do one movement at a time. Each movement could consist of a couple of steps but you basically could only go from one position to the next. It was so cool. My brain hurt after we got done with that. It was insane to see how few concepts and moves I know. This was a tremendous exercise to highlight areas that I can work on immediately and probably make some significant progress.

During the game, I accidently made some shit up. It was hilarious. I had only glanced at the most recent graciemag. We got into a position similar to one I "remembered" seeing in the magazine, I got all excited. I said "ohhh this is just like what I just saw in the magazine." Then I proceeded to do a choke. A little while later D said, oh this is that position, how did that choke go again. I basically couldn't recreate it. I said it's in the new graciemag, he gave me a very confused look because he didn't recall seeing it in there. When he came back with the mag I showed him the choke I thought I did. Apparently I had almost none of the steps the same. LOL - I'm still such a beginner.

2010-03-12T09:02:00.000-05:00

LI Pride (Cont.)

My 3rd match was extremely tough. Unfortunately, we didn't get video of it. The woman I went against, I think her name was Michelle Maldonado, was very strong. She had great posture. I was a little scared when I locked a triangle in and she postured up and picked me up off the ground. Anyway, after what felt like an eternity, I managed to finally finish the triangle. All the people from my gym who were watching were screaming "grab the back of her head" and it took about 30 seconds for it to register. When I finally grabbed the back of her head she tapped. Whew. That was a tough one.

Match 4 - Open division finals.

This match was freakin crazy. The woman I competed against was quite a bit bigger than me. She probably had 25 or 30 pounds on me. Almost immediately she took me down with a very basic throw. Then she took the side mount, man was she heavy on me. I remember thinking I have to get out of this position, however watching the video makes it look like it took me a while to think that. I was definitely making mistakes. At the end when I was trying to sink an armbar, I stopped her from kicking her leg over my head. If I had let her continue what she was doing I would have been able to get on top of her. I managed to finish the armbar but I still made a lot of mistakes.

Here's the Youtube video of Match 4:

2010-03-11T14:50:00.000-05:00

The Long Island Pride tournament went really well. I won all four of the matches I had. I won my division and the open weight white belt division.

My first match was with a woman in my weight division. She was a little bit taller than me but not by much. I was pretty nervous when the match started out. You can tell I am a bit jumpy, or spastic, at the beginning of the match. She ended up pulling guard because neither of us was able to take the other down, not that we tried for very long. I ended up in half-guard. That only lasted a short while and I ended up standing up and backing out. The same thing happened after we had a time out so she could re-tie her belt. Except I ended up in side control and took the mount. I started working on an americana and quickly switched to an arm bar submission. The whole thing took about 2:15.

Here's the youtube clip:

The Second match was also with a woman in my weight class. I felt kind of bad for her because the organizers of the tournament did a poor job on the planning and she was left off the brackets when she arrived to the venue earlier that morning. Then they stuck her in with the blue belts. It was a pretty tough match and in some ways more tough than the first match. She ended up getting more points that's for sure.

Here's Match 2:

More later.

Expensive

2010-03-05T10:28:00.001-05:00

This jiujitsu thing is starting to get a bit expensive. Noe and I entered into this tournament on the 7th, $105 each. We drive 1.5 hours each way to class 3 to 4 times a week, $50 gas a week at least. Now we just found out its $100 for belt testing. I am excited about belt testing but I don't know if we can afford to keep up this jiujitsu habit.

I am sure that many people are having the same experience as we are. I love training, especially jiujitsu, but it becomes so expensive. Luckily when we move back to Kansas City, I'll be working shortly thereafter. We will be training at the gym we used to train at and things will be back to normal.

Enough with my bitching about money problems. Last night my friend C came over and we did some light drilling. We worked on basic sweeps and a couple of other moves. It was nice because we probably did each sweep from guard like 50 times each. I love just drilling stuff. I mean I love rolling too but sometimes I feel like I will much more out of drilling the same move, like an armbar, 100 times. I need to do that more often. Hopefully Noe's injury will get better soon and we can do more drilling like we used to before we started going out to EW.

We are leaving in the morning for NYC. The website for Long Island Pride says that brackets will be up sometime today. I'll put some pics and potentially some video up of the events from this weekend on Monday.

Mount Escapes

2010-03-04T10:12:00.000-05:00

Class last night was really good. We worked on escaping/reversing when someone has the mount. I am really bad at that so I was pretty excited when G said that's what we were going to work on.

My friend D started coming to the EWCC this week. I am really excited. He is the only blue belt in class, as of right now. D and I worked together last night on on the techniques. It was nice because I am not scared of working with him. Sometimes I am worried about getting hurt when I am training with some of the guys.

Instead of regular rolling last night we did situational rolling. I really like doing situational rolling because you get the chance to work on the positions you might not be in very often, and thus don't have good escapes/reversals/submissions from those positions. We did about 8 rounds of various positions, such as mount, full guard, half guard and from the back. We would start with one person already in the dominate position, then if we got the sweep or the dominate person got a sub we would stop and start over. We would do 2 rounds with the same person, alternating who was in the dominate position, and then switch partners.

Gearing up

2010-03-03T10:28:00.000-05:00

I will be participating in the Long Island Pride JJ tournament in Flushing, NY at Queens College on March 7th.

This will be my first jiujitsu tournament. I am excited and nervous. I registered in the women's white belt under 141 lbs. and white belt open classes. Generally, the women's classes end up getting combined because of the small number of female participants. I think there is at least one other woman who registered in my weight class.

I participated in a no-gi grappling tournament a few years ago. There were no other women entered in the tournament, so I ended up competing against a man. I lost by triangle about four minutes in. I was disappointed but it was a good learning experience.

I have been preparing for the tournament daily. Yesterday, Noe and I went to our friend's house, he's a blue belt, and we worked on some specific positions. We were thinking we would be taking it easy and just running through some stuff. Of course, I ended up rolling 2 rounds with my friend. Noe ended up tweaking an injury she got last week, so she didn't get to roll. :-(

Sharice's BJJ Blog

2010-03-02T13:50:00.000-05:00