Pan No Gi Training Day 2 & 3

Jory watching some training

So… Training in AL is going well. In case you missed my first blog, you can see it here. I’m exhausted though.  You may or may not know, but sometime around 2004 I got diagnosed with Celiac Disease. I do ok, but I have some trouble, esp with vitamin absorption. Of course that affects my training and recovery. Recently I was so tired I couldn’t move for about a week. I went to the doc where they put me on B vitamins for a deficiency.  I had never experienced anything like that in my life but it seems to be helping, it’s just a matter of waiting for this dose to kick in.

We trained 2, 4-hour sessions each day.  All I did pretty much all day was sleep, train, eat, sleep, train, eat sleep. Repeat. Marcelo showed some good stuff, in particular some stand up stuff that I will most definitely incorporate to my game and our training. I credit him a lot with elevating my game as a brown belt, and I will continue to train with him for competitions.  Having Marcelo and Daniel here is great for Jory also, as he has some good black belts to push him. It’s good for me also as I have different high ranks to try stuff on and practice defense.  Daniel, not sure what to say he’s freaking strong and he showed me a pretty nice sweep that I’ll use.  I’m happy that NU is growing, and we can have these camps.

We were fortunate enough to get to stay in Michael Holt’s house, which is pretty close to the gym. It also allowed me to cook my food and not have to eat out, which makes me sick.  We are right at a month out from the competition so it will be a lot of hard grappling from here on out, as well as focusing on proper nutrition, weight and recovery.  I had knee surgery June 3, and that is recovering better than expected, though I still need to be cautious.  I have not done weights since then, but have done quite a bit of body weight exercises for strength, which led me to a quick recovery.  I usually quit training 1-2 weeks out from a tournament for recovery, so there’s not much time left. I feel really good about my training thus far and this camp.

Pan No Gi Camp Black Belts

I really enjoy these camps. Obviously it’s a great way to prepare for a competition, but it’s also great to give your game a boost to the next level. I always notice huge improvements in my game after intensive training. A lot of our students that came, well all but 1, aren’t going to the Pan No Gi. I was proud they all came and are that interested in improving their BJJ.  I would recommend anyone to do a competition training camp even if you don’t want to compete. It’s like taking a caffeine pill. It speeds up everything in your training and will help you get to to the next level quick. Some people don’t like to compete because they get nervous in front of others, or have some other issue like the competition itself like the expense, etc. Others don’t like to compete b/c they don’t like to work hard. Well if you don’t like to work hard, this isn’t going to help you.  On the other hand, if you do like to work hard, and for whatever reason don’t want to compete, at least do the competition camp. You will see drastic improvements in your cardio, strength, performance and overall understanding of the game.  Simply put, when you return, you will be ahead of everyone who didn’t do the camp. They will wonder why you got rank quicker, why you are getting better quicker, etc.

There is one thing I want to stress, as became evident to some in this camp. You don’t start training for a competition 8-12 weeks out. That is when your competition camp starts. There’s a difference between training and the training camp, and don’t for a second think that a training camp is when you start building strength, cardio, etc. If you aren’t training before you start the training camp you are screwed. Prior to your training camp, you want to make sure you have worked on your general physical preparation and strength. This lays the foundation for you to build upon when you are in your camp. A few of the guys at this camp had no foundation and found out quickly when they got injured. Always go to class and train regularly so that you can take advantage of opportunities when they present themselves!

Pan No Gi 2011