Thursday/Friday training (4/16 + 17) - BJJ, MT, MMA

Thursday's class at Richmond BJJ focused on butterfly half guard. I had the students drill for about half an hour to warm up, light stretch, and then a couple basic techniques from the position.
Rolling was standard, but solid. I rolled a bit with the students, including Parker, who is getting ready for the worlds. Snake wasn't there, although he did train Wednesday at 2 PM and at 7 PM for no-gi. I mention Snake as well because he is heading to the worlds as well.

Fundamentals at 4 PM, Burdo went over some basic mount positions in very good detail. It's good for me to train as a student because I pick up a lot of details for my students from a different perspective than simply executing the techniques. I got to roll with Burdo a bit (neither of us is in "tournament mode" right now, so there was a lot of flowing and little smashing going on). Chris Ferguson, who will "run the gauntlet" next week twice (train at all four classes on Tuesday and Thursday at RBJJ) was there. We partnered up, then rolled. Chris is the bald bear in the pic above.


Friday at my gym - Revolution BJJ

I got a text from Scott Eckert, our Muay Thai instructor, about meeting early to do some MMA training. "Trane UFC? I'd love it!" So we met at 5 PM, put on the 4 ounce gloves, and played a little. Dave "Loco Pony" was there. He's tough both on the feet and on the ground, as is Scott. It's really fun training with light strikes on the ground. On the feet, I'm a bit of a fish out of water, but with consistent training, I'd like to change that.

Scott is getting ready for an MMA fight this summer, so he's looking to up the number of times he spars MMA each week. I'm down to help him get ready as much as possible, and to train a little myself (just for fun).

Muay Thai training afterward was fun. Yeah, that's right - fun. Mark, a new guy, came back with paperwork to sign up (woo!), and he partnered with Kevin, who is super tall. Mark is a big dude himself. I worked with Big Jus, whose balance is getting a lot better, and who already punches pretty hard. The endurance round was kind of a killer, even though it was only three minutes, and you can do anything for three minutes, right?

BJJ class was open rolling with Tommy Nooooo!!! and Devin (who are getting ready for the worlds, blue belt feather and light, respectively), and Big Jus. We did a total of 12 rounds, rolling 4x with each partner. Great training. Tommy and Devin are getting sharp. Justin's conditioning is good and his technique is getting good as well. My weight was 167.5 with the gi on before class, or exactly the lightweight cutoff. I mention this because I am toying with the idea of competing at the worlds, although I have pretty lax ambitions at this point.

A few years ago, I would have thought this was an impossibly tough day of training. Last night, it was just another day at the office. Being able to say that feels good.