Finally I have accomplished one of my short term goals. I work for a web development company who has developed an awesome Content Management program called Aptuitiv Studio. For the past few months I have been working with one of our partners to design a new look for my Jiu Jitsu club The Foundry. Jon and I reviewed the mockups and thought it was the look we were going for, so we gave the go ahead to move forward. Now the site has just launched and I think it turned out great. Be sure and check it out if you have some time to kill www.foundrybjj.com.
It feels good to have accomplished one of my goals. This goal doesn’t help me on the mat or anything, but it does help out my club and all of the students who attend. I hope they like it as much as I do. Sometimes setting small goals for yourself in Jiu Jitsu can prevent you from getting burnt out. Sometimes I will set a goal for the month, maybe even the week or sometimes down to the roll I’m about to have. Even if it’s sometime like pulling off a certain sweep, progress is progress, no matter how big or small. If you do this for yourself I think you will feel more successful with your Jiu Jitsu journey.
Holy smokes people, summer is officially here! I have been busy as hell lately, but things are going well. I have moved into a new roll at The Foundry. Our black belt Jon Lamarche now has a new work schedule and he has asked me to fill in and help teach when he can’t be there. Let me first say, this is an honor. I’m very pleased that my instructor has enough faith in me to leave the class in my hands. How it works now is he makes a schedule with a plan of what needs to be shown and taught during specific classes and then I see to it that everyone understands the material.
This does however mean that there are fewer classes where someone is actually teaching and instructing me. This part makes me depressed because I have this fear that my Jiu Jitsu may stagnate and that I will not progress as rapidly as I should. On the other hand though I have noticed that in preparing to teach classes its helped me tune some areas of my technique that I don’t normally use every class. So in that respect I see some growth in my game. How do you feel about this? Does teaching tighten up your game? Or does stepping up into a teaching roll tend to bring your game down? I would love to hear everyone’s view on this.
Oh by the way, Ferdum subbed Fedor last night. JIU JITSUUUU!
Here are a video of me rolling recently as well. I have the black Gi top on. Enjoy.
This past Sunday I had the pleasure of attending another great seminar taught by Joe Moreira. I think this was my 3rd or 4th at this point and all of them have been excellent. It doesn’t matter how long you have been training Joe can break down a basic technique for hours, and show you so many more details to tighten that move up, it will amaze you. This seminar was held at Pushard’s it was about a 45 min drive from The Foundry so we all car pooled. The weather was great so the drive flew by as we all chit-chatted and talked Jiu Jitsu. Once we got there we were introduced to Rob Pushard, the person in charge and the one who made this seminar a reality, also a very nice and welcoming individual. We all suited up and started to stretch. Jon Lamarche ran a short warm-up and then we got down to business. Joe showed some great top game stuff this time and I really think this will tighten up my side control and give me some more options. After we all went out to eat and it was great to talk with all the guys and hang out with Joe. It was a great seminar, met some great new people, learned some great new techniques. Another day in the Jiu Jitsu life.
Recently I ordered a Dragao Arm Lock Series Gi from www.mmagearpimp.com. When it was all said and done I believe it cost about $188 USD. I heard really good things about Dragao and of course I checked out www.jokerjitsu.com for reviews before making my decision. This will be a two part review. The second part will be after a month or so of rolling in it, so you all can see how its held up. For background I have a Koral Lite, an Atama Mundial #7 and a Koral MKM. I also have owned a Keiko Raca at one point. All of these pictures were taken after the Gi had been soaked in vinegar and washed through the rinse cycle twice then hung to dry. Little to no shrinking occurred.
My first impressions of the Gi when I first opened the package were I was surprised how light the Gi top was. Also that both the top and the bottom were pretty stiff and it was going to take a while to break them in. After trying it on I was pleasantly surprised at how snug it fit for an A2. I am currently not training for any competitions so I weight about 165 and I’m around 5 8′. My Atama fits so baggy it feels like I’m wearing a trash bag while training. The Dragao fits more like my Koral Lite which is an A1. Again this was a good thing and it didn’t shrink any after I washed it twice in cold water and air dried.
After rolling in it for the first time last night, I can say that the top softened up pretty fast and was comfortable to wear over a rashguard. The pants on the other hand are a bit suspect. They are good in terms of length, but they are a bit baggy around the waist. When I tie them there is a bit of balloon action going on. They are still stiff and I think it will take many washings before they will relax a bit. I’m still not sure I like them yet or not. They may be good for training, but not for competition. I’ll make sure I touch more on this in part 2 of the review. Now on to some pictures!
I hope everyone enjoyed the first part of this review. If anyone has any questions or needs any measurements, I would be happy to answer or assist.
OK so I’m pretty sure most of us out there knew that Damian Maia was going to have a tough fight on his hands at UFC 112 against Anderson Silva. I knew in fact that Maia was going to get beat up on the feet and that taking Silva to the ground was going to be hard. What I was not expecting was to have Silva show such disrespect for his opponent and then refuse to engage for 3 rounds. I by no means thought Anderson was going to just flop into Maia’s guard, I knew he would play it safe and keep the fight standing. What really bothered me was the things he was screaming at Damian and the disrespect a Jiu Jitsu blackbelt would show the art. Here are a few links to different stories about some of the things that Silva was screaming during their fight. Here and here I know Anderson doesn’t really use his Jiu Jitsu much, but for someone to hold a black belt in the art and then trash talk someone saying things like “why don’t you use your Jiu Jitsu now?” makes me think he doesn’t take his BJJ Black Belt seriously. I lost a lot of respect for him this last fight, but this is what bothered me the most. What are your thoughts not only on the fight, but his disrespect towards Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?
If any of you are like me, you spend time on Youtube looking at Jiu Jitsu videos. I would like to create this post as a place where everyone can send links to their favorite Bjj highlight videos. Some of these videos are so well done they give me such a rush to get on the mats and train. So lets try and motivate each other and at the same time spread some great videos at the same time. I’ll start with a few of mine- Braulio Estima, Marcelo Garcia, and of course Cobrinha.
Earning rank in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is easy right? That’s why we have tons of 7 year old black belts running around everywhere kicking people in the knees like mini pajama ninjas. Oh wait no, that’s other martial arts. Jiu Jitsu is far more hardcore then that. It truly does take a lifetime to master averaging 10 years to get a Jiu Jitsu black belt. Personally this is just another reason why I love Bjj. Rank means something! When a single stripe on your blue belt counts for literally months of training 3-4 times a week, achieving it is an awesome feeling. I do see the other side of the coin though. Some people can get discouraged and give up because they are not progressing fast enough. Or at least they think they aren’t because they don’t get the quick rank they are looking for. Lets face it a very small number of white belts that start out even make it to purple belt. So lets hear it, how do you feel about the way rank works in bjj? Do you think it’s a good thing and keeps the art from being watered down? Or do you think the opposite?
This past Wednesday I had the chance to train with BJJ black belt Alexey Cruz down in Portland Maine. He teaches out of the Choi Institute of Martial Arts and Science. Alexey is a 3rd degree Jiu Jitsu black belt under De La Riva. He also is the one who puts on the Freestyle Grappling Open Tournaments every year. I was super excited to get a chance to train with him and his guys. I think we had a total of 6 people from The Foundry make the almost 2 hour drive. Call it a Foundry field trip if you will. Alexey showed some sweet half guard stuff, mostly passing it, but also a few submissions thrown in. I rolled with 3 of his blue belts, all of them were really skilled and seemed like all around nice guys. At first I was playing super defensive, feeling like if I went for submissions it would not be respectful. I’m not sure where that feeling came from, but I think my logic was, well this is their house and I am just a guest. No one likes to tap to a guest. After a few mins though this feeling passed and it was really awesome to roll with new people. I think we will be making more trips down there to visit from time to time and I am looking forward to it. Do any of you make trips to visit others schools regularly? If so do you see a jump in your game?
A friend of mine, we will call him “Chief” has started up a podcast and I was lucky enough to make it on episode one as a guest. We talk about video games, movies, Valentines Day, and of course Jiu Jitsu came up. Be sure and show some support and check out my sexy voice! The Weekend Pregame
Alright it’s that time again. Last time I posted a move I had been working on, I got great responses back from everyone. Thanks to all of you because you have really made that move so much tighter with all of your pointers. This time I would like to share a guard pass that I have been working on. So far it is my number 2 guard pass I use in Jiu Jitsu. I would like to ask everyone to again comment with their tips or on anything that I could add or should be careful of. If there are any Youtube videos out there that are the same as this pass, please send them my way for me to study. Thanks again everyone and I hope you enjoy.
