UNIJJ 5th Anniversary

Today was the fifth anniversary open mat and party for the University of Jiu Jitsu. I haven't been on the mats in 2.5 months so I purposely showed up late and stayed on the side lines as long as possible to avoid the temptation to over do it. The last thing I wanted was to hurt myself on my first "day" back.

To say the mats were crowded is an understatement. I'll update this post on Monday with pictures, but...let's just say I've never seen anything like it. Packed to the max. It was good to see everyone again still training hard. Several White Belts are now Blues. A couple Blues are now Purples. A purple is now a Brown. To quote Mr. Miller, "Time keeps on slipping (slipping...)..."

I jumped in with another Blue about my age and weight for the last six minute round of the session. Survival was my goal. As Professor Matthias from NOLA BJJ advised, i went 50% and played defense. Well...sort of. I went 50% at first and tried to play defense as best as I could. I recall getting into some trouble quickly. He had me cross-faced but hadn't secured side control. Felt smashed and claustrophobia alarms started going off. Eventually he secured the side control and advanced to knee on belly. I recall escaping to turtle and rolling out to open guard. Open guard to x-guard sweep. Then pass to knee on belly. He turtled out and I set up the back attack but he rolled out again to guard recovery. From guard he set up a front gi choke. But it wasn't the typical front gi choke. He looped a forearm around the head and smashed a wrist blade across the face. Same move three times and third time was a charm. He had it tight and I tapped thinking he left me with a fat/blue lip fo sure...

Shortly after resetting from the tap, I laid back into open guard. Got a spider grip left side. That used to be my go to side for sweep off a pass, but given that I'm 50% (at best) on the left Tricep and otherwise weak on that side, I wasn't sure if I could hold the position. Well, it held. I got the sweep without too much trouble and immediately transitioned to the arm bar. He tapped verbally as I arched my hips. But I cold tell something was wrong. He was holding his upper arm and said his shoulder dislocated. Said it's the seventh time in his life and third since he started training BJJ. Master Saulo and Professor Santos looked concerned and told us to sit out the rest of the round. He quickly reset the dislocation and said he's ok now (just can't tell his wife about or no more BJJ for him...).

Hmm... Hurting my training partner upset me. Was I too aggressive? Did my ego and pride take over allowing me to crank too hard on the arm? Would a more skilled fighter have cotrolled the sub setup and provided more time for the tap before injury? These and other thoughts have been running through my mind all afternoon/evening.

Injury to my teammate notwithstanding, my first five+ minutes on the mats in 2.5 months couldn't have felt better. I didn't gas. My neck seemed safe the entire time. I felt...well, fantastic. Can't wait to resume training next week.

After the open mat, Master Saulo and Judo Sensei Lizumi gave rousing talks about the virtues and martial arts and the master-student relationship. I'm proud to be part of the UNIJJ team and, God willing, look forward to many more years of safe training.