Project Shade

This is a repost from Myspace from back in October. I decided to repost it over here for all the usefull BJJ links I put in it.

Having just worked six out of seven days, all of them the standard Bridgestone 13hr shift, one would think that today I’d try to take it easy a bit especially coming off nights. Unfortunantly that assumes I’m not mildly retarted, which I must be. For today not only did I get up at eleven for day class, but I also went back tonight at six. I’ve had better plans for sure.
My reasoning was that since I won’t get to go Monday or Wednesday due to work, I should go twice today. Sounded good eh? I’m wore out, but both classes were really good.
First class we went over escaping the arm bar, side takedowns after a missed or defended punch, spent time drilling each technique and then we rolled.
 Round one was against James Noland a friend from work. He quickly tried to pass my guard but I caught him in a half guard and was feeling pretty proud. That lasted about thirty seconds. I was so worried about keeping him in my half guard that I wasn’t paying attention to my arms and forgot to lock my hands together. Hello Kimura! After we reset I did much better and even managed to get side mount on him. No submission on him, but an overall improvement.
Round two was against Chris. He tried to push me over to gain mount but I sprawled and went for a guillotine choke. Not having it sunk well enough to actually choke him out I opted instead to go for rear mount. Once again my poor technique didn’t allow me to get what I wanted. We went back and forth for a bit with me actually pulling off a few sweeps but in the end his conditioning got the best of me and I had to stop due to being completely gassed. If you take out the whole not being able to breathe thing, I’d say I won that round.
Great day I ramble, let’s sum up the rest of the day a bit quicker eh. After class I came home showered, slept some, and went back to class at six. We went over arm bar escapes again, then worked on the butterfly guard some and ended with sparring as usual. Both rounds went well, without me getting submitted and even stalling out a blue belt. Taking into account his skill level, I’m pretty proud of that one.
Well that’s enough for now. If any of you read this and are going to Andrea’s party, I’ll see you there!

Tags: BJJ by Todd
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Here is the original blog I wrote explaining a bit about BJJ. I wrote it back in the day on Myspace.

If you’ve watched any UFC or Pride you no doubt are familiar with the term. For those of you not in the know, it stands for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and is the martial art I’m currently taking.

A few months ago after deciding it was time to lose some(a lot) weight I started looking at ways to incorporate some cardio in with weight lifting. Tread mills suck, bikes suck, eliptical machines..well you get the picture. They’re all so boring! Understanding that any sort of cardio involving a stationary machine would in the long run be abondoned by me, I decided to look into sports to get my cardio.

My first choice was some sort of traditional activity as those were the ones I was familiar with the most. Unfortunantly, the VRA(Valley Rats Association) and any other group I could find, lack an adult division. Not really feeling a church softball league(to rough), I started looking at the non traditional types and thats when I came across martial arts. My buddy James told me about his BJJ class but I decided to go with a Karate class as the striking aspect of it intrigued me more. After a month and half of that I didn’t feel as if I had gained any practical knowledge for defending myself and I was going home feeling like I had only started a work out. Which is pretty sad if you take into how out of shape I am.

The entire time I was taking Karate, James was still taking the BJJ classes. He was always telling me about how he went home dead tired and hurting after each and every class. Also he felt as if he could defend himself with the skills he had gained.  It still seemed kinda boring to me since there was no striking, but I decided to try a class anyway if only for the workout.

Well here we are a month later and I’m hooked. The workout you get from rolling(sparring) in class is far greater than anything I did in Karate and the cardio….dear lord…I’m not even close to where I need to be for it. I’ve also gained a lot of practical knowledge for defending myself in a real fight, where no one is going to care about how pretty your kata is. We roll every class and really go at it. Check the bruises on my arm. I’ve never had so much fun in my life.

So if you’re looking to lose some weight and the traditional methods don’t appeal to you, come join us for a class. You won’t be sorry.

Tags: BJJ, Weight Loss by Todd
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