Competition Time: Part II...

A day after competing and I am less angry with myself. But that would not be hard considering the foul fucking mood I left the venue in. I basically lost all discipline and hit the self-destruct button at the tournament.

The truth is that I've been here before when I crashed and burnt at a big national pool event a few years ago. What I did after that was stew for a few days, then dissect, dismantle and rebuild my entire single-frame game. Result: I've regularly performed at every big tournament since under the pressure of not letting my team-mates down.

So I clearly need to adopt a similar policy here.

My best strategy at BJJ is always to pull guard, get my opponent in my closed guard, secure an overhook and attack from there with omoplatas, chokes and wrist locks. I have been trying to add half guard into this mix for a while, too, and it's sort of coming along.

So I need to build in more strategies to get opponents into this place where I feel I operate best and I need to build in more failsafes to avoid making myself vulnerable when this doesn't happen. 

So my four priorities for the next few months need to be: 

i) drill mount and side control escape combinations so I can escape bad positions and either establish or re-establish half or full guard 

ii) drill pulling guard or throwing using the Greco throw I like to get on top of an opponent 

iii) drill butterfly, shin-on-shin or single x to defend bad positions when I am fighting a standing opponent from the floor

iv) drill breaking and passing guard to establish a better position 

Any other fancy shit can wait. I think that's a decent plan.

Competition Time: Part I...

A return to competing at BJJ but an utter disaster of a day. I'd trained harder for this event than ever before and I was fucking awful. The only thing I did right was make weight.

Fight number one was No Gi and, because there was nobody else in my age category, I was thrown in with fighters 15 years younger. That's not normally a massive issue, but I ran up against someone who was also just better in every department and was much stronger as well. Result: I made a half-arsed attempt to pull guard but ended up getting passed and tapped to an Americana that badly wrenched my rotator cuff in about 30 seconds.

I had higher hopes in gi with four of us in the category, namely myself, another 50-year-old and two 40-year-olds. I tried to pull guard in my first fight, again made a mess of it and got trapped in side control for five minutes and lost. I then fought for bronze and tried to pull guard again, fucked it up and ended up in a weird butterfly position that took absolutely no passing. I nearly got a sweep but ended up tapping to a footlock.

The gi fights were both winnable but I didn't do the basics right in either and got entirely what I deserved. My coach told me that I should have mixed side control escapes up in my first and secured a guard in the second. I had options to go to single x and de la Riva but basically did nothing. And these are not things I don't know either.

There are no good philosophical take homes from this. I was utterly rubbish. I genuinely may as well not have bothered. I needed to be more focused and I needed to have a clearer plan. I also need to drill bread-and-butter positions and techniques I don't drill with much more regularity. 

PS: just when I thought the day could not get any worse, my train home was cancelled.

The 120-press-ups-a-day Challenge: Part VI...

So we are done. It's less than 48 hours until competition day and, this week in particular, I have trained like a lunatic and logged about 15 hours of mat time. 

Anyway, the press-up results so far: 
Day 52 Accumulative Press-ups Total: 4980

Day 52 Weight: 12 stone 10 pounds

Day 52 Waist: 34 inches

Day 52 Chest: 40 Inches

I would post a picture of my finely honed physique but I fear it would break the internet. So I have posted a picture of Stan Laurel with Oliver Hardy instead because I have a new haircut and I look like Stan. We also share a similar physique.

I'm also going to continue the press-up and punching thing but only do it a couple of times a week and increase the numbers.

Nearly Great Song Titles...

A semi-regular flight of fancy in which I play with song titles and try to make them funny by swapping one letter for an alternative letter. 

Today's entries are submitted by the Other Woman:
A Day in the Wife by The Beatles 
Teenage Dicks by The Undertones 
Brighton Cock by Queen 
24-hour Farty People by The Happy Mondays

The first one is a particular favourite and it reminds me that she is a world-class smut bucket.

Nearly Great Song Titles...

A semi-regular flight of fancy in which I play with song titles and try to make them funny by swapping one letter for an alternative letter. 

Today's entries:
Fridge Over Troubled Water by Simon and Garfunkle
All Night Dong by Lionel Richie
Lancing in the Dark by Bruce Springsteen
Glue Monday by New Order
Teenage Dicks by The Undertones

I will try to make future entries less smutty and more surreal.

The 120-press-ups-a-day Challenge: Part V...

I'm still at the 150 press-ups mark and I'm finding it OK. I'd like to increase that daily number, but I also don't want to exhaust myself. Or maybe I'm just lazy and this is the plateau where I've decided to pitch my fitness tent. Don't worry, I know the latter is a terrible analogy.

Anyway, the results so far: 

Day 46 Accumulative Press-ups Total: 4530

Day 46 Weight: 12 stone 12 pounds

Day 46 Waist: 36 inches

Day 46 Chest: 41 Inches

The loss and gains so far are minuscule. But I'm also training BJJ and Hapkido so I am hoping muscles also replacing fat and that is why the weight has remained reasonably constant. I'm certainly eating enough fruit to single-handedly increase the share price in M&S at the moment. So at least they should be happy...