24 Feb 2005

I am always curious to hear stories of how ju-jitsu affects people’s daily lives. Club regular Marco told me the story of how ju-jitsu cured him of a recurring nightmare. Each night he would dream of encountering a foe, everytime he tried to speak, nothing came out, and everytime he tried to punch the enemy, all he could muster was a slow and limp wrist. Dream analysts out there might ponder what this all means, but one night, perhaps down to a series of vigorous training sessions, Marco’s nightmare recurred but this time, his voice was loud and clear. He shouted with full force ‘’NO! I KNOW JU-JITSU” and proceeded to punch his assailant with full force. It seemed to be a pivotal moment since it appears that after that night, the dream never came back and Marco was cured. Needless to say, all this nocturnal shouting and punching did wake up the wife.

Dreams come true for some

I am always curious to hear stories of how ju-jitsu affects people’s daily lives. Club regular Marco told me the story of how ju-jitsu cure...

21 Feb 2005

Some more on the story about that ‘geezer’ chap at the Royce Gracie seminar. Turns out that Royce was standing in line at a hotdog stand (so much for the Gracie diet) on the way to the seminar and the guy next to him recognised him. Unable to get away Royce explained that yes it was him and he was on his way to conduct the seminar. The geezer chap asked if he too could join, so Royce, without wanting to say outright NO but at least sound him out, replied that he would need a gi. The geezer chap was rather keen and begged to be allowed to join so Royce said, well I guess I have a spare gi in the car – so the geezer bought it for £90. Then Royce said that it was a closed door seminar and he would have to purchase a ticket too - £60. The Geezer did so without blinking an eye. Now I know that Royce wasn’t joking when, after one of the many outbursts from the guy, he joked that he should have left him behind on the motorway!
Anyway, it’s an amusing story that really only makes sense if you were there at the time. The Geezer was annoying but essentially harmless, just a fan of NHB.

The Meerkat was stunned and shocked to yet again be promoted another rank by Eddie. Two-stripes on the old white belt is not to be sniffed at and means that everyone else in the club will be gunning to take my scalp. But I’m pretty pleased that my commitment to put in some serious mat time has panned out. There is talk amongst us of entering the Gracie European Tournament in April. Gulp! Now we’ll see who’s worthy of a stripe.

Hotdogs

Some more on the story about that ‘geezer’ chap at the Royce Gracie seminar. Turns out that Royce was standing in line at a hotdog stand (so...

15 Feb 2005

Last night Royce Gracie came down to take the mat and it was a great seminar. What amazed me most was two things. Firstly, for a man who makes his living by smashing huge opponents to pieces, he is remarkably devoid of any ego or pretension. Just a normal bloke who is mad about martial arts like the rest of us. He was happy to chat, offer advise and correct our awful technique.
The second thing I really admired was that the techniques he showed us were incredibly simple. They progressed and built up into a nice sequence covering attacks, defences, counters and counters to counters. They could be used in sport BJJ, no rules NHB or self defence. In all the techniques, Royce demonstrated some clever use of the body to lever, fake or manoeuvre the opponent to your advantage. It was priceless stuff but again, nothing here a complete beginner (and there were quite a few non-BJJ students last night) could not perform themselves.

It was also a surreal evening. One chap brought his young son along so there was Royce, a fighting legend explaining the secrets of his mastery, and some little toddler is running around playing Ninja turtles completely oblivious to everything going around. There was also an odd chap that no-one seemed to know. I can only describe him as being a bit of a ‘geezer’ – mixed with a smattering Tourettes - very loud and boisterous. Royce showed great humour by handling his outbursts eloquently. At one point the man took great offence to another in the crowd who appeared to mock him and there was much eyeballing and chest puffing. I don’t know, all this excess testosterone, the calmest man on the mat seemed to be Royce himself!

Anyway, I think I’ve improved a few things thanks to Royce and can take away a couple of nice techniques to add to my slim armoury. I also shamelessly queued up for autographs, photos and branded merchandise like some little kid at a movie premier.
There is talk of getting younger brother, and grappling sensation Royler Gracie down soon – another must-see seminar if that ever happens.

This is one damned happy Meerkat right now.

Meeting a legend

Last night Royce Gracie came down to take the mat and it was a great seminar. What amazed me most was two things. Firstly, for a man who mak...

12 Feb 2005

The Meerkat was involved in an embarrasingly immature tête - à - tête at BJJ class the other day. I was sparring with another novice and locked him up in a nice spider type guard. He got frustrated at this and starting dropping his knee into my ribs. The first time he did this I thought it was maybe an accident and gave him the benefit of the doubt, but he saw the gap and proceeded to do this a total of four times! Now forgive me for stating the bleeding obvious but the rules are quite clear on this...NO STRIKES ALLOWED IN BJJ.
I was so infuriated at his bullying tactics that I screamed abuse and four letter words quite unbecoming of a gentleman. He simply laughed when he saw how much I had lost my rag and even blamed me for not telling him first time. By now I was infuriated and swept him to the ground and rolled him around quite forcefully looking for a killer armlock to teach him a lesson. Luckily he tucked up pretty good. Sitting on a semi-mount position I was still mad but the next thing I knew, he turned his body around to face me and elbowed me in the face. He claimed it was an accident - yeah right - but I was by now a crazy ball of fury so I elbowed him back in the face. I knew that was wrong the moment it happened but I just completely saw red.
I stopped afterwards and took a moment to myself to calm down. He was still smirking with a 'you didn't even touch me' look and when I explained that what he did was bang out of order, he simply shrugged his shoulders and pleaded ignorance of the rules - come on, you don't start BJJ and not know that strikes are disallowed???
Anyway, after I calmed myself down, I apologised for losing my temper and he said he wouldn't do it again, but that it was hard for him to ignore his years of martial arts training (doesn't seem to be a problem for me). Hmmm, I'll wait and see. Luckily for both of us, our little incident was in the far corner of the mat as I don't think Eddie would take too kindly to our moment of disharmony.

The year of the Rooster, which is my birth sign, has certainly started off with a bang. It seems I've been acting recently more like a young fighting cockeral than the ropey old broiler chicken I normally am. There's too much testosterone in the all male grappling club. A cold shower and some soothing TLC from the Mrs I reckon will calm me down.

On Monday - a date with the mighty Royce Gracie - one seminar I cannot wait for.

Handbags at dawn

The Meerkat was involved in an embarrasingly immature tête - à - tête at BJJ class the other day. I was sparring with another novice and loc...

 

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