You pay for your mistakes

First training in two weeks tonight.  First we had weather.  Then I got sick.  And stayed sick.  And got lazy when I was less sick.  Sometimes you just have to get off the dime.  Laying around is a mistake.  Tonight I paid.  Tomorrow I head back in and rectify.  Because I don't make the same mistake twice.

Training Beats RIP edition

Miss you, Nujabes.

Working today so I can fight tonight...

MMA 101; hopefully with time to box five rounds after all that dang fitness work.

Whoops there goes ANOTHER week...

Not happy about it.  First we had a week of winter weather that did it's usual, paralyzing the greater Seattle area and closing shop at the gym for most of last week.  Then I got sick.  With my outsized sense of caring about my fellow grapplers, I stayed out of the gym when it did open back up.  But it's now been over a week since I last trained and I hate these sorts of discontinuities.  Best not to dwell on them when they come up; gotta just get back in and start training again.

Snowed Out

Seattle and the Greater Puget Sound region express a paroxysm of paralysis at the mere mention of snow.  Idiot reporters for the local television news get breathless with hype stories beginning sometimes a week in advance of predicted "snow in the low lands" (meaning anywhere in the general metropolitan area where we're mostly less than 500 feet above sea level). 

The stories get worse as the snow actually falls.  Those same reporters excitedly puff out their accumulation stories.  "Here, take a look at this..." they implore as wander on-camera to some parked car and try to make two inches of snow look like it's meaningful.  It's some of the most juvenile reportage you'll ever witness in a genre that has long since abandoned actual newscasting.

Just this morning, one poor reporter tried to suggest that wet snow was dangerous (as opposed to dry snow which is actually far more difficult to drive in).  She reached down, grabbed a handful, and described it as "oily" in an effort to embellish her suggestion of slippery danger.  I was so taken aback, I had to look up her bio.  Yup.  Born and raised and went to college in Hawaii.  The news director that sent her out for live work ought to be docked pay.

And so the region has rolled over on it back and pissed all over itself in its irrational fear of what is really very moderate weather.  There's nowhere to go.  Even the hardcore BJJ gym is closed today.  Guess I'll black-box some workout or other and post you the details here later after I finish work for the day.

This Man Should be a Legend

A 78 year old Gracie Barra student was just awarded his black belt. Rumble young man, Rumble!

Training Beats Question

Does your school play music during training?  Mine does.  Sure helps you get through three rounds of five-exercise Tabatas.  And four rounds of focus mitt combos with crunches in between.  And four rounds of submission-rolling with MMA gloves followed by four rounds of boxing.  Finishing up with three minutes of burpees. Saturday MMA class is no joke. I think I'm going to watch a little football today, do some long, easy cardio in the family room, and wait to train again until tomorrow!

I'm Going to Make a Grappling Dummy

Like all things homemade these days, there are hundreds of recipes and plans on the internet.  My internet search for grappling dummy plans led me to this site.  When I looked through his pictures the first time, I laughed my ass off.  Read to the end to figure out why.  I know; real mature Mr. Gnarly.

Drills and Good Training Partners Make Good BJJ Classes

Had another good class last night thanks to a series of drills, a new asthma medication, and some strategic rest during rolling.  Instruction was great with the usual protracted warm-up (running and calisthenics) modified to add a protracted set of drills.  I read that nowadays there are some schools that really focus on drilling and its my belief as a lifelong athlete and participant in many sports, that drilling increases competence more sharply than any other form of practice.

I'm not dismissing the value of the "skills" portion of any class, or the live sparring we all look forward to at the end of every session.  But the process of drilling in brazilian jiu jitsu conforms to ideals about competence and  learning described in such diverse works as Josh Waitkin's The Art of Learning and Daniel Coyle's The Talent Code.

My school has a weekly class devoted to just drilling.  The one time I attended, I thought it was both brilliant and unfortunately, beyond my physical capacity.  I still can't do a wall drill.  But the more I work it, the better it gets.  I recently bought Andre Galvao's Drill to Win hoping that reading the book might give me some insight.  I also expect that working some solo drilling at home will help improve my BJJ movement and sensitivity.  Hopefully at some point I'll do enough work through the book to give it a review here on this blog.

At any rate, last night's drilling gave me a proper warm-up and when it came time to roll, I was able to work a half-guard sweep we learned in the skills part of class.  By resting after one or two rounds, and by figuring out how to grab some recovery in the midst of a round, I was able to stay relaxed enough to feel comfortable underneath, even under some pretty good pressure/coverage.  Might I have crested that hill of claustrophobia that's plagued my return to BJJ?  Could be.  Nice to have cool upper belts in class, egos in check, willing to "present" openings for skill taught during drills or to provide enough space to enable me to avoid the panic tap.  I am so happy to be back at Foster Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

Training Beats, Again

"I have... become pure water."

 

I loved this song in 1999 and love it now. If you don't start bobbing your head or skanking in your office, I can't help you.

Music and BJJ

Really I could have left the "and BJJ" off the title and been a little more transparent.  This post has little to do with BJJ other than I was reading Tangled Triangle, one of several BJJ blogs I really enjoy right now, and came across this post.  The post contains a video montage of dramatic BJJ and submission competition footage ranging from high level gi competition to MMA.  But what makes the video SO dramatic is the use of Moby's "Flower" as the soundtrack.

I was curious about the song but couldn't place it.  Tangled Triangle's author Megan uses Moby's name in the title to her post, a cue as to where the music came from.  But instead of trying to wend my way through 100's of Moby songs in search of this one, I googled the lyric "old miss lucy's dead and gone" and found several links to Huddie Leadbetter, better known as legendary blues master Leadbelly.  A little more digging lead me to this post on cocojams.net, providing a neat anthropological look at the underlying folk-rhyming that Moby samples in Flower.  The stomp and clap beat Moby uses gives the song a field spiritual element and while I love it, the connected connotations of exploitation make me wince.

And it doesn't end there.  A quick youtube search reveals the song's use in the film soundtrack for Nicholas Cage's barely bearable "Gone in 60 Seconds" among myriad other reuses, with or without permission, none of which seem to credit the original Leadbelly piece.  Here are a few examples:

Moby "Flower" (nevermind the misnomer or malapropist use of "Bring Sally Up")


Three Six Mafia


One of dozens of remixes


Thanks to Megan for posting the original BJJ vid, which I like too.  Inspiration for a little lunchtime anthropological excursion thanks to google and youtube!

"You're Not Old, Dude..."

I attended the most intimidating BJJ class ever on Thursday AM.  Clearly this is the class the school studs attend.  Several of the heavy- and ultras- giving face time.  Two browns, several purples and blue.  Two white belts out of 19 men.  Me and another guy with biker facial hair, full sleeve tats and four stripes on his belt.  I was nervous the whole time;  reminiscent of those moments before the kickoff or the first puck drop back when I played rugby and hockey.

I drilled with the other white belt, a really cool guy about my size, but with way more facility in the sport.  Then we rolled, six rings, changing every three minutes.  While waiting for a ring, one of the guys introduced himself and we recognized eachother from the last time I was enrolled with James at his Auburn school.  A third party I've been training with and therefore already knew from this time around joined the conversation.  He's 20 and trains six days a week, sometimes doubling up. 

I congratulated him on his schedule and progress saying get it now before marriage, family, career, age become reasons for less frequent training.  That last one lead he and the first guy to ask about age and I mentioned I was 49 and have been thinking that's an impediment to progress in BJJ, finally after years of being very athletic.  20-year-old's response was, "You're not old, dude."

It was the best compliment I've gotten in years.

A Little More on Fitness and Aging

If you want to understand this blog better, you need to read two of my first three posts here.  I couldn't figure out how to add an "about me" button to the top of the page like so many of my favorite BJJ blogs have.  So I wrote these posts to explain my relationship with BJJ and physical culture in general:

Gnarly Old Guy 1

I followed it up with this to complete the tale:

Gnarly Old Guy 2

If my posts over the past couple of months haven't made it perfectly clear, I live in my self-deprecation.  I own it.  I think that honest humility is endearing, and training in max effort combat sports after one's 30's is very humbling (unless you're Randy Couture, who happens to be one my favorite sports icons).

I got here because I lived a lifetime as a physical person.  I have probably outcompeted my own ability to letter in multiple sports in high school, play two sports in college, and suffered through two nasty injuries, the first of which is actually one of the defining elements of my being (left knee injury in college).  And don't get me started on how asthma defines the asthma-suffering athlete!

I believe that now, I have chosen to train in a very difficult discipline, one that requires peak conditioning to accomplished fine motor techniques against a backdrop of max effort at anaerobic and just sub-anaerobic energy expenditures.  This shit is hard for me, and I am old for it.

In addition to the fitness attributes of a BJJ'er, BJJ requires a melding of the seemingly competing attributes of well-above average flexibility with strength in the core, hips, and hands.  To illustrate this irony, I recently saw an interview in which grappling whiz and MMA coach Ricky Lundell stated jokingly that "flexibility is weakness entering the body;" a play on the old saw that "pain is weakness leaving the body."

In my 30's, I was exceptionally strong, moderately flexible, and could put down 18 scrummages and 18 tackles while running 8 miles during the course of an 80 minute rugby match.  I was not bad for a high level club game, but not select team caliber.  I my 40's, I could put down max effort 50 second shifts on a pretty good senior league hockey team.  As of last September (2011), I was swimming 5000 yards in just over 90 minutes.  I've done the hard and was competitive at it.

And now, I want to progress in a discipline I have already tried and dropped 3 times since my 30's.  One that requires me to be able to thread a fucking sewing needle while meeting or exceeding the gross motor output of any of the sports I have tried before!  Repeatedly.  While my opponent tries to break my arms off or choke me to sleep, or step inside my jab with a wicked left hook to my ridiculous old guy head.

And I hope you keep reading my travail.