Week 3, Day 3

Crap day at works gets turned into a fun one, just by virtue of training.  I love how that stuff works out, man!  Seriously, I was late leaving work, frustrated by the way everything was going & pissed that work had now made me late for Judo.  I showed up after warm-ups & already into drilling the first technique, but by the time randori began, I was feeling good again & by the time I walked out the door, I was smiling.  I went home, ate, & then headed back to the gym to catch the late BJJ class (sorry for skipping Muay Thai, Jon).

• Diet
• Breakfast - CHEAT 2 bacon egg cheese Croiss'anwiches, Dr. Pepper to drink
• Lunch - "Salad" Bar at Shoney's (Pork BBQ, baked beans, green beans with bacon, banana nut pudding, strawberry shortcake), sweat tea to drink
• Dinner - Chicken & pasta, lemonade to drink
• Dessert -  Chobani greek yogurt ( )
• Exercise
• Only pull-ups.  I need to stop slacking on that

So, as I said earlier, I hit Judo, skipped Muay Thai - Advanced, & then hit Brazilian Jiu Jitsu - Advanced.  Came home in between to eat, shower (mainly just rinsing the sweat off so it didn't ferment before he late class) & change.  Here's the recap:

Week 3, Day 2

OK, quick & dirty on this one, let's get her done.

• Diet
• Breakfast - bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios, Red Smoothie to drink
• Lunch - Meatball Marina sub, 10 Sour Cream & Onion, can of Dr. Pepper to drink
• Dinner - Chicken & pasta, Romain lettuce, Sweet Tea to drink
• "Dessert" - Slice of bread & butter (to mop up leftover marinara sauce & Italian dressing on dinner plate), Chobani greek yogurt (blueberry), cup of Mountain Dew to drink
• Exercise
• 2 pull-ups every time I went into the chicken (roughly 10 pull-ups)

Rather than type it all out, I decided to yammer on a bit about training tonight:

 

Lemme know what you think of the vlog-within-a-blog idea.  I like talking & being on camera, so unless y'all really hate it, I think I may transition to this from here on out.  Either leave a comment here or back on my Fb post & I'll tally the results, decided if I care & then make a decision.  Until then, I'll see y'all around the intra-webs.

Week 3, Day 1

Woo-hoo!  I'm happy this start for Week 3!  I took yesterday (Monday) off to let my knee & ankle heal up a bit longer.  The knee is fine 98% of the time, but every now & again it'll fuss at me if I move it in a direction it's not a big fan of.  The ankle, on the other hand, is just constantly complaining.  There's no one particular position that makes it any better or worse, so I'm actually more confident in using it, since I at least know what to expect.  Anyhow, before I get to today, I wanna recap the weekend, diet-wise (since I haven't been doing my morning exercises):

• Saturday
• Breakfast - whole grain french toast, scrambled eggs, Red Smoothie to drink
• Lunch - CHEAT 1/4lb Big Bite from 7-Eleven, 22oz Mountain Dew, a slice of Boston Creme pie, a Reeses cup, a few cans of Sprite &/or Coke, 3 Dunkin Donuts Munchkins, 7-10 pigs-in-blankets, Cherry Pizza, turkey wrap*
• Dinner - CHEAT (at BDubs during UFC 152) Chili Con Queso Nachos, 12 wings (6 Asian Zing, 6 Hone BBQ), a bunch of Cokes

*It was my dad's surprise 60th birthday party, so I spent all afternoon grazing

----- Start of Week 3 -----

• Sunday
•  Skipped breakfast
• Lunch - Lunch Meat Sammich (4 slices of turkey & 2 slices of ham on whole grain bread with lettuce & mustard), Sweet Tea to drink
• Dinner - 2 Lunch Meat Sammiches (added a little Italian dressing to these), Mountain Dew to drink
• Monday
• Breakfast - CHEAT 2 Bacon Egg Cheese Croiss'anwiches, Red Smoothie to drink
• Lunch - Turkey & Provolone Sandwich, Coke to drink
• Dinner - 2 plates of chicken & pasta with Romain lettuce, Sweet Tea to drink
• Today
• Breakfast - Bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios, Red Smoothie to drink
• Lunch - Club sandwich & chips, water to drink
• CHEAT - 15 Sour Cream & Onion Pringles, glass of Mountain Dew
• Dinner - Chicken & pasta, green beans, Sweet Tea to drink
• "Dessert" - Chobani greek yogurt (Strawberry)
• Exercises
• Only been doing pull-ups as I go into the kitchen, and not even those as regularly as I should.

OK, so the fun stuff:

• BJJ - Advanced (Unfortunately, I'm so late getting this blog post up, I'm not going to go into my usual "detail" about the each technique)
• I only went to the one class tonight (Tuesday), because I'm trying to be careful with my knee & ankle.  For those of you unfamiliar with Revolution BJJ's class schedule, for the late classes we roll first, then learn the new technique(s).
• During the sparring portion, I just worked from the bottom of mount again (like I did on Friday) and I felt pretty good about how I did.  I think I was only tapped 2-3 throughout the rounds, so I'm pleased with my defense.  As near as I can remember, these are the names of the guys I rolled against, in no particular order: Matt (wb), Scott (pb), Justin (bb), Sean (bb), Tyler (wb) & Mike (bb).  I also rolled against Fahs & Andrew, not just situational sparring.  Pretty sure that both of them ended up in mount anyhow, though, plus Andrew practice that night's lesson on me!
• Sweep to S Mount with Wristlock Grip Break
• Opponent's in your guard, you arm-drag to take the back, but he pushes back into you.  You catch his far ankle & sweep him into mount, keeping the dragged-arm pinned between y'all's chests.  Once there you proceed to S Mount, then take the arm.  We also learned how to break a gable grip (if your partner's defending) that can lead to a wristlock if he refuses to let go.
• From Mount, defeat "good elbows" to S Mount with Americana Grip Break
• When you're mounted on your opponent, but he's got his elbows in tight defending.  To loosen them, cup the back of your opponent's head, lift straight up, then pull to the side.  This will make the same side elbow light & you can advance you knee.  Once there you proceed to S Mount, then take the arm.  We also learned how to break the grip by imposing an Americana-style shoulder lock.  Either he lets go & gives you the armbar, or he holds on & taps to the Americana.

Well, it's late, both on the clock & in terms of when this should have been published.  I'll try & get the next one out sooner.  Until then, see y'all around the intra-webs.

Week 2, Day 3

OK, y'all, sorry for being so amazingly tardy with this.  Saturday was a busy-but-awesome day for me, Sunday I had a little extra stress & Monday I just came home to veg out after a nuts day at work.  Here's the skinny on Friday:

• Diet
• Breakfast - CHEAT 2 Bacon Egg Cheese Croissan'Wiches, 1 Minibon, Red Shake to drink
• Lunch - Naked Qdoba burrito (black beans, grilled chicken, mild salsa, lettuce, queso & guacamole), water to drink
• Dinner - Chicken & pasta, Romain lettuce, water to drink
• Exercise
• None - I've let my bum knee & ankle be an easy excuse

I decided that instead of having a single Cheat Day on which I would eat like crap, I would have 3 Cheat Meals & a Cheat Snack that I could choose to use throughout the week.  Obviously, I used one of meals here & if you remember back to Wednesday, I had also already used my Cheat Snack.

Here's the important part, though: I did make it in to train!  I kept my knee & ankle wrapped up tight all day at work, iced it regularly, popped some Aleve & headed right over at the end of the day.  Got to do the drilling class & competition class with Daniel.  They were both a lot of fun, but at the same time they were very humbling.  In the drilling class, I'd said that I had to sit out of about half of the activities because my knee wouldn't have fared well.  I wanted to be in there doing everything that everyone else was, but it just wasn't an option, unfortunately.  We rolled at the end of Drill Class, which went pretty well.  I went first with Matt (white belt), who mounted me pretty quickly (my knee wouldn't allow me to fight hard to maintain guard), so I spent the majority of the round playing defense.  Next round I rolled with Mo (purple belt).  When I mentioned my knee, he was instantly super cool & asked me how I wanted to work.  We ended up spending the time working on my bottom mount defense.  He'd attack for awhile, then pause & offer some tips to adjust, then we'd get back to work & I'd try to implement what he suggested.  I felt a lot more confident by the time the 5min were up.  Last round, I went with a white belt whose name I can't remember for the life of me (I know for a fact that he's told me multiple times & he's been at the gym for a long time now, but I can't remember.  Sorry man).  Anyway, we just did some situational sparring (him in mount needing a submissions, me mounted needing a sweep/pass).  I was able to apply a lot of the things that Mo had shown me & was pretty successful, even with a bum knee.

Overall, my ankle wasn't much of an issue.  It was mainly just "tired" through the class.  My knee was the one that would twinge & complain if I tried to make it do something it didn't want to.  Fortunately, I was able to take the rest of the weekend to rest them both.  I haven't iced them nearly as much as I should (I think the last time I had ice on them was sometime yesterday morning), but they're doing alright.  I'm headed back into the gym tonight (Week 3, Day 1), so I'll be posting more about that later tonight.  Until then, I'll see y'all around the intra-webs.

Too long for a Fb status

You know what I love to do?  Sit around & listen to experts discuss something they love.  It's amazing to hear them still have so much fire about something even when they "should" be jaded by the familiarity.  It's why nerds like me love the commentary bonus feature on a DVD: we're clearly passionate about this movie, so we can't wait to hear the director(s)/actor(s)/writer(s) share that passion as they unveil even more of their creation to us.  It's why thousands of MMA fans worldwide so eagerly await the Gracie Breakdown after every major event: here's the two current spokesmen for the family that is responsible for MMA in the US, still so enthusiastic about the sport & highlighting the great techniques, not just the finishes, from the night.  It's pulling back that curtain & letting us even further behind the scenes.  Or watching a TED Talk: guys from the top of their field, distilling the essence of their entire work into a 15min segment that anyone can digest.

I got to experience that today while at work: I found the entirety of "Talking Funny" on YouTube.  It's Ricky Gervais, Jerry Seinfield, Chris Rock & Louis C.K. sitting around & talking about comedy for 42min.  It's hysterical, it's enlightening & it's captiviating listening to these titans of comedy discussing their fears, their favorite memories, their philosophies, etc.  Absolute gold.  Please enjoy (very much R Rated): http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=rVBFwY4na7E&feature=endscreen

Week 2, Day 2

2 down, 1 to go!

Well, in every great narrative, you're introduced to protagonist with whom you can easily identify.  He's handsome, charismatic, adventurous, a little mysterious, perhaps even an athlete of some type.  Problem is, he's always got that one fatal flaw.

Well, things seem to be going well for our hero, but inevitably there is an external conflict which happens to highlight his internal struggle.  He is then forced to make a decision: does he give up & accept defeat, or does he fight back, against the situation & his own character, to emerge victorious?

OK, so maybe that's a little bit over-dramatic.  Lemme just break down the day.

• Diet
• Breakfast - 3 eggs, red smoothie to drink
• Lunch - Italian BMT sub, water to drink
• Dinner - Chicken & pasta, Romain lettuce, water to drink
• Exercise
• 10 push-ups
• 10 squats
• 30 bicycles
• 1 burpee

What??  Ben, I thought you said you'd be doing 10 burpees a day, why you slacking?  This is where we hit the external stressor: I woke up with a sprained ankle.  Don't ask me how I pulled that one off, but I did.  Went to bed 100% A-OK, woke up sprained.  So I popped 2 Aleve & went to work.  I hobbled my way through the morning & by lunch time was fed up.  I rolled over to my neighborhood CVS & bought myself an ankle brace.

I wrapped up & went back to work.  It was still bugging me & I had to make a decision.  I could either fold like I had in the past & use the reasonable rationalization of a bum ankle as an excuse to lie on the sofa, or I could suck it up, go the gym & get some work in while still being wise about my ankle.  As you may have guessed from the pic at the top of the page, I chose the latter.

• Training
• Judo:
• Warm-Ups
• I actually missed these.  I was late because 5 things came up at 4:45pm that "just absolutely must be done by 5 o'clock".  I did show up, however, just in time to be thrown on my head by Trey twice & Andrew once.  What a wonderful welcome!
• Modified Uchi Mata
• Your opponent grabs a single leg on you (illegal in Judo, but common in BJJ, MMA, street, etc.).  You reach over his shoulder to grip his belt in the small of of his back with your inside hand (same side as the captured leg) while simultaneously gripping his sleeve with your outside hand (same side as your base leg).  Draw his sleeve up to your waist, look back over your outside shoulder (as though someone's calling your name) and hop back-and-into your opponent.  This cause his inside leg to lift up, placing all his weight on his outside leg.  Continue to hop back-and-into him until his rising leg & compromised balance results in the throw.
• Uchi Mata to O Uchi "Gake"
• In this one, you attempt the Uchi Mata, but your opponent counters by trying to return his weight to his inside leg.  As you feel him start to make that transfer, you place the foot of your inside leg behind his base leg & drive into your opponent, tripping him.
• Sparring
• Everyone was really great about being mindful of my ankle.  Played with Matt & Andrew, who both did a nice job of letting me play a little, making me pay for my mistakes, & then letting me know what I did wrong!
• Muay Thai - Advanced
• Warm-Ups
• Rounds of jump roping with push-ups in between.  My ankle held up better than I had expected.
• Catching the kick
• As your opponent throws a kick, you step & slide with the kick, dissipating its force.  The instant it touches you, whip your arm around it, "guillotining" the knee tightly.  With your free hand, immediately & forcefully post on their chest to maintain distance while back-stepping with your inside leg.  Great for a tall guy to use on little people.
• Cut-kicking the base leg
• Again, as your opponent throws a kick, you step & slide with the kick, dissipating its force.  This time, however, you are going to use that step to throw a kick of your own, underneath the plane of your opponent's kick, and take their base leg out from under them.  Great for smaller individuals to use on bigger guys.
• Sparring
• Again, everyone was really cool about going light with me.  Tried to keep the speed & flow of the rounds up, but not blasting away at each other.  Really worked on putting together combos & finishing with a kick.  Problem was, I found myself wanting to throw a lot of switch kicks, which entailed pivoting on my bum ankle.  Found myself having to switch mid-technique.  Then, in the last round of sparring, seconds before the bell rang, I threw a right kick & my left knee popped.

Enter external stressor #2:

Mysteriously mid-night strained right ankle, now a questionable left knee.  I've been RICEing since I got home & will be babying them both throughout the day tomorrow (gotta remember to brin my ice packs to work).  I can give up & lay on the sofa tomrrow night, or I can go to the Competition Class.  I know which I want to do right now.  We'll see how I feel about it tomorrow.  Until then, I'll see y'all around the intra-webs.

Week 2, Day 1

Man, aren't all my titles just really deep & insightful??  Yeah, I'm not buying that crock either.  Let's be honest, I'm not smart enough to re-invent the wheel, so I'm just keeping it simple.  Real quick, let's get the boring mundane stuff out of the way:

•  Diet:
• Breakfast - 3 eggs & a bowl of cereal, milk to drink
• Lunch - Chicken Caesar salad, water to drink
• Cheat - my manager brought in doughnut holes yesterday morning.  I held out until about 2pm, but I finally caved & had a raspberry -filled one.
• Snack - Greek Yogurt Bar, more water to drink
• Dinner - "The Regular" (see future post about food), sweet tea to drink
• Exercise
• 10 push-ups
• 10 burpees
• 10 squats
• 30 bicycles

Now the fun stuff:

• Training:
• Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Fundamentals
• Top position:
• How to clear your opponent's elbow if he gets it inside to make space (switch hips to kesa gatame, control tricep, switch hips back to head & arm)
• How to secure & finish an arm-triangle if your opponent passes his "free" are over your head (pin arm between your head & opponent's, pass to mount, lock up arm triangle grip, dismount into opposite side control, move perpendicular &shrug shoulders to finish)
• Bottom position:
• How to recover your guard (knee in the hip, elbow inside hip, opposite forearm framing on opponent's throat, hip away & insert knee, extend away to make space & wrap a leg around for partial guard, escape hips to side of trapped foot to allow full guard recovery)
• Positional sparring:
• Upper belts on bottom side control, white belts on top with "good arm control".  White belt needs mount/submission to win, upper belt needs closed guard/submission to win
• Worked twice with ____ (man, it is really embarrassing how terrible I am with names.  Not even kidding either).  First time I was over eager trying to pass to mount & he was able to use the space to insert a knee.  From there it was a downhill battle until I ended up back in his guard & then quickly swept into mount.  The second time I was more control-oriented & didn't compromise my position.  Each time he made space or got an elbow/knee inside, I stopped what I was doing, address the threat & then got back to work.  I patiently focused on his far-side arm, was able to isolate it & eventually got him to tap to a kimura.
• Rolled once with Andrew.  He got half guard pretty quickly, but from there I was able to maintain top control.  Lots of fancy trickery going on, but I did my best to just focus on balance, underhooks, pressure, etc.  Bell ended the round before Andrew decided to stop toying with me.
• Muay Thai Fundamentals
• Warm-Up:
•  Partner cario - do 10 jump squats, then kick your feet into your partner's hands & wheelbarrow the length of the gym.  He then does 10 jump squats & you wheelbarrow him back.  Lather, rinse repeat.  I was able to get through 7 lengths in the 5min.  Best part, though, was having Dax yelling at me "You got 9lbs to lose, Ben, pick it up!"  Gotta love encouragement from teammates!  Then there's Jarrett: "He looks like a little squirrel when he jumps."  Ah gee, thanks, coach!
• Footwork:
• Simple box pattern drill (forward once, left once, back once, right once; forward twice, left twice, back twice, right twice, etc.), then we started working the jab while advancing and eventually the jab-cross while advancing.
• Drilling rear kicks
• Worked a coupla rounds of on the pads, back & forth with partners.  Then we put together a basic combo: jab-cross-rear kick.  My roommate Alex is finally starting to get comfortable with this one & is turning his hips over more.  He's consistently able to rock the pad-holder backwards.
• WAR
• Final 5min was a burnout.  Both you & your partner have on Thai pads & are trading rear kicks.  The idea is that the instant your partner kicks you, you return a kick faster & harder to make him pay for his impertinence.  Always a killer way to end class.

That's my training recap for today.  Tomorrow I'll work up a more detailed post on my diet & stuff.  Lotsa pics for that one.  Until then, I'll see y'all around the intra-webs.

Plan the work, work the plan

This is something my dad used to say to me about a hundred times a week back in high school.  Prolly had something to do with the fact that I kept turning stuff in late or just straight forgetting to do it in the first place.  Anyhow, I've finally started to listen to him.  Here's my attempt to plan out my next 6 weeks.

As I mentioned before, my gym attendance has been really hit-or-miss recently & above all I want to represent my school well.  This means that I've got to get back in the gym, get back to work & get up to competition level.  The obvious answer is to just dive head-first into it & spend every available moment rolling.  Unfortunately, there are 2 drawbacks to that plan:

1. I have other committments.  Work, training for my new UFC gig, friends, family, etc. all put taxes on my time.  As I get closer & closer to the competition, I'll be racheting those down drastically, but I'm too much of a social butterfly to quit cold-turkey.
2. Attainable goals.  I'm used to going home & relaxing after work.  Watching TV, surfing the web, etc.  If I try to say I'm going full-bore straight out of the gate, I'll get burnt out sometime around Thursday & stay home.  Then I'll get frustrated with myself for having failed already.  Rather than setting myself up for an early failure (and setting a bad tone for the rest of training), I'm going to give myself attainable goals that I'm confident I can meet, thus building from success to success.

For this reason, I've mapped out a more gradual approach.  I decided to retroactively declare last week as the beginning of training.  I went to the gym twice in Week 1: Wednesday for BJJ Fundamentals & Muay Thai Fundamentals and Thursday for Judo & Advanced Muay Thai.  This week (Week 2), I will go to the gym at least 3 times.  Week 3, I'll go at least 4 times, and so on.

A few ground rules:

1. If I show up to the gym for a Muay Thai class, but no grappling, it doesn't count towards my recquired sessions.  The whole point of this training schedule is to get me ready for a grappling competition, so striking counts for zero right now, other than cardio work.
2. Judo on Thursdays & Competition Class on Fridays are mandatory.  They are mt two weakest areas (standing & strategy) & the two that I think could most positively affect influence my game if improved.
3. MMA Conditioning on Saturdays is "highly recommended".  I don't think I've ever felt exhausted during a match, but you can never have a deep enough has tank.  That being said, it is also not a grappling class & therefore will not count towards the required number of sessions.
4. I have do my best to split my time equally between gi & no-gi classes.  I'm competing in both disciplines, so I better be ready & comfortable with both.
5. Two classes in one day (6am & 5:30pm class or 5:30 & 7:30 class) still just count as 1 training session.  So I can't go 3 times tomorrow & call it a week.  Obviously, the type of class can be used for balancing gi vs. no-gi.
6. The weekly required number of sessions is simply the minimum.  I'm not going to be forcing myself to lay around the house just because I already checked off all my boxes.

All that so that I can get to this: Week 5.  It's the part of this process that I am simultaneously the most excited & the most nervous about.  For those of you smart enough to follow the pattern, by Week 5, I have committed to 6 days in the gym.  I'm here to let you know that it's going to be even more intense than that: I'm not committing to just 6 classes, or just 6 evenings  taking a coupla class, I'm committing, here & now, to ALL 22 CLASSES OFFERED BETWEEN MONDAY, OCTOBER 8th-SATURDAY OCTOBER 13th.  I had 5 vacation days that I had to take before year end, so I took off that week.  For those six days, I will be doing nothing other than sleeping, eating, showering, washing gear & training.  It's going to be a glorious nightmare!  On top of that, I'll be doing Russ' Drilling Seminar the Saturday before, and (if my body doesn't flat out refuse) all 4 classes the following Monday (October 15th).  All in all, I'm hoping to get in 27 classes in 9 days.

My Training Schedule.  Each day I go to the gym, I get to put a big fat X on my calendar & note which classes I went to.

So there it is, my nice color-coordinated Training Schedule.  The colors getting more & more intense leading up to Boot Camp, then tapering off a bit the two weeks prior to the tournament so that I don't risk injury.  Week 6 is back down to 5 days in the gym, full intensity, and Week 7, though it'll still be 5 days in the gym, will be much lower intensity.

So anyway, that's how I've planned the work.  Tomorrow (Hobbit Day!) will be my first training day of Week 2.  I'll hit 3 days in a row to make sure I keep in line with my requirements.  Until then, see y'all around the intra-webs.

Serendipity!

Check out this article my coach Andrew just wrote:

5 Steps to be Able to Roll for Longer… With Intensity!

After writing a more general article on how to be able to roll for longer based on advanced principles of energy conservation and learning how and when to relax, I was asked to tackle this complimentary subject.  Here are five tips to help you to roll for more rounds, but with an increased intensity.
It bears mentioning that you shouldn’t always train with this much intensity.  This style of training is reserved for when you are getting ready for a competition or a fight.  Having said that, you definitely need to “turn it up” when you are preparing to compete, or when you’re helping a teammate prepare for the same thing.

1. Remember to breathe, but also know how to breathe.  One of the simplest pieces of advice often given out to newer grapplers is that you should always remember to breathe.  Holding your breath can certainly be detrimental to any athletic performance, and you will surely find yourself holding your breath when you’re newer to jiu jitsu.  However, there’s more to maximizing the efficiency of the oxygen coursing through your veins than simply remembering to breathe.  Always start by breathing through your nose, and concentrate on doing that for as long as you can.  When you breathe through your mouth, you are using reserves, and you should only use those when the going gets especially tough for your body.  Try to focus on regulating the rhythm of your breathing once you get more comfortable with breathing through your nose, and you’ll notice another bump in your conditioning.
2. Learn the difference between power and strength.  When you are in a frenzy to pass the guard, it is necessary that you push the pace in order to win what can turn into a scramble.  On the other hand, as soon as you have passed the guard, now is the time to settle in to the position and use consistent strength in order to control your opponent’s hips and shoulders.  Using tensile strength for increasing duration is something you can definitely develop outside of the gym by doing certain exercises, but you can also develop this simply by rolling more and attempting to control your opponent by holding him or her in place, something often overlooked in BJJ.  Using power (strength in short bursts) is important in certain circumstances, like the above given example of passing the guard, is extremely useful, but so is using strength for endurance.  Be sure to pay attention to when the right time is for both.
3. Get the most out of the rounds when you’re training.  This might sound like a given to you, but if you’re wearing a gi, don’t bother to take time to fix the gi when you’re rolling.  Your gi is going to come undone and your belt will come off when you’re competing, and the referee won’t always stop the match in order to reset your gi.  Likewise, when you are training for no-gi competition, don’t stop and discuss positions with your partner when you are trying to roll intensely.  Instead of discussing what interesting positions came up during the roll, shake hands and continue training.  Take a mental note to talk about the position later; this isn’t the time to learn how to do new moves or figure out positions; it’s the time to train hard.  Finally, along these lines, don’t stop for water once your intense training has already started (you should show up to practice hydrated).  If you’re rolling intensely for one round and then sitting around for the better part of the next round, you are cheating yourself.
4. This one is crucial:  when necessary, give up the position in order to avoid injury.  If your leg is twisting underneath you and you have to concede the sweep in order not to have your leg pop underneath you, by all means concede the sweep.  If your guard is in danger of being passed while you are stacked, and you feel like you might incur an injury to your neck or spine based on past experiences, it’s OK to allow your partner to pass.  You’re not cheating yourself if you give up a position even while you’re trying to train more intensely if it means that you will get to continue training.  Always remember this.
5. Take a minimal amount of time between rounds to “rest.”  Fifteen seconds is optimal, if you have good training partners who are willing to push the pace.  Even better:  make sure you get a fresh training partner every new round.  If you’re getting ready to compete or fight, but your partners aren’t, have them sit out the round before they roll with you so that you can have a fresh body every single round.  Starting with longer rounds and then working up towards shorter, more intense rounds will give you the opportunity to work up to rolling with a fresh partner every round, but you won’t be able to keep this pace up right away, so you need to work up to it.

Man, just as I'm getting into competition mode, I get a seemingly tailor-made article laying out for me how to make my training time more effective.  Rock on, thanks Andrew!!

Avert thine gaze

Ugh, not a fan of doing this.  I'd rather just pretend I've got a set of six-pack abs that'll blow your mind under my shirt, but, alas, I'm confined to the real world:

OK, so this is me as of now: 6'5", 224lbs.  Like I said in my last post, I've got 40 days to lose 9lbs.  Certainly not an impossible task.  I've got just a few simple adjustments that I'm making to my lifestyle that should help this along nicely:

1. Diet - Nothing ground-breaking, just the obvious stuff.
• Water - I barely drink any, so what I add will be a huge increase.  I'm shooting for about 4 cupfuls a day at work, which should be right in that 64oz ballpark.
• Sodas - I drink way too many of these & need to cut back.  There's no way I'm cutting them completely out (Mountain Dew is my lifeblood and there's no way you're taking my Jack & Coke away from me), but it's now just a reward: if I do well during the day, I get a small glass with dinner.
• Junk food - gone save for cheat days (which will prolly be Saturdays), and even then only in moderation.  For awhile, I had been eating so clean that McDonald's tore me up something fierce because it was all just grease.  Need to get back to that.
• Meals - Chicken, fish, turkey, whole grains, veggies.  Lunch will be a little more difficult at work, so I may just resort to lunch meat sandwiches.  Not the best, I know, but still a vast improvement over Five Guys/Wendys/Taco Bell/etc.  Breakfast will be Honey Nut Cheerios & eggs instead of Bacon Egg Cheese Croisandwiches & a Dr. Pepper for BK.
2. Exercise - Again, nothing shocking.
• Actually do something - That pretty much sums it up.  I'm starting small for now: roll out of bed, do 10 push up, 10 burpees, 10 squats & ten [insert ab exercise here].  Also, we've put up a Total Gym pull-up bar in the doorway to the kitchen & the house rule is that you gotta pay a 2 pull-ups toll every time you go in.  Should get me to at least 10 in a day.

So that's that.  It's all simple, obvious stuff that I should have been doing all along.  Until then, see y'all around the intra-webs.

And so it begins

My hope is that this blog will eventually evolve into a place for me to post all kinds of random thoughts & ideas that spring from my time training Jiu-Jitsu, Judo, Muay Thai, etc.  At the moment, however, it has only 1 purpose: to chronicle my preparation for my next tournament.  This inaugural post was supposed to be a much longer & grander thing, but procrastination being what it is, I'm now up two hours later than I wanted to be before work tomorrow and am only just now getting around to this.  Better a weak start than none at all, however, so here's the skinny:

I will be competing at USGrappling VABeach on October, 27th.  I plan to compete in the Super Heavyweight (202.1-215lbs) and Absolute (open weight) divisions for both White Belt Gi and Beginner No-Gi.  My gym attendance recently has been shoddy at best and I'm currently walking around at about 224lbs.  This means that over the next 6 weeks, I need to get my weight down by about 10lbs and get my grappling up to competition standards.  I'm not expecting to walk out there & Ronda Rousey fools, but I refuse to go out there as a representative of my gym, Revolution BJJ, and embarrass them because of my lack of commitment.

I usually don't like to make big statements like this in public because I have a tendency to not follow through, which leaves me making a lot of excuses to people.  But that's why I think this blog is 100% necessary: to hold me accountable.  This is me serving notice to all my buddies, both in the gym & outside it, that I expect y'all to bust my chops for not sticking to my word.  Encourage me, remind me, harass me, berate me, drag me, whatever you feel is necessary, I appreciate it.  I want to make all y'all proud on the 27th.

I will post again tomorrow & include more specifics, including, but not limited to:

1. My proposed training schedule
2. My dietary changes
3. Unattractive "before" pics

Until then, see y'all around the intra-webs.