Day 60

Where to start with this post? It's a long one, I think it might dip in the middle but then power through at the end, can you make it?

I have to say the Hamburg open was a really good competition, well organised, very friendly atmosphere. For €35 I got to enter into 4 different comps and came away with a few medals so I can’t complain... well not too loudly, but there were on a few occassions, as there usually are at competitions, some very circumspect refereeing decisions. But in general the refing and spirit of the competition was excellent.

I am quite annoyed that since starting this blog I have consistently become unreliable and may give the impression that I am unorganised... This is not true, the blog has brought the worst out in me. I was just very very tired on Friday night when I set my alarm for 6am in order to catch the train. So it was not my fault when I was rudely awoken by light streaming through my windows and looked at my phone to see that it was now 7.32am.... 9 minutes after my train had departed for Hamburg. A little bit of head scratching and I realised I had set the Mon – Fri alarm. Luckily, I handled the situation very cooly and calmly, as the train had already left I didn’t really have a choice. Went to the station and got another ticket and actually arrived at 11am instead of 9am and my division wasn’t until 2pm anyway. Standard for any competition. 

I was ready to fight. I was a little nervous but not in comparison to Warsaw. I don’t know if that’s my experience building up or the fact that it was a smaller competition, but it let me enjoy my time there more, although I have come to the conclusion that while I love jiu-jitsu, competing is like playing golf, you usually play crap get frustrated and angry with yourself, nothing goes how you planned it, but if you hit one great shot, the whole thing is worth while, I'm very very bad at golf. Luckily for me I'm not so bad at jiu-jitsu and I had one great fight this weekend. BUT even if you don’t have that great fight and you lose every fight, tournaments are still the best way to improve your jiu-jitsu. As a result of this tournament I’ve learnt a lot of things.

1. I have a good shot. (Bang bang?)
2. I need to be more aggressive with my guard (known that for a while, but I can make sweeps at certain points, I am just too.... not lazy, but not aggressive enough)
3. I need to think more about strategy, particularly running/jumping way from a failed pass rather than accept the sweep because I want to play my guard, and then losing on points.
4. I’m still too impatient and don't have enough practice of guard passing.
5. I need kimura defence and awareness... and after Sunday, a new elbow please.

As seems to happen a lot at competitions, I got a by in the first round as my opponent didn't make weight. So

Fight 1

I fought the same person who I fought in the first round of the open weight at Warsaw. That fight was 0 – 0 decision and I’d just watched him beat Matthew Smith (who coincidentally runs gidirekt where you can buy JJ style and any BJJ epuipment you desire if you live in Germany [he better be happy with that free plug... I currently have 2 followers at least one of them is German!!]), back to the fighting my opponent beat Matthew  by a single advantage when Matt pulled guard, almost got passed, regained guard..... and that was it. So I knew how strong and tight he was, last time I didn’t open my guard, this time I thought I’d open my guard and just be more aggressive. I was aggressive, but he was just really closed, about half way through, he almost passed, I regained guard, he got an advantage. I have to say I felt helpless for a couple of minutes. I thought to myself... I’m going to lose by and advantage. I couldn’t tell you what happened or how I did it but I think I half swept him, thought to myself, fuck technique, DRIVE DRIVE DRIVE and bundled myself into his guard, 2 point, 20 seconds left and the win, there was absolutely no Brazilian person there saying 'Beautiful Jiu-Jitz' at this point. Needless to say this was not the fight that made the weekend worthwhile.

Fight 2

So due to my by and the small nature of the compeition (8 in my category) I was now in the finals. Against someone I train with from Budokan, Morritz Goll. Here is the fight.

2 – 4. Happy with the fight, should have just pulled guard immediately rather than waiting for the inevitable shot. As you could see, I tried 1 guard pass before getting frustrated, moving myself into deep half and getting swept. Overall happy and learnt a lot.

Absolute Fight 1

Fought the guy who I was supposed to fight in the first round of my weight division. I could say that he was fresh, he was heavier (by at least 2kg) and he spoke portugese (imbibes jiu-jitsu players with magical powers) but really we each got a sweep and he won, 2 advantages to 1, again didn’t control top position after the sweep, got swept right back.

A small pause, Saturday night. I got to meet a lot of really friendly guys, the more competitions I go to the more I realise that 95% of the jiu-jitsu community are very friendly. Went out for dinner with about 10 guys, 5 of whom I didn’t know before the day and had a good time chatting BJJ. Special award must go to this man, deadliest man in BJJ. Purple belt. Drove us to the center of Hamburg. Lets just say his driving was worse than his parking....

He almost killed us twice, one side collision with a campervan, emergency skidding action by both parties saving the day, one side collision narrowly avoided with a bus traveling at full speed. 2 other minor possible collisions..... Took the train back to the dojo. Slept there, not comfortable. Left me feeling pretty bummed out and tired the next morning.

Fight 1

Again due to no shows I ended up fighting my first fight in the semi finals. But man, what a fight.... I didn’t get it on tape though (or on SD card more correctly). I won 11 – 2, taking the back, flattening him out and securing the mata leon for the win. But to add a cautionary note to the tale, I did struggle as I passed into side control he tried a Kimura on my left arm. It hurt a little bit but luckily I could pop to knee on belly and wrench my arm free....

Fight 2

Deja vu.... Same final as yesterday. To be fair Morritz had 5 fights on Saturday compared to my 3 and 2 fights on Sunday compared to my one. To be really fair though, he was just better than me and won 4 – 2 again. (I hope to put a video up soon) I did surprise him with a shot and double leg take-down that felt amazing right at the beginning. Then a sweep happened. He tried to submit me with arm triangle from half guard, never had a chance (definitely almost tapped a couple of times). Ended up breaking up, standing up, he shot and took me down with 10 seconds to go, 4 –2. Felt much better about that fight compared to the first one, possibly only because I was ahead for a couple of minutes at the beginning, and really if I’d had more tactics, I could have moved away, sat down and just played my guard (which was unpassed all weekend) but then we get into the fierce debate about tactics, sport jiu-jitsu, submission only rules.... not really worth it, better to get swept, still be losing by an advantage but holding on for a less worse 2 - 2 and one advantage, loss, but get taken down in the dying seconds to lose soundly on points.

Absolute Fight 1

Sweet double leg take-down. Stuck in half guard. I get frustrated. Guy goes for Kimura, locks his wrists. I battle to try and move my arm inside my hip to prevent the submission. He tries to submit me. He wins, I forget to submit (didn’t really plan on it, thought I’d roll if he really had it), my elbow makes multiple popping sounds, he screams and lets go. I’m a bit bewildered, didn’t really feel anything because of the adrenaline. Glad he let go, just popped a few ligaments, the elbow proceeded to swell up. That was the end of the tournament for me. Although I’m not marking that one down as a submission. WARRIOR. I’d planned on taking a week off anyway. Now extended to probably two, depending on how the swelling is.

You may all be thinking that this guy has absolutely no chance of winning the worlds. But what you have not considered is that I know what makes a good Hollywood movie, and no one would watch it if I won every fight for 6 months leading up to the world championships and then won the world championships.... where’s the story there? So I would stay tuned if I were you.