my Arte Suave

My game for eating right and earning it

How are you sure that you deserve anything as far as competition is concerned? One way of thinking I totally agree with, is Tom Brands way of thinking, who is currently the head wrestling coach for  Iowa Hawkeyes, one of the greatest teams ever, period. He goes to say, “You dont deserve anything, you only deserve what you earn!”

These words have had a profound effect in how I approach a lot of things, and truthfully I wish I had this kind of approach on my University studies, haha, but that is another post. So how do you know you deserve a victory or a gold medal at a tournament? Is there anyway to know? Of course, training hard, putting in effort, time, and energy. But every I feel as though everyone trains hard, rolls hard, does their sprints, so how do you know? More importantly how do I know? The honest answer is to live everyday like a champion. How do I know how a champion lives? I read, and read more, not about Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighters, because BJJ fighters just aren’t that chronicled, I have somewhat of an idea how my favorite fighters Terere, and Jacare have trained, but I don’t know their habits, what they do on a daily basis, and how they approach important things like drilling, strength and conditioning, mental preparation as it relates to getting ready for huge events. So I instead read about, NCAA wrestling champions, Olympic gold medalist in any sport such as Judo, and whomever else has to go through hell fire and brimstone to prepare for huge events, huge tournaments. And what I have found, and what I like best is Cael Sanderson’s suggestion of “living every single day like a champion”. When I read that, I knew at the time I was not doing the best I could and a lot of the details he was speaking about, which a lot was about my attitude towards preparing and just doing everything in our power to ensure we get the results we want. Since reading about Cael, I know that I have to prepare more, and do more, and after that do a little bit more. And what I have found is this game I made up out of no where for myself…

Everyday that I practice, I do a mini circuit after training, regardless of how I feel, and if I have done conditioning and strength that day. The circuits must include at least 3 of the following.If you want to play along, you can have your own exercises, these are some of Cael’s favorites and mine, and are the best for a grappler.

1. Sprints
2. Rope climbs
3. Pull-ups
4. Wall-sits
5. Push-ups
6. Planks or get on the roller thing

This part of the game is the MORE aspect of my training, just a little more of this, and I always feel like I could of done more, and when I do this after a training, I feel like I have done really well.

The other thing I am doing is 50 pullups after every practice, regardless of anything I have done previously, I will try and do the pullups in the circuit or if not (my gym does not have a pull-up station at the moment) I will do them at home on my doorway pull-up thingy.

The other game I am playing is that I DO NOT GET TO EAT UNTIL I HAVE COMPLETED THESE “MORE” CIRCUITS! This builds upon my discpline, to finish any and all tasks, and to make sure I am doing right by me, and not cheating myself, I am sooooo sure that Every champion I admire has not cut any corners, and neither will I. Dan Gable said it best, “if you don’t train, you don’t eat”. A little extreme for most people, but I have to maintain a certain weight, and Gable said this to his athletes on the off-season when they werent training and wrestling like they were during the on-season.

This is how I will earn GOLD at the 2011 BJJ World Championships, everyday I will earn gold, not 8 weeks out not 12 weeks out, but every second of everyday I will try my heart out to get .01 percent better.I am not in a big BJJ scene in Rhode Island, but who cares, I am going to work…

In closing, it is my belief that if you aren’t doing it everyday and your opponent has done more days more hours, minutes seconds then you, then you do not deserve that victory. This is about accountability and discipline Do you think you deserve and why?

I will continue to try and pay the price everyday…The idea is to never get tired.

**In other news**

Today I weighed 200lbs, already on weight for my division lol, and my roommate told me my abs are beginning to show after I did my pullups, this made me glimmer. Looking at this weight makes me think about fighting at 194lbs for CBJJ events. Hard work is visibly paying off, now its time to make my technique show when it counts. Also this game helps to improve your work ethic.

Training for Chicago Open

Recently I have been writing a lot of my feelings towards the bjj scene at large and really haven’t touched on how my training has been going in regards to getting ready for ibjjf Chicago open. The last 5 or so weeks I have been training is hard as I think I could have. The focus is of course been on the gi. I’ll be honest and say that everything hasn’t gone 100% the way I have wanted it to while training. I have had injuries really limit me. It is like they come and go and it keeps going that way. Injuries are nothing new though, I cant ever remember being %100 when a competition nears, and I have come to the realization that I probably never will be. And this is common place in bjj and competition bjj, so I can’t complain with awesome examples like michael langhi at the worlds competing with a major injury and examples like stephen hall who seems to always be under the knife. So with that I will be going full steam next weekend no doubt.

In other news, I’ve been just been drilling as usual, locking down my strategy, and training to absolute exhaustion at least 2 times per week.I have been going to Next Level Fitness in Johnston, RI and being tortured by mike campbell and my boy Justin. It’s such a great facility! My whole strength and conditioning has changed. It’s been one strength session, dedicated to nothing but building strength and power. And the other session is dedicated to nothing but conditioning, circuits,circuits, crazy reps.

So it’s been going great, but conditioning and grips are in tremendous shape. Chicago is a week away and I’m feeling great. I am training hard all the way until Thursday!

Skills pays the bills.

Chicago Open coming up..

Its been a couple weeks since my promotion to purple, and with those weeks, I think i am about 90 percent over being prromoted. Occasionally i look down and see the gleam of the new belt around m,y waist, and for a split second I remember all it took to get there, I am always smiling big but now i am smiling even bigger. Bigger because of the challenge that is coming for me. The challene is in Chicago! I will be going to compete in my very first CBJJ purple event out there! I have already won a purple belt division at a NAGA, but honestly that gave me confidence in what I was doing but that is about as much as that title does for me. I know i must prove my worth to myself again. And thanks to Justin Erickson and www.4zero1.com I will be given this opportunity.

I have been training with the same kind of pace I usually train with before big events. I have been doing a ton of cardio, and lots of lifting. Recently I have adopted this sprinting routine. Warm up 1 mile run, sprint 100-200-300-400-300-200-100 meters at the track. Now i train with a heart rate monitor, so after every sprint, i walk the same distance, or until my Heart Rate gets back down to 120bpms! That is incredible tough job to do in under a minute! But that is my goal! At the end of the entire work, I rep out 5 50 meter sprints, 10 seconds of rest in between. This sprint routine is brutal! I am doing it twice a week, sometimes right before class.

As far as lifting goes, I am doing the bar complexes that I still have not posted the video to. Where I take 12 exercises, and do all of them for 6 reps, with the goal of finishing in under a minute! This is stupid hard when you begin to add weight to the bar.

Also I will begin to do farmer walks complexes. This one is brutally hard as well and a great finisher. Take X # farms walk, and alternate the way you hold the dumbells and walk for distance. So you can hold the bells in front of you then walk, above you, alternate above and at your side, in the clean position, staggered. Hopefully that all made sense.

And of course I am doing my guard passing drills =)

The will to win is nothing without the will to prepare!
Getting ready to go to war!