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Training
41

[quote]pch2 wrote:

If there are no bands at my gym are there alternatives? I think a lot of it is that I have no tricep strength. I do a lot of the rowing motion in BJJ but there really isn’t any pushing. Is there a way to work up to unassisted dips that doesn’t involve machines or bands? I guess the pushups while keeping elbows close help. Do I really need something in the vertical plane?
[/quote]

There are no bands in my gym either, so I bought some inexpensive ones from Iron Woody and brought them to the gym. It was band-assisted dips that finally got me strong enough to do them unassisted.

42


Last weekend I had to be in Columbus. I thought finding a class, but it didn’t work out. I spent the rest of the week trying to wash off the smell, only to have to go back this weekend.

So then I hit to BJJ classes on Sunday. Do I remember what we did during those classes? Nope. I did roll hard after them though, and it was a great confidence boost. I took some time to pick on newish white belts, and it paid off.

43

I competed at Arnold’s, and got my ass kicked, hard. Like after the match went and cried on the boys shoulder hard.

Getting beaten up hurts, ribs and mouths and bruises take a while to heal thus you’re reminded of sucking for a bit. It’s been a week though, and I’m mostly whole again (I don’t think ribs ever actually stop hurting) and have had time to think about things.

To treat this like any other problem, first what went wrong? I lost based on two things, strength, and fear. Strength is pretty easy to elucidate. Female weight classes suck, and I ended up rolling with a girl that had 40lbs on me, and she was significantly stronger. I routinely roll with guys that have more than 40lbs on me, but when a guy is that much bigger than you he’s really contentious and doesn’t try to win by out muscling you. Girls on the other hand have no problem out muscling you. Something I tend to forget, since I rarely roll with women my size/strength or bigger. So then, the best way to deal with this? Bump down a weight class (which puts me lighter than I’ve ever weighed as a adult!) and get stronger. If I want to be someone that competes I need to be the one that does the muscling.

Fear is much harder to tackle. She was visibly bigger than me, and I let myself get intimidated. So, I played a safe game. I sat to guard, which I hate doing with people bigger than me, but do out of default when I think I’ll be taken down. My technique was clearly better than hers, but I didn’t go for offensive opportunities because I didn’t want to give her any opportunities to hurt me. She playing really roughly, which always make me play really safely. If you’re going to gi punch me, I’m going to stay really tight and not give you any space for it. Being safe though, is not winning. Throughout the match I clearly saw what I could do, but didn’t because I didn’t want to take risks. When time was short, and I was already losing, I did try some stuff, but at that point I didn’t really have the confidence that it was going to work, and so it didn’t.

How does one train to overcome fear? I guess I need to put myself into more scary situations. I need to start rolling with the mean guys more. I wasn’t really seeing the merit in rolling with anyone that was just there to beat people up, but apparently thats how people roll in competitions (this was only my second) so even if I don’t want to be that person, I need to start learning how to be able to deal with that person.

A large contributer to my fear was not having confidence in my knowledge. I know what to do in a lot of situations, and if you were to ask me, I could tell you, but I need to take that knowledge out of my head and make it instinct. The way to do that is to drill more. I need to pick movements and drill them until I do them without thinking.

So, those are my goals now. Be lighter (ideally stronger and leaner), roll with more ‘tough’ guys, and drill more.

44

Sounds like you have analyzed the situation pretty darn well. I’ve never competed in a contact sport such as BJJ. When I underperform, I always console myself by remembering that at least I’m not sitting on the couch! Then I do exactly what you’ve done. Analyze and regroup.

45


Taking a step back to evaluate and understand always gives you an edge over the opponent.
good for you.

46

[quote]kpsnap wrote:
Sounds like you have analyzed the situation pretty darn well. I’ve never competed in a contact sport such as BJJ. When I underperform, I always console myself by remembering that at least I’m not sitting on the couch! Then I do exactly what you’ve done. Analyze and regroup.[/quote]

Oh, my first reaction was to of course cry. Ugh, there’s no crying in Jiu Jitsu! Then I just wanted to quit. I’m not intrinsically competitive, which is why I haven’t competed a lot. Competitions are good for reality checks though, and that’s clearly what I got. Reality bites.

I used to think Ethan Hawke was so cute, now he just seems dirty and thin. Lol

[quote]nlmain wrote:
Taking a step back to evaluate and understand always gives you an edge over the opponent.
good for you.[/quote]

Yeah, now it’s time for the hard part. The actual doing.

47

There are so many good lessons in competing. Even if only competing with oneself. I regret that I came to it so late in life.

48

Next time I compete, I need to be under 135lbs. Losing any more than 5lbs of water feels like it would be too much, so I’d like to walk around at 140. Man, that’s scary. I’m heavy, and sitting at 170 right now. That gives me 30lbs to lose. It seems like a scary huge amount. Perfectly doable though…right?

While scale weight is what counts, of course I want to retain my muscle and just lose fat. So I’ll do measurement too.

Neck: 13.5
Shoulders: 44.5
Upper Arms: 12
Boobs: 42
Under Boob: 33
Belly: 38
Hips: 42
Thigh: 23
Calf: 15

49

I like the sound of your last post…you may have been defeated but your mind hasn’t!

Hey, we’re the same weight now :stuck_out_tongue:

30lbs isn’t HUGE, depending on when you want to lose it by…I agree, maintaining what muscle you have(and gaining some) will be GOOD!

50

[quote]mom-in-MD wrote:
I like the sound of your last post…you may have been defeated but your mind hasn’t!

Hey, we’re the same weight now :stuck_out_tongue:

30lbs isn’t HUGE, depending on when you want to lose it by…I agree, maintaining what muscle you have(and gaining some) will be GOOD![/quote]

You’ve gotten the food nazi thing down though, I need to tap into it again. I’m going to try the shame thing, I’ve never actually posted what I eat, always just qualitative assessments. I ate horribly today.

I’ve also been really bad with my Synthroid. Intellectually I realize the negatives of non compliance, but I’ve been taking it since the middle of high school and it no longer feels like a big deal. To deal with that, I’ve started leaving it on my night stand and setting an alarm for 5:30 and taking it no matter what. I’ve informed the boy about it and he’s made a point of reminding me when I sleep over.

Ok, back to the food, I didn’t measure anything, and for those of you that don’t know, I’m a vegetarian so no need to point out the lack of meat.

Today so far,
Lots of coffee with lots of milk (I’m ambivalent on my view of dairy, any one have any strong opinions?)
A shake w/ 2 scoops MD, 2tbsp Flax, and some pineapple
Egg salad sandwich (real mayo and bread, I know better)
A giant cookie, like bigger than my hand, ugh.

I went on a NEPA walk earlier, but that doesn’t really counteract a giant cookie does it?

51

I did ‘lift’ on Tuesday. I’ve been going to the gym with my brother, and while it’s helpful for him, I don’t think I like it. I’m easily distracted and its hard for me to go from conversation, to concentrating on lifting. I don’t know what to do to make it beneficial for both of us, if I want us to do our own things he suffers, if we work together I do. I don’t know. Any tips on adapting to a lift partner when you’ve never had one?

We did the horizontal push pull, but didn’t do legs for some reason. The gym was insanely crowded so thing were not in the order I prefer or supersetted.

We always warm up with a handful of MM movements, and a few odd BJJ movements.

5x5
A1) Rows (on the leverage machine thing, what’s that called) 35lbs?
A2) Push ups on the smith machine

B1) DB BP 30lbs

C1) Inverted rows
These actually felt pretty good. I’m able to go through the whole range of motion with out assistance for all the reps.

52

I didn’t realize that you had a thyroid issue. Or that you were trying to lose weight. In one post, I think you mentioned 1,300 calories. That’s not very much . . .

53

[quote]kpsnap wrote:
I didn’t realize that you had a thyroid issue. Or that you were trying to lose weight. In one post, I think you mentioned 1,300 calories. That’s not very much . . .[/quote]

Sorry I tend to be bad about assuming people have been reading my logs for as long as I’ve been keeping them.

I’m hypothyroid, and was diagnosed way back in high school. My dad blames perchlorates in the drinking water, but that’s a whole different issue.

Before I wasn’t really thinking about weight loss, but now I need to focus on it. I guess I need to redo some calorie math too.

54

Since Arnold’s I have been to class. The first week, I was still in the mopey woe is me mindset, so I didn’t absorb much. I can’t not go to class though, occasionally it seems futile, but actually skipping for no real reason feels really wrong. It’s become part of who I am.

The perfect opportunity for background for those who don’t already know me, or haven’t known me forever. I started BJJ in Sept of '08. I’m not athletic, I’ve actually spent most of my life as a fat kid, but when I started grad school, I started lifting. I lost a bunch of fat, but then needed some sort of goal. Figure’s not for me, so I was thinking strongman. This all occurred in my old log, so one of the other women suggested I try BJJ. She connected me to a friend of hers in the area taking privates with my current instructor. I joined her for one of her privates, learned the beautiful physics behind the mount escapes and was hooked. Now it’s a year and a half later, and I’m a super addicted blue belt.

Ok, back to the training. The only noticeable things are that there have been more women around, and I’ve been drilling after class. Sometimes on Tuesdays I go to an MMA gym where our instructor also teaches. It’s no gi, but they have a girl. Last week there were three! One was brand new, and the other one was from a different MMA gym. I drilled with the new girl. It’s a double edged sword, I get to roll a girl, but she’s always new and thus it’s not actually rolling. The same thing occurred throughout the week. Our instructor also teaches at a nearby college so a few girls from there came to classes. They were mostly new though, so I did a lot of talking about what base is, and teaching the mount escape during rolling time. Hopefully some of them will be consistent and I can have a female rolling partner.

Drilling, this week I aimed for 10. Which doesn’t seem like enough, so I’m going to have to bump it up. I did the hip bump sweep, scissor sweep, and a sweep from butterfly guard.

55

pch2 you speak my language:

I did the hip bump
sweep, scissor sweep, and a sweep
from butterfly guard.

56

I forgot your were hypo-t. sometimes I forget I am, but I think I’m ‘normal,’ now.

57

[quote]pch2 wrote:

Lots of coffee with lots of milk (I’m ambivalent on my view of dairy, any one have any strong opinions?)[/quote]

I love dairy…especially cheese, and it loves me. That’s not true for everyone.

I like your attitude. You didn’t lose that match at all if you take from that experience what you need to progress.

58

[quote]nlmain wrote:
pch2 you speak my language:

I did the hip bump
sweep, scissor sweep, and a sweep
from butterfly guard.
[/quote]

Nobody noticed I wrote a haiku with pch’s sentence? And I felt so witty too. Maudit. Wrong forum I guess.

59

[quote]kimbakimba wrote:

[quote]pch2 wrote:

Lots of coffee with lots of milk (I’m ambivalent on my view of dairy, any one have any strong opinions?)[/quote]

I love dairy…especially cheese, and it loves me. That’s not true for everyone.

I like your attitude. You didn’t lose that match at all if you take from that experience what you need to progress.[/quote]

Hey pch2 - new to your log!

You want strong feelings about dairy, I got’em!

We are the only species on this planet to drink another species milk.

It has only been in the last few centuries that we started consuming dairy and until then our bodies were not able to digest it. Clearly out bodies can adapt to many things, but it is not always positive. Heroin addicts get extremely sick the first time they use, but their bodies starts to crave it and adapts to it so quickly they need more and more. A little extreme yes, but its true!

More than 1/3 of the human population is lactose intolerant.

Most Asian cultures do not consume dairy and they have the lowest rates of osteoporosis and disease overall.

Cows are given tons, literally tons in poundage, of hormones and anitbiotics to continue producing milk after they have given birth and are often kept pregnant year round until they die premature deaths from weakened bodies and immune systems. Also, their female calves immediately become dairy cows and their male calves are taken away to become veal within minutes after birth.

The mechanical techniques used to pump the milk from udders is so painful and taxing that they often get cuts, sores, and infections, and the puss and blood can be mixed with the milk. And trust me when I say the USDA and the FDA are not legitimate sources of food safety regulation.

Almond, rice, soy, and hemp milk are all great alternatives to milk. Almond milk usually has 1g fat, 3g carbs, and 2g pro per cup.

I would just advise that if you continue to drink milk, which is everyone’s personal choice, find out where your milk is coming from. Try to buy from local farms who treat their cows humanely and only milk them when they are actually pregnant naturally. And try going a few weeks to a month without milk and then reintroduce it to see what kind of effects it has on your body. Sometimes, especially with dairy and gluten, people have been consuming it for so long that when they take it away and then reintroduce it, they find it makes them sick and they have food allergies to it.

Sorry, didn’t mean to hijack! Just some useful information! :slight_smile:

60

ya, but ice cream on a hot day is sooooo good!! :slight_smile:

There are always alternatives though, to anything!