Saturday, July 31, 2010

Summer weekend...

This morning I bounced wide awake at 4:50am (a full ten minutes before my alarm would have gone off, had I set one, which I hadn't..) and then tried to get back to sleep.

Eventually, I gave up and checked email, read a book for a while, and took a shower. Dropped off a harddrive in the mail for my buddy Pete in DC (it's arriving Monday!) and arrived at the academy just in time to miss some of Giberson's infamous "little warmups." We do "little" ones when it's hot out. In cooler weather, 1000 crunches and 100+ pushups will be interspersed with ridiculous drills, rolls, and cardio that takes an hour. In the hot weather, we usually take things a little easier though still for a solid hour. I can handle things pretty well except wallstands.

In a wallstand, you put your hands on the mat about 2-3' from the wall, then prop the balls of your feet up about 3-4' up the wall from the ground, and make your back flat from shoulders to feet. Just when that becomes unbearable, he calls "heels to the wall" in which case you flatten your feet to the wall and raise your hips. You think that's restful for about 30 seconds fewer than you have to hold that position. And back. And forth. 'Till your delts are exploding like popcorn, your lower back is thrumming like a live electrical wire, and you pant like a dog in the sun. Don't forget this is in full gi and it's 90something in there, with 90% humidity and no breeze. Somehow it makes me deeply happy when big tough wanna-be MMA fighters come in to take their first class and end up puking on the back patio halfway through a warmup. Granted, I do break a sweat, and usually get my heartrate up to 90ish (resting rate is upper 50s) but I have never gotten queasy. Nyah nyah.

Anyhoo, then we did positional sparring, then technique (all closed guard breaks) and then we divided into weight classes for more positional sparring. Yay, in my group we had a 12 yr old boy who weighs 80 lbs, so I could have swept him at will. Found out after class from his mom Heather that his dad will be off to Afghanistan at the end of August. Felt really badly for them, they looked so sad to say it.. hopefully I can get her in training too. Give her something to focus on, and a new family support network, too.

Had one good roll with a purple belt, Lee... felt like my guard passes were tighter, my halfguard passing especially, and had good shoulder pressure, and had two entertaining armbar setups at the end, one of which he allowed me to nail in kind of a sitting-on-his-shoulder-hip-forward-belly-down way. Wooo!

But then sadness, my friend Amit took his last class before moving home to Sugarland where he'll be training at Leo Xavier's (lucky) and saving money (lucky.) I will really miss him. He's a big strong brute, but always reserved his playful, experimental, not smashy side for rolls with me. He also managed to consistently make me feel genuinely helpful for him and his development, which is something I crave. I just want to be a good partner for my friends, to be useful and not a burden.

Had lunch after, at Hoover's, with Spencer my judo tutor and his fabulous wife Sharla. (She'll be bellydancing tonight at a Greek restaurant so I'll see how the hubby feels about venturing out as moral support.) Hoover's makes delectable Southern comfort foods like smothered pork chops, green beans with onions and bacon, chicken fried steak, fried okra. I picked the green chile-cheese-poblano burger this time (boo, I didn't care for the smoky flavors) and green beans. Now I'm stuffed and drowsy on the couch.

1 comment:

Dev said...

You touched on something semi-not-jits-related, but it's HUGELY jits related at the same time. Maybe it's time for a separate post.

The kid who's coming, whose dad is going to Afghanistan? Your mention of a support network is, in my opinion, the single most important thing the family can have back at home. Jits may be the answer, because, as we've all discussed at some point or another, this is definitely a big family. Maybe it's not jits, though. Maybe it's another martial art. Or classes at a community college. Or a running group. I don't know.

But the important thing, in terms of your post, is knowing that you - and everyone else in your school - recognize that kid's situation, and keep him positive and focused on jits. Because he's going to need it... AND it gives him something to write to his dad about. :)

Thanks for mentioning that, Georgette.