Almost forgot

Went to class yesterday (actually, two classes) and didn't have time to write about them. Beefy and I went to BJJ and signed up. We're officially students there now. There was a bigger class this time, three blue belts and three white belts, besides the two of us. The warm up still feels like it's going to kill me, but I'm pleasantly not sore today. After the warm up, the instructor (I need to come up with a codename for him, I guess) told us that in the evenings, he'd been having some of the purples and senior blue belts teach their bread and butter moves to the class, to help them learn how to teach. He then shared with us a variation on a guard pass used by one of the smaller guys at the school. I'm going to try to describe this, but it will probably be gibberish to most people, and maybe even me.

You start in your opponent's closed guard. You move your left knee out to the left, to make space for your right knee, which you move to your opponent's tailbone. Now you can adjust a little further to the left, pulling your opponent a little on to his right side. Push down on his right knee/thigh with cupped hands, pushing it to the mat. This should open his guard. Put your right hand back on the inside of his left knee to monitor it, and bring your right knee up the middle. Move your right arm to underhook his left arm, and put your head and shoulders on his torso, while sliding your right knee over the top of his upper right thigh. Now, you can post out with your left hand. Push outward under his right calf with your left knee to make some space, then step over his right leg entirely with your left leg. Now, pivot on your right knee 90 degree clockwise. You should end up on top in side control. This video is sort of similar, but not quite what we did.

After doing that for an hour, the other guys rolled while Beefy and I finished our enrollment paperwork. They were out of gis in my size, so I've ordered a Lightweight from Padilla & Sons. I hope it gets here soon.

After an afternoon full of meetings and not getting any actual work done, I took off for Karate class. Tak split the class up, and I worked with the purple belts. We spent the whole class doing kata. We did Seisan, then Ananku, then Wanshu. Me and one of the purple belts didn't really know Wanshu, so we did that for the rest of the class. My Seisan felt better than it did last Thursday, but I think it still needs lots of work. My thighs were really tired by the end of class from holding low stances through Wanshu, but that's something that I really need to improve. I've decided to not post details from the Karate class. There's not a whole lot of information about our Karate online, and I'm probably not qualified to be the one that puts it out there. So you'll just have to be satisfied with the names of stuff we do.

And Another One

Last night after work was karate. Something I probably neglected to mention is that one of my best friends teaches Shorinji-Ryu Karate at the local YMCA. Starting around November-ish, we signed up for a YMCA membership and started taking my five year old to karate classes. A couple weeks later, I started joining him. Then in January-ish, Mrs Chops started attending classes too. We've tried bringing the three year old, but he's not quite into the whole "paying attention" thing yet. Since I'm blogging my BJJ classes, I should probably also blog my karate classes.

My friend was in "Old Skool" mode last night, so there were lots of push ups and crunches being handed out. Thankfully, we did them in sets of 10, so they all seemed manageable at the time. I'm sure feeling it this morning, though. That's kind of sad for a guy who could do 100 push ups a year ago.

Quick rundown of what we covered - Kihon (sprinkled with calisthenics), then the white belt line and colored belt line alternated doing Kenshuho (and calisthenics for the colored belts). Next was Ananku and Seisan kata. I think my Ananku is more or less fine (meaning I pretty much remember it all, but I think it could look cleaner), but I lost track of what I was doing in Seisan, *again*, towards the end. Ugh. Seriously, this frustrates me. I can learn two Sayoc transition drills and a template or two in a single day, but several weeks in and I can't remember all of the second kata. Ugh. Maybe I need to add a reps goal for Seisan this year. I doubt I'd get 10,000 reps of a kata in this year, but a couple hundred should be doable.

At the end of class, he went over test results (Tuesday was our test). Mrs Chops, Chops 2.0, and I all passed. This means that for the first time in my life, I have a ranking in a traditional martial art. It feels weird.

Lastly, it was mentioned to me that unless you have somebody to crank on, reading the notes from my BJJ class doesn't really make sense. A) Those notes are actually just meant for me. I find that the act of organizing my thoughts and writing them down helps me remember the details. B) Next time I'll try to find a YouTube video that represents what I'm talking about. Also, I might do more in-depth notes on the karate, too. Or maybe not. We'll see.

Look Who's Back

Well, it's been an interesting year so far, and I mean that in the most negative sense possible. Just before the holidays, work suddenly got crazy busy, and it didn't let up at all until well into February. During that time I got a cold, which turned into a sinus infection, which, despite antibiotics, turned into bronchitis. The bronchitis turned into pneumonia, then back into just bronchitis, and now, finally, I can breathe.

So, where were we? Oh yes, I did not hit my 10k reps goal last year. I'm torn between soldiering on now that I'm well, or just scuppering that one and starting a new goal. I'm actually leaning towards finishing my 10k reps on principle, but I still need to motivate myself to actually do the reps.

Early last December, a co-worker approached me and said he was interested in learning martial arts, but had no idea where to start. I looked into the options around our office, and explained to him what the different styles available were. He decided that Brazilian Jiu Jitsu sounded like something he wanted to try, so we went and watched a class. We tried to attend a free trial lesson, but showed up on Open Mat day. We planned to come back the following Monday, but that happened to be the day that the world exploded at work, metaphorically speaking. Today, at long last, order (and my health) had been restored enough for us to go. This is my long winded way of saying: I'm going to study Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and this will become my training blog. In conjunction with this, I'm probably not going to be so circumspect about my identity, in case you don't already know who I am.

Moving on, first class. Beefy and I showed up at 11, only to be told that class actually starts at 11:30. We hung out in the car for 30 minutes, then walked in and signed the waivers. We got changed and headed out on the mat. There were only two white belts and the black belt instructor in class today. Warm ups consisted of jogging around the mats, side to sides, cross stepping, jumping jacks, push ups, two kinds of crunches, mountain climbers, and another set of push ups. Really, it wasn't too bad, except I'm a lazy fat ass, so I was beet red and out of breath.

We moved on to technique, which was kimura from north/south position. Going against the bottom guy's left arm, you place the thumb side of your left forearm under his elbow, while cupping his left wrist with your right hand. Lift up on the elbow while pushing his wrist towards the floor and away from his center. Slide your left hand, palm down, under his elbow and grip your own right wrist, while monkey-gripping his left wrist with your right hand. Pull his elbow up to your navel, turning him to his right, while you slide your left foot behind his back. Your right knee should still be down on the mat next to his head, so he can't slide out. Put your left forearm on your left knee, his elbow should be bent at 90 degrees, with his upper arm pointing straight up, and his forearm parallel to the floor. Posture up so you're looking straight ahead. Now, slowly look towards your left, turning your whole upper body. You should be able to feel his shoulder tighten. We did this on left and right sides.

Next technique was the Americana. For example's sake. we'll be attacking the left arm again. Cup both of your hands, and place your left hand on the opponent's left wrist, your right on his left elbow. Put all of your weight on this arm and drive it into the mat. Place your left elbow on the mat next to the opponent's left ear while monkey-gripping his left wrist with your left hand. His elbow should be at a 90 degree angle, and your left forearm should be parallel to his left upper arm. Now, slide your right hand, palm down, under his elbow and monkey-grip your own left wrist. Slide his left wrist straight down towards his feet, as if you're painting the mat with it, then lift up under his left elbow with your right forearm.

Last thing we covered was escape from under mount. The instructor covered some general points about being under mount, such as not letting your opponent get high on your chest, keeping your elbows in tight, etc. He talked about the difference between covering from punches and defending chokes. Which led nicely into the mount escape. For the example, the opponent reaches his right hand into your left lapel to set up a choke. You cup your right hand and monkey grip on top of his right wrist, pinning it to your chest. You then take your left hand, palm towards you, and grab his right forearm at his elbow. Now, hook his right foot with your left foot and bridge straight up. As he posts his left arm out to keep his balance, turn and roll to your left, keeping the foot hooked and elbow/wrist control on his right arm. You should end up in his guard.