MMA Training Hub

Training
1161

Wed, Oct 29

MT:
More work on stances. Kicks, switch kick and teeps from both.

BJJ:
Worked on breaking past closed guard, several variations. Worked on some base building stuff. Basically, face off with your partner and try to knock them off their base. Fun stuff. Then worked on side control with a transition into an arm bar. My partner is 5’ tall and weighs about 102. Her entire arm is as long as mine is from wrist to elbow. It’s kinda weird. Had to give it a whirl with someone else to really get the gist of it.

Cappy

1162

Thanks Miss Parker.

My Judo coach\Sensai has two sayings for Judo tournaments

  1. You used judo well (when you do well)
  2. You learned a lot of Judo (when you don’t do so well)

No matter what happens I expect to get something out of this weekend. I am mostly trying to get my mind ready for the tournament.

as for recent training. Last class we practiced several setups for the tournament and then did Randori.

I had two successful throws, and was able to take advantage of a failed throw by my classmate. I missed, slipped, and left is arm straight up with me standing beside him. I gave him a second to remove it. He didn’t and I threw my leg over his face and rolled into a slow controlled arm bar.

Can’t wait for final class tomorrow night.

1163

Level 1, Gorgeous Bastard. Palm heel strikes, which, since I wasn’t wearing wraps ripped the skin right off my hand. Freaking girly skin. Front kicks & drill drill drill drill. GB’s drills are always fun, though.

We did the one where you put the bags in the center of the room - only enough for half the class - & everyone goes to the edges of the room & faces away, lying face down, hostage style with fingers interlaced behind your head & ankles crossed.

When he gives the signal you jump up as fast as you can & try to get to the bag first so you can be the holder & not the striker for the fatigue drill.

We also did one where the striker (me) strikes the bag with 10 hard palm heels then goes down for 5 pushups while your bag holder takes 2 steps bag & you jump up quick like a bunny & continue the exercise all the way across the room & back, as fast as possible.

I was so tired by the last 2 sets I thought my life was over & my bag holder is taunting me mercilessly while I’m doing my pushups, “What’s wrong with you, Parker, I can’t even feel those strikes?!!” The giant bellow of “FUCK YOU!” was out of my mouth before I even had time to think the words. He just laughed.

Level 2/3, taught by Relentless, which he is. Nobody loves a good punch to the gut more than he, so that’s what we all gave and got. We also played an awesome game of Monkey in the Middle. This one was tough.

The Monkey is attacked by four attackers in quick succession & responds with hammerfists, front kicks, & knees, for one minute. Then, on the signal, the attackers throw down their bags & shoot in for chokes, one immediately after the other, for another minute.

The key is to never ever let the Monkey rest. This allows the exhaustion & disorientation to set in quickly, which you then have to fight through. By the end of my round my legs are rubbery, I’m giving pathetic little heaving sounds with every strike, and I can’t breathe or focus my brain.

We’re all like that. Its freaky, because I think we’re all in really good shape, but going all out like that for two minutes straight just wrecks you. Maybe because it comes at the end of two hours.

Good night, sleep tight, I know I will.

1164

Houston open wrap up.

Got to the venue around 11:45 and signed in. About 12:20 I started doing some mobility drill, and some light Uchi Komi?s with some guys from my dojo.

I had my wife come out to the tournament with me to watch. It was nice to have the support, but I started to wonder if that was a bad idea. During warm up I started thinking she was getting bored by herself. I realized at that moment I had to get out of my head. I was there to compete, so I stopped warming up and started working on getting my mind right.

This is a double elimination tournament for my division( 6 total competitors). About 1:30 my division starts. Lucky me I drew first match.

I get a couple of minor points due to some counter attacks and the fight gets down to the final minute. Dude pulls a slow delayed tomoe nage. I go with it thinking I can push his leg to the side and gain a dominant position on the ground. Sadly I waited too long to push his leg. Guy give one final strong pull, and I slowly start to roll over. Full Ippon for him. My coach is a corner judge for my match. He called me over and said you know you don?t have to go over on those throws right?..

Next match I compete against a fellow Judoka from my dojo. He scores a minor point due to me not pulling enough on a throw. There are a few ground scrambles. Then it happens. We both went for a throw. He had a better position in the throw, but he stopped mid throw. Since I was already attempting my throw as well it was strange because I was expecting resistance, but since he let up on his throw I just basically pulled him over. I started scrambling for a hold down, and then I hear it. Mate, suri mate(sp?)

Match is over via Ippon.

Next match I start off with a minor point from a throw, we stand back up, and start again. Guy attempts a throw, I drop and roll into a kesa gatame hold. Guy scrambles a bit, and I roll into a modified tate shiho gatame. That guy was squirming, all over the place, several times if he would have had just a little more I would of rolled off of him. Luckily he was spent. 25 seconds later(and that seemed like an eternity) the buzzer sounds. Another Suri Mate(sp?) is called match over. I won by hold down for a full Ippon.

Next match I will medal no matter what. I face the guy from my first match. I get several half point, and then I got sucked in to his throw, and I was gone. Match was over. He wins silver by Ippon. I was 50 seconds away from it, and I totally let it go.

On a positive note I made friends with the guy and expect to see him in future tournaments. I also realized that I could have beat him and taken silver, but I let it go. I didn?t walk away feeling like he beat me, instead I beat myself. Over all I am Happy with my performance. I have not competed in a martial arts tournament in 14 years and this is my fist Judo tournament.

1165

Still a solid performance, you know what to do next time

1166

Well, good job, haney! With that mindset you’re going to beat your new friend next time, and more.

1167

Haney,

Congrats on getting in there and competing. Fun, isn’t it?

1168

Response to Xen

Thanks. Honestly my goal was to win atleast one match. My stretch goal was to place.

Response to Miss Parker

[quote]Well, good job, haney! With that mindset you’re going to beat your new friend next time, and more.
[/quote]

Funny you should say that about the mindset. I think that is the most attractive part of martial arts. People that are really trying to practice the art have no problem leaving their ego out of training and competitions. I am hoping one day I will be able to master that side of it.

Response to Djwlfpack

It was great! I really enjoyed challenging my self. I looked forward to my next tournament.

Now it is back to training again. I think my next training schedule will be significantly more focused than this one.

1169

Glad to see you’re already working on your plan of attack for the future.

Tonight, I attend my first Kenpo class. Details to come later.

Thanks for giving me the extra kick in the ass I needed, Haney and Miss Parker!

1170

Well, its my pleasure, Djwlfpack! Can’t wait to hear how it goes!

Tonight, I’ll be brief, for once:

Private lesson with GB, we worked the whole hour, just like last time, on headlock while on the ground & I still can’t pull the defense off smoothly. It got me thinking about Xen’s Eddie Bravo video. I wonder what my number will be on this technique? Very high, I’m afraid.

2nd hour, level 1, delivering & redirecting punches to the abdomen, then choke from the front with a 2 handed pluck.

3rd hour, level 2/3, GB, more of his crazy hard drills. He has more weird ass-kicking drills than any other teacher I’ve ever had. Then uppercuts & defenses against same on and on and on.

1171

Kenpo
Time: 70 min.
Notes: This was my very first class, and first things first, I have to say I had a lot of fun. Everyone was very respectful and nice, and helped show me the ropes.

The first thing I notice is things are much more structured here than at my BJJ school. The BJJ school was very informal, where he you must say “Yes, sensei” and address every instructor as “sensei.” That will take a little getting used to, as will the bowing and traditional stance, which is open hand over closed fist, arms raised just below the chin.

Started off the class with some conditioning and dynamic stretching, then went into technique work. We drilled knees from the clinch and then worked on a few side kicks. My hip mobility sucks, as I haven’t done this stuff in a few months. It should come back soon (I hope).

So, that pretty much sums things up. I’m already looking forward to my next class. Since I have a BJJ background, everyone says I’ll do really well when we start working on the ground fighting drills, so I’ve got that going for me.

1172

Sweet! Djwlfpack is back! That’s great Dan, I know you’ve wanted this for a while.

Those formalities can be a bit much at times if you’re not used to it, but for the most part I really liked that about my old karate school. It lets you show respect to the people who are helping you grow without having to say anything, and its also interesting to feel those relationships/behaviors change when you see each other socially.

1173

Tonights Judo workout
we practiced the following
Grip fighting
Deashi Harai
and we worked fighting different size opponents (i.e. make them fight your size)

1174

Haney, will you explain a little bit about making them fight your size?

1175

[quote]Miss Parker wrote:
Haney, will you explain a little bit about making them fight your size?[/quote]

Sure…

You have one tall fighter and one that is shorter. The advantage will almost always be for the taller fighter.
The idea behind making them fight your size si, if you are a shorter fighter you would be pulling them down and making them fight bent over while you can stay upright and evenly balanced. This would place them in a more unstable situation and make it much easier for you to throw them.

If you are the tall fighter you tend to do stand up naturally. So the training for that scenario was to understand what is happening when a Judo player that is shorter starts pulling you down to his level. We also emphasized that the upward pull is much easier for a taller player if he stands upright.

1176

Gotcha. Thanks, Haney.

1177

Kenpo
Time: 50 min.
Notes: Today’s class was all about strikes, specifically, what to do if someone comes charging at you. So, we worked on various knees, kicks and punches all designed to stun our attacker, then quickly get out of harm’s way. But, when you move out, be thinking of what to do next, as unless your attacker is KO’d, he’s going to come back at you.

Not as much conditioning in this class, more focused on technique, which is cool.

1178

Miss Parker, No problem…

Judo tonight
90 min.
Typical 45 min warmup
Then we practiced Harai Goshi which I experimented with and learned a whole lot of variations to that throw.

After that we finished class with ne waza randori. I decided a few classes back that I am going to play defense in mat work so I can improve my escapes. So for the most part I worked my guard, half guard, and a few attacks from the bottom.

I did have a few successful transitions from the bottom to being in their guard which at that point I would try one or two attacks and then rolled to guard. I also let a few pins get applied to try and worl on my escapes.

It is amazing how much more relaxed I am in that situation compared to when I started back in may. I also realize how much muscling through the mat work takes it out of you when I watch my class mates.

1179

Its awesome to be able to post my first real combat sport training session! After so long talking about it.

Last night 90 mins at Gracie Barra Derby. Got horribly lost on the way there so missed some of the conditioning bit at the beginning, so I started out doing some weird floor based stuff- inchworms, forward rolls etc. Then some flexibility work, which showed how much I need to work on that, before we started some drills.

The teaching was great, I got loads of help from the sensei. I practised pulling guard, and breaking guard, as well as some other stuff that I don’t know the name of- tripping someone who tries to stand out of your guard. The I learned a basic choke, although I really struggled to apply it.

Then we did some sparring, and it was so cool to be able to spar full bore without worrying about being smacked in the head. Not wanting to sound like a pussy, but in the past I have only done semi contact, so being able to use full effort was great. I sparred three different blue belts, and got taken to school (obviously).

They were all good at explaining where I was going wrong, which was mainly that I was being too aggressive without actually knowing what I was doing- I was just piling in there going for the full mount, trying to muscle my way through their guard and getting subbed repeatedly.

Nothing quite so rough on the manhood as being tapped out by a girl three times. Also they said I was wearing myself out by just attacking all the time, but I think they were being kind- I need to work on my anaerobic fitness.

Anyway, it was amazing, loved every second of it. I need to work on flexibility and conditioning, but I also felt that my strength was lacking, although that may just be because I am lacking in technique.

So I am going to turn up the heat on my training- I am going to pay for two sessions a week, then go to more on weeks when I have the time, as well as getting to as many of Victor Estima’s technique sessions that I can, of which there are two each week. Outside of classes I will be using the MMA training on ferrugia’s website, as well as pavels flexibility training.

Should I be adjusting the stuff on Ferrugia’s website to take into account the fact I am doing just BJJ, rather than MMA?

1180

Just tuning in on this fine thread.

After spending the last hour or so rading through it I thought I would contribute a bit allthough I only train Bjj.

On a normal week my schedule looks something like this:

Monday-wednesday:
10-12 Bjj
12-13 rest/eating
13-15 Bjj
15-17 rest/eating
17-19 mma (only grappling in my case)
19-20 rest/eating
20-22 strength and conditioning.

Thursdays :
20-22 Bjj

Friday-sunday : i normaly get a strength and conditioning work done on fridays but other than that; shitload of work/sleeping.
Every third week I have a weekend of from work and the entire week is scheduled like monday-wednesday.

Strength and conditioning looks like this :
week 1 consists of two exercises each day for 10x3 in the following order
OHS - BP
DL - Chins
Clean & jerk - squat variation front/back
Row - power clean

Week 2 to consists of crossfit wods like filthy fifty, fight gone bad etc. and a lot of hand/wrist/finger strength exercises.
Week 2 allso consists of alot of prehab exercises to prevent shoulder injuries, knee injuries etc.

Week 3 consists of the same layout as week 1 except it’s 10x1.

Week 4 consists of a mixture of week 1 and 2.

All workouts allso consist of alot of mobility work !