[Frodo]

3-28-2006

Went to Judo Class. Did some drills:

• Pull the mat (army crawls).
• Shrimping.
• I skipped cartwheels due to my broken toe.
• I tried ukemi, but after the first one I quickly decided to skip it too.

Then we worked on some standup moves:

• Ouchi Gari
• Kouchi Gari
• Tokui waza (favorite technique): I chose Morote Seoinage.

I have to work on these techniques. However, I was in a little bit of pain in my toe. Next we did ground randori then standing randori (which I skipped). Josh also has an injured toe, but he didn't have as much pain as I did. Either his toe isn't broken, or I am a wimp.

...

Went to the Panther Grappling Club. Eight people showed up. Again: Went of the basics in preparation for the Dual Meet. Most people did rolling, but I (Jim) only rolled twice due to my toe still hurting and my ear caulied up. I had a little bit of trouble Andre the Giant.

...

Went to the CMU Grappling Club late. Drew kept a decent log of training at practice. Today we kept it real for the mean streets of Pittsburgh.

• foot drag mount escape to half guard.
  
  
• taking him down when he puches you.
  1. Use crazy monkey defense and shoot when he throws his rear hand punch.
  2. from his side, do tani otoshi, blocking his leg and falling down.
  3. if you're facing him with a bodylock and can't get to his side, use your bodylock on his low back to bend him backwards and trip him back.
  
  
• passing the guard with punches.
  1. put left hand on his throat.
  2. stand up, with your eyes over his eyes. punch down with right hand.
  3. when he opens his legs, thrust hips forward, head up, crunching him into a ball, and pass over his legs.
  
  
• guard on the bottom with punches.
  1. either close or far.
     • closed guard on the bottom
       1. get head control and overhook.
       2. get your knee blocking his bicep so he can't punch you to the body.
       3. put hand on his shoulder, slide it down to his wrist, push wrist away, throw leg over, triangle.
       
       
     • open guard on the bottom
       1. plank your body so he can't hit you in the head.
       2. put your knees in his biceps.
       3. as he punches, catch behind his arms and slide hands down to wrists. Now you have spider guard.
       4. triangle.
  
  
• hydraulic mount escape
  1. Defend the punches by bridging, not with your arms.
  2. put your hands on his hips, bridge up and hold him up in the air with your arms as you get your knee in and go to a leglock.

Didn't do that well rolling, but I have been training all day and I'm kinda banged up. They were fresh so I don't feel that bad. Met a dude named Adam who trained with Carlos Machado a few times - he was good for a noob.

[Frodo]

Judo with no pants:

[lockjaw211]

I stoved my toe real bad at a kickboxing class and it took almost 2 months to be able to even walk on it, you should really try to stay off it if you think it is broken, toe injuries take forever to heal, and longer when you stay on it.

[Frodo]

Damn, I hope you are all right. Mine is most likely broken according to the doctor. However, I feel completely worthless and I don't want to miss practices because of just an injured pinky toe. Sometimes I feel I should just glue all of my toes together...

I still want to go to SCMA at least to talk with Sensei Achille tonight. I probably won't roll much if at all because of my toe and because of my ear having caulied too (took longer to blow up, and looks silly). But I still would like to drill and practice technique at least.

I will take your advice and not go to TKD until it completely heals. Thanks!

[Frodo]

3-29-1006

Went to Steel City. They were doing just drills and randori tonight. However, my ear is the size of a watermellon and my toe is screwed, so I am not allowed participate. Argggggg!

Fortunately, Santino knows someone who knows a doctor who is willing to treat it. Unfortunately, if I don't get the cauli drained within the next week I suspect it will harden. Damn the red tape - I've been getting the runaround by my normal docs. Argggggg!

Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.

...

Question to anyone reading: What can I do to exercise with a broken pinky and a newly cauliflowered ear? Just lifting?

[Frodo]

3-30-2006

Went to Judo Class. Couldn't do the "gracie challenge" shiai - i.e. one guy stands, someone else challenges - because my pinky is still pretty broken and my ear is the size of Mt. Saint Helens. Not that I'm complaining...

Got promoted one step closer to yellow belt. I wonder which kyu rank that is? If the pattern holds, it could be 2 years before I am as good as Ronny.... well maybe not that good, but I need to set high goals.

...

Went to the Panther Grappling Club. Went over:

• shrimping, rolling, hip extensions
• basic positions
• kimura/armbar/americana from side mount
• hip bump sweep
• failed hip bump sweep to kimura
• bridge and roll sweep
• rear naked choke
• arm triangle

I then started them rolling. I did not roll tonight to let my injuries heal more.

...

Went to the CMU Grappling Club. Did just technique because of my cauli and my broken toe. Went over:

• Throw a jab cross and then shoot a double leg, pick him up and slam him. Frank Shamrock does basically the same move at the beginning of this movie and ends Igor Zinoviev's MMA career. Zinoviev was very promising too, he had already beaten Sperry.
• same mma guard pass as before
• same mma closed guard, but now we did the kimura instead of triangle.
• same mma open spider guard but now we did the kimura and the triangle. You can see Minotauro using this against Fedor in this clip. He got his ass kicked, but that's against Fedor. Fedor is an unstoppable killing machine anyways. He does it against coleman with better results in this movie.
• backdoor escape from mount. Bryce's thing.
• Bryce showed me the bicep crusher from an armbar. Observe.

[Frodo]

3-31-2006

Took Friday off.

4-1-2006

Went to SCMA. Went over technique:

• Looping Collar Choke from guard
  1. Start with opposite hand grabbing one side like in Cross Choke.
  2. Same-side hand goes over your hand and grabs back of collar, thumb inside. Your arms are on the same side of his head right now.
  3. Yank down and adjust so his head come up through your hands. At same time, push opposite knee (opposite of how you started the choke) out.
  4. Finish choke.
  
  
• Looping Collar Choke from neutral. Basically do it faster and smoother.
  
  
• Bodyweight Collar Choke from failed Looping Collar Choke
  1. Try Looping Collar Choke from neutral.
  2. Opponent counters by putting his forearm inside, across my opposite-side arm.
  3. Release same side grip (was gripping the back near neck). Use that hand to push opponent's elbow through. Then quickly hug close to trap arm. Don't release other grip!
  4. With free hand, grab belt and push out knee.
  5. Use your weight to help you finish the choke. Can be turned into a sweep by rolling him over the far shoulder (which should be closer to the ground).
  
  
• After practice I asked Brad about the Master Eugene Special. He said it was like a Helio Choke from side control. To do a Helio Choke:
  1. Starting from mount, extend right leg for a more stable base (prevents bridge-and-roll escape).
  2. Now cross grip collar with thumb in. Grip low on the gi with other hand.
  3. Drive cross elbow to mat. Choke choke choke.

Did no rolling since my ear and toe still hurt. Santino and Brad were promoted one strip on their belts.

[Frodo]

4-2-2006

Today's the day I have been preparing for two months for. The Oakland Throwdown, the Battle at Trees, the dual meet between CMU and Pitt grappling clubs. I am proud of everybody from both the CMU Grappling Club and the Panther Grappling Club. The only thing about the day that I hated was that I could not fight due to my injuries. Argh! So I ended up running it and refereeing instead of competing. Oh well...

We started 30 minutes late. Everyone from CMU were on time or early, but most people from my club were late. Some people who said they could come didn't show up. There were various excuses by other people. Some just got confused by today being the first day of DST this year. Oh well... Fortunately, three people stepped up to the plate to compete even though they came just to watch. Way to go!!!

Setting it up was easy. I got a digital timer and two pairs of wrist bands - white (with a red Nike logo) for CMU and blue (with an NBA logo!) for Pitt. I held up my hands for each team. We had two score-keepers and one time-keeper. Two score keepers helped to watch out for mistakes. We also had a taped up hand towel that was thrown at the competitors when time expired to help stop the match. We used the lower multipurpose room and three desk-chairs by the mat for the score-keepers and time keeper.

First we had a rules meeting. Advantages were thrown out of the rulebook. Each team lined up in order of weight at each end of the mat. Then two were called up. They said their names, shook hands, and I said begin to begin the match. The final results are that CMU won 44-16. The individual scores are:

1. Aaron Hoy (CMU) defeated Norman Richardson (Pitt) by a score of 9-2.
2. Aaron Sikora (Pitt) defeated Russ Stanton (CMU) by submission.
3. Xander Veerhoff (CMU) defeated James Beach (Pitt) by submission.
4. Matt Erdosy (Pitt) defeated Hanyan Wang (CMU) by submission.
5. Bryce Lee (CMU) defeated Jake McBride (Pitt) by submission.
6. Bryan Ovalle (CMU) defeated Josh Cannon (Pitt) by submission.
7. Randy Jones (CMU) defeated Pat Daley (Pitt) by submission.
8. Drew Yao (CMU) defeated Paul Lewandowski (Pitt) by submission.

Everyone showed a lot of determination and heart. Although CMU won most of the matches today, most of their grapplers have a year or more of experience. The challenge matches at the end were very interesting and cool to watch. I am sure that next year many of our grapplers will be beasts! Congratulations to the CMU Grappling Club on the win.

In the future, we should have worksheets set up to keep score, with each row having:

• one competitor's name for the match
• the other competitor's name for the match
• their weights
• their teams
• the scores as given by the ref
• the total score, or sub that won the match
• the time of the match
• indicator for the person who won

I wore nice clothing (kaki pants, a belt, a pitt golf-tee). But I was a little confused by the rules even though I made them myself. Next time I should learn to be a better referee.

Finally I should advertise more next time. Get some free food from Sodexo, look into a better facility, and reserve the times a month ahead of schedule. Certificates, ****ls, or trophies would be nice too, but not required. Next year I hope to have two dual meets - one against CMU and maybe another against Columbia Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in New York.

All in all, it was a nice dual meet.

...

Visited the TKD club after lunch. Learned that a good way to practice kicking technique is to do sets of slow extension kicks per leg. One slow extension kick set is:

Originally Posted by true2kungfu

3 sets of slow extension kicks.....havent done these in a while... its basically, i do a roundhouse very slowly, hold it, recoil, without putting my leg down, side kick slowly, hold it, recoil, then a hook kick slowly. THEN i put my leg down, so its a super slow 3 kick sequence per rep with each kick as high as possible. I did 3x10 for each leg.

Also learned that a "Grappling Situp" is actually a hip lift. Finally went over a new TKD kata form, but I forgot the name. I think I might start trying to do kicks this week with my injuries.

[Frodo]

4-3-2006

Warmed up by using the stationary bike. Burned 113 (k)cal in 15 mintues. Boy, I hate that machine! Went down to the mat room. Played a little game called kick over the atomic bomb. Actually, I just kicked over the standing bag (with the water filled base) as many times as I could with roundhouses or side kicks. Then I did 2x10 sets of Rich's Slow Extension Kicks. I was going to do 3x10, but the mat room got crowded.

I noticed that my toe hurt when used my leg for support when kicking with the good leg. However, it usually didn't hurt when actually kicking the bag. I hope that is a good sign about (1) my toe and (2) my form.

That's it for today since I feel like sh*t.

[Frodo]

4-4-2006

Took a chance with my injuries today, since I was feeling macho. Went to Judo Class. We did some drills:

• pulled the mat (army crawls)
• shrimping
• ukemi
• ukemi over a person
• fireman carry with squats at the end of the mat

Then we did 30 seconds of fits, with a throw at the end, of:

• osoto gari
• ippon seoinage

Then we went over uchi mata. I have to practice this move. Practice practice practice. Remember to keep my back straight, pull him half way (leave some space between), tori's body & head will be perpendicular to uke, get collar-grip arm out of my body's way.

Finally we did stand-up randori. I only went once, due to my injuries. Taking it slow was smart.

...

Went to the Panther Grappling Club. The "Meditation Club" was taking our space. Apparently the room was double booked. We walked around trying to find another room with free mats, but none were available. So we kicked out the meditators. First we went over some technique:

• guard breaks again.
• armbar from mount
• triangle choke from guard (because I was confused by what they wanted to see)
• escaping the armbar - make sure you practice it!

Next we rolled for a while. I got tapped one time... by Tyson - good job! I also rolled with Justin who I first roll with 2 years ago a few (1-2) times at Jake's Grappling Club. Back then I didn't know anything and got submitted very easily (he remembers armbaring me from an insane position), but this time I outlasted Justin.

All in all, I don't think it was a good idea for me to roll tonight. After practice, my ear was really really red and even more swollen. A little while later when the adrenaline rush left, my toe started hurting like crazy. I almost cried (but didn't, you pussies). Got to have a better pain tolerance. Rolling again was dumb.

...

So I didn't go to CMU tonight because I left too late. (We started late because of the darn meditators.) I will definitely go on Thursday.