Monday Lesson

So I went for BJJ lessons this morning. As usual I went for the really early timing at 745 so that I can have the rest of the day to go to school for classes and other scholarly stuff. I'm pretty happy that I decided to go today because my usual instructor Zoro is back! He recently just fought in the One Fighting Championship in the main event and won convincingly with an awesome armbar. In the weeks leading up to the fight he, he stopped coming for the morning lesson and also in the weeks after the fight. So basically today was the first time that he came back to teach after his fight. Zoro is an exceptionally friendly teacher and the way he greets you before training starts just makes you feel happy to train and you can feel that he is happy to be teaching you. Today he was especially happy, undoubtedly from his recent win and also because everyone was congratulating him on his victory.

Friendly but deadly and efficient!

So this morning we learned a few things.

1. Blocking a hook and grabbing across behind the head for a hip throw
2. Sweep from guard (sit-up sweep? not sure what it's called)
3. Armbar from guard
4. Straight arm lock from guard

For the straight arm lock I thought I heard Zoro call it a Juji gatame but when I came home and checked youtube, all the juji gatame that I found were all armbars. The closest thing that I could find that looked like what I learned was the Hiza gatame.

I can't find videos that teach it exactly how Zoro taught it today but here is one that shows you how to pull-off an armbar from guard.

So it was basically the same move with the exception that we pull the arm across our body before going for the armbar. If the person resists the pull, we overcome by bridging rapidly whilst pulling it over.

Okay, so that's all from me today. I might try to find videos of the other techniques if I can.

Fighting!

First things first...

Introductions


This is going to be a typical first blog post kind of post. Let's get it on! I'm a 24 year old (1988) Chinese Singaporean male who has recently started to venture into the world of MMA. I decided to chronicle my journey into this exciting world of martial arts and at the same time consolidate whatever useful resources I can find onto this blog.

Background


As for my existing experience, I have learned Taekwondo and achieved a black belt level at the age of 16. Admittedly, rising in rank in Taekwondo seems much faster and relatively easier than the martial arts that I have started to learn recently. About a month ago (Feb 2012), I enrolled at Evolve Mixed Martial Arts located at Pomo together with my friend. So far I have attended both the Muay Thai lesson as well as the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) lesson and have thoroughly enjoyed both. The BJJ lessons especially appeal to me because I have never experienced this level of grappling and technique while learning Taekwondo and the complexity combined with strategy makes for very interesting lessons. After one month of training I had managed to achieve my first stripe at white belt for BJJ and the satisfaction has really gotten me addicted to BJJ.


Physical Fitness


I am an asthmatic. I have been since I was 5 years old but my asthma is relatively well-controlled so I have engaged in sports most of my life. Playing badminton in primary school and squash in my junior-college. During my national-service I managed to complete the 21.1km army half-marathon but I feel that my physical fitness has definitely fallen since then. I currently weigh 65kg and hope to bulk up through the MMA lessons at Evolve. Apart from Evolve, I have also recently signed up for the Sundown Marathon but only for the 10km distance. Don't want to overestimate myself. 


Aims


So what's up with this blog? Firstly it is going to be a fitness journal. I am going to blog my progress of my physical fitness. I believe it is only with regular and specific monitoring will I be able to make progress with improving my fitness. Secondly, I hope it can be useful to others who are thinking of picking up MMA. I hope I can give some insight into what it is like to learn the martial arts and also some preview into the gyms that I am a member of.