My thoughts on my first six months of training Bjj

Month 15… I know it’s a little early, but it’s slow at work so here we go. I have become completely obsessed with jiu jitsu. I couldn’t keep track of how many hours I spent daydreaming about what woulda, coulda, shoulda happened during my rolls from the previous week. My brain is overloaded with techniques and I’m starting to notice the tiny little details some of the most basic techniques. I actually missed my stop on the train going home because I was replaying a roll from the prior night’s training. I’m working on my open guard and it seems that the lasso is working best for me as far as retaining guard, and sweeping from there. I have been trying to omaplata from there, but I haven’t been able to pull it off live yet. With passing, I’m focusing on double unders and stacking. Successes are few and far between, but it does feel really good when I pull of a sweep, or submission, but for the most part, I am consistently getting an ass beating. The benefit of that is I’m getting much better at escaping mount/side mount/half guard. Abu Dhabi trials are on Oct. 20 so I’ve made a commitment to train at least 5 nights a week. I’m very nervous about my first competition at blue belt, but the training intensity of our little gym has increased, and I’m focused so I’m sure I’ll be the better for it. My regular training partners are beasts and I thought I might introduce you guys to a couple of them.

The Mountain – 6’ 235 fluffy asian guy. Reminds me of Odd Job from James Bond Goldfinger without the moustache. Blue belt. Judo brown belt. Don’t let his size or fluffiness fool you. This guy has the speed and agility of a guy 100 pounds lighter, is extremely tough, finds subs from the most unorthodox of positions, and rolls at a high intensity. He loves knee on belly, knee on kidney, knee on rib, knee on face. He’s been kicking my ass since day one and I can count the number of times I’ve caught him on one hand. I don’t look forward to rolling with him, on some days I’m hoping he doesn’t show up, but he is a perfect match for me and has been great training partner and we’ve become good friends.

The Wrestler – 6’1 240 built like a bulldozer. One of my best friends. Former room mate, and the toughest guy that I know. I’ve watched him beat up half a football team in our younger years. He was a great wrestler back in high school and I brought jiu jitsu to him. His technique is not very good, he can be spazzy, but he is extremely difficult to hold in mount. Explosive in every way and seems to have a sixth sense as he can feel when I cross his center of gravity and goes immediately for a reversal. Very difficult to sweep/submit and he never gives up. Has a couple of go to chokes from side control that he pulls off consistently. Great training partner, great friend.

More next month. Thanks for reading.
 
Month 15… I know it’s a little early, but it’s slow at work so here we go. I have become completely obsessed with jiu jitsu. I couldn’t keep track of how many hours I spent daydreaming about what woulda, coulda, shoulda happened during my rolls from the previous week. My brain is overloaded with techniques and I’m starting to notice the tiny little details some of the most basic techniques. I actually missed my stop on the train going home because I was replaying a roll from the prior night’s training. I’m working on my open guard and it seems that the lasso is working best for me as far as retaining guard, and sweeping from there. I have been trying to omaplata from there, but I haven’t been able to pull it off live yet. With passing, I’m focusing on double unders and stacking. Successes are few and far between, but it does feel really good when I pull of a sweep, or submission, but for the most part, I am consistently getting an ass beating. The benefit of that is I’m getting much better at escaping mount/side mount/half guard. Abu Dhabi trials are on Oct. 20 so I’ve made a commitment to train at least 5 nights a week. I’m very nervous about my first competition at blue belt, but the training intensity of our little gym has increased, and I’m focused so I’m sure I’ll be the better for it. My regular training partners are beasts and I thought I might introduce you guys to a couple of them.

The Mountain – 6’ 235 fluffy asian guy. Reminds me of Odd Job from James Bond Goldfinger without the moustache. Blue belt. Judo brown belt. Don’t let his size or fluffiness fool you. This guy has the speed and agility of a guy 100 pounds lighter, is extremely tough, finds subs from the most unorthodox of positions, and rolls at a high intensity. He loves knee on belly, knee on kidney, knee on rib, knee on face. He’s been kicking my ass since day one and I can count the number of times I’ve caught him on one hand. I don’t look forward to rolling with him, on some days I’m hoping he doesn’t show up, but he is a perfect match for me and has been great training partner and we’ve become good friends.

The Wrestler – 6’1 240 built like a bulldozer. One of my best friends. Former room mate, and the toughest guy that I know. I’ve watched him beat up half a football team in our younger years. He was a great wrestler back in high school and I brought jiu jitsu to him. His technique is not very good, he can be spazzy, but he is extremely difficult to hold in mount. Explosive in every way and seems to have a sixth sense as he can feel when I cross his center of gravity and goes immediately for a reversal. Very difficult to sweep/submit and he never gives up. Has a couple of go to chokes from side control that he pulls off consistently. Great training partner, great friend.

More next month. Thanks for reading.

Haha, we all have experienced that training partner. The guy who can kick our ass. Encountered more often during my early training days.

Looking back however, I appreciate having had the chance to train with some of those guys since they pretty much force you to improve. When I first got into training, I was maybe the second or third biggest guy in the classroom, despite only weighting in at around 200 pounds.

The biggest guy in class was about 350, so in order to keep things somewhat uniform, we almost always got paired together. Who knows, maybe the instructor just plain didn't like me. While I used to dread having to drill and roll with this guy, I didn't quite appreciate how much he actually helped me improve.

Because of that, rolling with bigger guys doesn't really bother me. Except for if they sweat a lot.
 
Congratulations by the change...

I got a question. When I was reading the blue belt requirements I got curious if in your academy you have self-defense, or are just for the test?

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Haha, we all have experienced that training partner. The guy who can kick our ass. Encountered more often during my early training days.

Looking back however, I appreciate having had the chance to train with some of those guys since they pretty much force you to improve. When I first got into training, I was maybe the second or third biggest guy in the classroom, despite only weighting in at around 200 pounds.

The biggest guy in class was about 350, so in order to keep things somewhat uniform, we almost always got paired together. Who knows, maybe the instructor just plain didn't like me. While I used to dread having to drill and roll with this guy, I didn't quite appreciate how much he actually helped me improve.

Because of that, rolling with bigger guys doesn't really bother me. Except for if they sweat a lot.

HA I hear ya. Currently we've got 9 guys over 200 and 5 of them are 225+ including me. It's great and terrible at the same time.
 
Watching 2 big guys roll is pretty cool sometimes, especially when they show awesome technique rather than just brute strength. But then you add the brute strength in with the technique and it is like a clash of giants haha.
 
Watching 2 big guys roll is pretty cool sometimes, especially when they show awesome technique rather than just brute strength. But then you add the brute strength in with the technique and it is like a clash of giants haha.

I agree..I see it all the time. We have some really technical big guys and they go at it. The walls shake when The mountain Osotos someone.
 
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