Saturday, July 10, 2010

Sweet Success!

So all the hard work of training 6 days a week has paid off. I can't say whether training 6 days a week was necessary to win my first tourney, but it definitely didn't hurt. For the the last four months I have taken every Brazilian Jiu Jitsu class I could, trying to absorb all the Relson Gracie know how that was available to me, and utilize the lessons learned in my seminars with Alvaro Romano, Ryron Gracie, Daniel Moraes and Phil Cardella...not to mention all my regular training partners that have no problem handing my butt to me when I slip up! I was really nervous about signing up for my first competition in Houston, but being the sole consistent female in the class, I felt I needed to represent our academy and well, why the hell not! We're moving to NC in a week, so it seemed fitting that I give it a go before I depart for whatever BJJ school awaiting me there. Let me tell you, I was a nauseated wreck waiting to see who would be in my division. UGH! There were so many people it was crazy. But if you have ever been to an event, you know it is a hurry up and wait thing. Just like the military.LOL. You starve yourself to cut weight ( everybody is doing it! ) and you always seem to be in that endless line for registration and weight ( even when you pre-registered)! So here we are all hungry, thirsty and anxious...great fun. Wehad a rules meeting at 0900 and fights started at 1000. It begins in no particular order...kids first and some adults mixed in..needless to say my match isn't till around 2ish. Had I known that, I'd have left to go eat! I meet an older lady in the bathroom dressed in gi without her belt...she asks me what class I'm in... I say 432. She says me too! I was like OMG! I am gonna feel so guilty now because I've met her, she's told me that she's only been doing this 2 weeks and that she recently got 3 toenails ripped off rolling with a guy training for this event. WTF? I mean, I kind of felt better not knowing who I need to beat to succeed. Then she drops a bomb on my already fraying nerves..there weren't many females in the weight class above us and they are putting the heavies with us. WHAT?! I can't take it..I had sushi last night, my belly's bubbling from the stress, and now I gotta roll against a girl who's got serious pounds on me? Don't they know I'm just cutting my teeth here? GEEZ! So time flies by and they finally call all women's divisions to ring 4. I had totally mellowed from watching all the other divisions roll. Then when they said those magic words over the speaker, I felt like a heatwave hit me, sweating and shaking like I'm suffering from a lack of booze! I felt better that the bathroom girl was just as nervous. We had nothing lose so let's let it rip, you know? I had the best coaches in my corner, Daniel Moraes, the 5x world champ, and Josh Lauber, my main instructor. Well, my hubby was there too..lol. The no gi starts off first and these girls were wild and if there were no rules to uphold, I was sure that hair would be missing by the handfuls. Whoa! Insane shit! After that, it was my turn. Turned out that the wild girl, was the heavy I had to go against. My coaches tell me to breathe and relax and just flow. I try my best to listen, it's hard to focus when everyone is loud and yelling for whatever reason. SO I go in with a plan to get this over a fast as I can to avoid overexposure to this beast that has had who knows what kind of training. I did the beginner division for 0-12 months.I try to get my grips and get an armbar from the takedown before my back even hits the mat..FAIL...she weasels out of it. So I scramble back up to my feet, we dance a lil bit longer and I attempt the same damn move again. This time I get it, but she has a good grip on her arm. I loosen my leg across the face to bait her into rolling up to get out, my foot on her bicep ready to slip thru to triangle her. No such luck...so I just went hard and ripped her grip and nailed it. She taps, I'm in shock and relieved, but still gracious enough to maintain myself. I vaguely remember the coach talking to me. It was hard to hear him. The next match they called is the bathroom lady. She was set up with this girl who had just beat the beast in no gi. She had very short hair and looked extremely athletic...did I mention her husband was an instructor at one of the academies? She had been doing this since like DEC. I'm worried for my potty pal now.. 2 weeks versus 8 months?! Then I worry about me..if potty gal fails I gotta go thru her. He man is coaching her in Portugese..I'm like oh shit, I am so done. Well, potty gal puts up a great fight but loses in the end by a choke. This girl jumps up on her to pull guard and while up there does a cross collar choke. Insane. Now it's me and the Brazilian..there goes my heart rate. I do some deep breathing and chug water. I get out there and get some grips, pull her down and take side control in the process. She is one of those bucking, flailing opponents. I get my monkey grips with one arm under her head..I'm ready to do my choke that I learned. My coach is telling me to calm down and pace myself..get the points and let her burn herself out. I back off the choke and take full mount. I spread out to get balance and smother her a bit. That lead to massive bucking and I attempt my ezekiel again at the prompt of Daniel Moraes. Josh tells me to just relax and stop moving so fast. I look at him and tell him it ain't me in a rush. So she bucked herself into giving up her back. How could I resist a gift like that..even a rookie like me knows what to do about that! Rear naked choke baby! It was friggin awesome. Maybe I got lucky, but maybe I had just enough training and knowledge to run the show. None of those girls scored points on me. I made sure to hold the positions for a few seconds to get the points, I remembered to breathe and take what was given to me. After this match I jumped up and screamed, "Hell yea" and jumped on my 2 coaches. I placed first and the Brazilian got second and heavy and potty gal got 3rd. We all won something and learned a lot from the experience. Even if I had gone out and lost, I would still be just as ecstatic as I am now. All the people who have the balls to get on the mat deserve some kudos. I was a nervous wreck, but I did it.

Friday, July 2, 2010

Mentors

Mentors can come in your life in various forms. You never realize how much a person can influence you...some good, some not so much. I've spent many of my days wasting energy on useless trash. Take that however you like. Translation is up to you. I have found few things in my current stage in life that I find actual joy in. My family, my inner peace and BJJ. My family has been a wreck since I was small. I can't tell you what normal is, but I can tell you what isn't. LOL. As much as I swore that I wouldn't be like my mother, I slowly evolved into her. I never saw it coming. I took the wrong way and the long way every time. Going around my ass just to get to my elbow. Ridiculous. Took me years to get a good man who didn't bolt on me, gave me a chance..a few of them... and helped me become the person I wanted to be. He gave me a new life, love, faith and hope. He's been my best mentor, friend and heart in this world. I've never been able to tell him how I feel about him truly in detail, but I hope he can read between the lines...I can't find words worthy enough to begin to describe a fraction of my emotions. He is amazing. He is also responsible for turning me on to jiu jitsu.

They say when you love someone, you start to absorb their personality and mimic their characteristics. True story..learned that in psychology class. We are quite different in several ways, but there are ways that we are of one mind. I've noticed I make the same quirky noise the way he does when he's caught off guard by something funny. Like when my daughter said she wanted to be a tattoo artist until she discovered she couldn't draw. Again true story. LOL. There are other things, but you get the point. We have a common bond together, besides our kids, and that's Brazilian jiu jitsu. We are crazy about it. Our instructor has been another mentor to us. First it was the Vibram Five Finger shoes..they are fantastic and have been awesome. Then it was the the juicer..to begin a journey into the Gracie diet. We can't swear off meat, but we are all about fresh veggies and fruits and all that jazz now. We are more careful about eating and taking better care of our bodies. Then it's smaller things like frame of mind and such.

Which brings me to another person who inspires me. A girl who is quite well known in our BJJ circle. I won't single her out, but she knows who she is..or she should after reading this. This girl is amazing, her dedication to the sport is unreal. She works competitions, she trains hard and has time to blog about it, all while balancing a life, husband, job and etc. She is sponsored, competes and is a compassionate friend to many. It's of no consequence to her whether you are her best friend or mere acquaintance, you are treated just the same. She doesn't hesitates to help you progress your game. I idolize this girl. She is the shit! I was reading her blog just a few minutes ago. She wrote about peeling a stripe off her belt because she didn't feel she deserved it. That bothered me. She is awesome at what she does, she has an infectious personality and is an ideal training partner. I know everybody has off days, but to feel like she needs to peel off a stripe if nuts! It was given to her for a reason, because somebody felt like she deserved it, because she is that committed and is where she needs to be. There will always be somebody who smashes better than you..always. Fedor said that if you don't fall down sometimes, you can't stand up. Let em have their moment in the sun...(there's plenty to go around) besides you bring sunshine to others!

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Getting hooked

I'm just a regular girl, average at best. Slightly tomboyish from being raised by my father. But I never understood sports or the mechanics of it. I never understood the adrenaline rush they talked about. It just seemed like guys gravitated to these events just to drink beers, talk trash and bask in all their testosterone glory. What was the big deal anyway?

My husband has always been all about manly things. He rides a Harley, drinks beer at the local VFW, smokes the occasional cigar and never washes his old pickup truck. He's into martial arts and all that. The man never watches TV unless it's a UFC fight or some other MMA type event. When I was pregnant with our last child, he started to go to some grappling classes. No big deal to me because I was home kicking up my "cankles" and feeding my cravings. I attended his NAGA competition, but it made me nervous and kinda squeamish. He didn't win, but he broke his ribs! He took some time off and we moved to Texas. He started up lessons again at a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu academy to blow off steam after his college classes. Between him pursuing his master's degree and these classes I never saw him much. Paying to get beat up was a total foreign concept to me...until I tagged along to one of the seminars. I was curious to meet this mistress that kept my man out late. Just who the hell was this home wrecker-I had to know!

Relson Gracie was doing a seminar at the academy and I asked if I could sit in the shadows and see what the fuss was about. When I asked him who this Relson Gracie is... he was sort of offended. I had never heard anything about this famous Gracie family. Apparently, they are a big deal! (Shame on me for not knowing more!) This place was packed with kids and adults. It was hot and stuffy, no where to sit (because it was jam packed), and the people that were participating were in these long pants and long sleeved jackets were sweating profusely. Hell, everyone in there was sweating to death. I didn't get it. The guy was kinda old and slender. If I had passed him on the street, I'd never would have taken him for a guy who could kick my ass. Everybody was crazy about him. There were people who drove quite a distance to see him. He seemed like a laid back guy and he just seemed to flow...until he started to talk Jiu Jitsu. Then he got serious. Passionate was not a good enough description about how he talked about techniques and this "sport" that all these people came to see. It was a lifestyle for him; everything about him screamed it.
I sat there absorbing his energy and listening to his lectures and was completely taken back by it. His vibe was so positive and easy going that it was hard not to be motivated. The way he made eye contact with each person there and was hands on in helping them improve their techniques. Watching them move and execute different techniques was kinda fascinating. I was like, "I can do that." I finally got it..why he was hooked, why he chose that academy and why Relson Gracie was a big deal. Anyone could do it, big or small, male or female, adult or child. You just had to learn the proper techniques. If these tiny 5 year olds could hang, so could I. That was it for me...I was hooked.

It took me about 2 months to convince my husband that I wanted to try it. He thought it would be a good opportunity to balance out training and quality time together. The first class was free, so IF I didn't like it I didn't have to go back. For my 34th birthday he bought me 8 classes. It was great. It was the first month they started to hold female only classes. Maybe that was why he gave in, but he will never fess up to that. I didn't realize that not a lot of women get into this particular martial art until hardly any showed up consistently. I was fortunate to get to train with a girl who's my size and was more than glad help me when I needed guidance and advice. She was one tough chick. She was the only one (female)who came regularly and never hesitated to roll with the guys. She and her husband got their blue belts the night of Relson's seminar. She rocks!

Unfortunately, she has been out for a few months due to an injury. I miss her immensely! It's been four months since I started my Gracie Jiu Jitsu journey. I train 6 days a week, taking anywhere from 1 to 3 classes a day. I am now a jiu jitsu junkie. I would venture to say that I now take more classes than my husband does. It took me forever to convince him that I need unlimited classes..LOL. It took me some time to get used to the heat and heavy gi, but he bought me a light weight one and it has been awesome. Thanks to the work out and wearing a gi, I have lost about 15 pounds.

I was kind of intimidated when I started out and was hesitant about rolling with the guys, but now I welcome the challenge. If I can hang with these big guys, I can almost hang with anybody! I met some other "girls in gis" and they have been so much help. Well, so have the guys. It's a tough and dangerous sport, but what is there in life that isn't? I have altered my demeanor quite a bit since starting, but I'm still sassy. I even rock a purple gi. I have discovered a new side of me and I'm quite proud of it. And it has all stemmed from trying to sabotage my hubby solo seminar trip. Well, the joke's on me I suppose.

Now he has to deal with me trying out new moves on him when he's totally distracted. Now when he gets on my nerves and I tell him I want to choke him...he knows that I know how to do it!