Work/Life Balance if BJJ is your life

   How often have you missed a training session because your schedule gets thrown off?  It's cool if you can make up for it soon but if you're an adult average Joe who doesn't do BJJ for a living what can you do?  It would be very cool if your job had some in house Jiu Jitsu wouldn't it?

Well, if you're lucky enough to work at Google now you can as the Bloody Elbow reported that" Google offers in house BJJ to its employees".  It looks like Google just became the most awesome place to work if you're a lover of the art.  Where do we apply?

Supplemental training.

   Not all of us our professional fighters or BJJ competitors as much as we would like to be.  We have bills to pay, families to take care of and doing that requires us to have jobs that will sometimes interfere with where we would rather be.  When that happens, in order to keep you mind and body sharp you have to supplement your learning experience somehow.

Both this video and his book I use.

I've always been comfortable using books and videos since I got my first book, The Tao of Jeet Kun Do by Bruce Lee.  It gave me my first work out regiment that prepared me for my future in Martial Arts and the importance of staying fit to keep my body ready to absorb new technique, even as I got older.  I have many books on Martial Arts, various disciplines not just Brazilian Jiu Jitsu since I did other disciplines in my life.  I always found books and videos helpful as supplemntal instruction to what was done at the academy.  This past weekend one of my training partners said, "I can't learn off of videos" and that surprised me.  I wondered why that would be?  I would think videos are more detailed than a book which seems to have been the standard before mass video production and the internet. I asked him to explain, and he said "I don't know, I just can't."  I'm sure it's individual preference but these things don't sell well for no reason, and I have to add this person is the probably one of a few that do not use supplemental instruction.  For the most part, the rest of my training partners do like to supplement their training with books and videos, mainly Youtube videos.

Does anyone else have preferred training supplements or are you like my friend and need a person to show them everything?  Both, are necessary in my opinion if you want to keep an open mind and I think any opportunity to learn is one that should not be passed on.

Jiu Jitsu in the Olympics

If you're reading this you have probably posted on some social media outlet or "plussed", "liked", or "favorited" someone's post about having Brazilian Jiu Jitsu become an Olympic sport for the summer games.  Well if you have been on of those people, apparently people that can make it happen are with you according to this article on Emirates 247.

It's no secret that Brazilian Jiu Jitsu has become popular with the help of MMA and proving it is a required bit of knowledge if you are going to consider studying martial arts or self defense.  Brazilian Jiu Jitsu has now become what Tae Kwon Do schools were in the 80's and more and more places to learn the art are popping up. It's nice to see the art finally be considered in the circles that have a say in what makes it official and while we're not there yet because, "Jiu Jitsu to be included in the Olympic Games is a long way off but at least we were able to discuss the work we are doing to broaden the horizons of the sport with the members of the IOC and ANOC,” according to Al Hashmi in the article.  Martial Arts affects a lot of peoples lives in  different ways but in the always evolving art of BJJ, the culture I consider "life training" and it deserves to be in the Olympics.  Stuart Cooper films put this small video out that I can't stop watching because it's a great look at the sport.:

The movement is there, and I for one would like to see it.  The USA Jiu Jitsu web site has more information and ways to help and try and get it in for 2016.  What do you guys think?  Are you ready for Olympic Jiu Jitsu?  Please comment below.

To GI or not to GI (No Gi)

In my excitement for Metamoris 3 and the submission only format I read a really good interview with Eddie Bravo and in it he talked about his dislike for training with the Gi.  His reasoning is sound because he's arguing for applying Jiu Jitsu to MMA, and I agree with him in that respect.  MMA is a sport and all that scrambling quickness on the ground with nothing to grab and slow an opponent down makes training with no-gi exclusively a lot of sense.

My dreams of MMA fighting have past me by though but I love martial arts and training is the only reason I do any other exercise, but my original motivation for doing the martial arts I have done was for self defense.  Not on the mat, in a ring or any competition, and for that reason I prefer training in my gi.  The stuff I hated about competition like points bothered me for a lot of reasons some of which he mentions in the interview like here:

"A giant percentage of points matches, at the end of the match whoever is winning holds and slows down. Very rarely do you have a guy at the end of a points match - the last minute or 30 seconds - where the guy winning is trying to submit the other guy. You don't really have that that often. You do have it, but it's rare."

I'm glad he laid out his argument the way he did because he's not wrong. But, for all his statements about training with no-gi in preperation for MMA, I think makes the argument for training in the gi for self defense. You can check out the full interview here and the event for Saturday is looking really good, I know I'll be watching it.  What do you guys prefer? Gi or No-Gi?  I suppose it doesn't matter as long as you're rollin'.

Weekend full of martial arts

Martial Arts enthusiasts  should be excited about this weekend.  This coming Friday Bellator 114 airs, Saturday is Metamoris 3 which includes the rematch between Royler Gracie and Eddie Bravo, and World Series of Fighting (WSOF)  on NBC Sports.

Most of these things are on TV and can probably be recorded on a DVR  or caught as a replay, but Metamoris 3 is streaming on line and can be ordered from the web site.  Anyone unfamiliar with Metamoris check out the recent trailer, it's  worth watching:

Naked without my Gi and a Jiu Jitsu PSA

    Sickness is the worse!!!  I hate getting sick because it keeps me off the mat and my school was moving so I haven't rolled in two weeks.  I haven' worn my gi in 2 weeks and it kills me, I've been laid up with this sickness wrapped in layers but I feel naked since I haven't worn my gi.

With respect to my training partners I hope everyone understands I like to keep the illnesses off the mats and protect others from getting sick too.  I would hope that is the way other people think but that is not always the case.  No matter how many announcements are made, people still feel the need to try and be tough and bring their diseases to the mat.  Nothing is proved by doing this other than you know how spread a disease, some people are competing at various levels and getting sick is the last thing they need.

Please stay home if you're sick, no one else needs to miss training just because you thought it would be tough to come in and train through your sickness.  Now, we're both sick so like my instructor says in his announcements, "stay your sick asses home!'

Submission Only tournaments

     I'm looking forward to Metamoris 3 and I'm starting notice more submission only tournaments coming up locally on the east coast as well.  Is this something that is a new growing trend or is it old school coming back?  I came into Jiu Jitsu when I was  28 which I feel is kind of late but in competition I always worried I would lose on points so I put them out of my mind only went for submissions anyway.

I was injured during a sparring session in another martial art when I had my blue belt in BJJ so I never felt confident in competing again for a while since the injury was a tear in my groin and took a long time to get over.  If this is going to be the new norm I would like to try and compete again but I wonder if losing the points would hurt the way anyone trains?  Please comment below...