The man, The Myth, The Rashguard

Before I start I would like to talk a bit about “hurricane” Irene. If you saw my post from yesterday you may of gathered that this storm of apocalyptic magnitude was in fact an apocalyptic let down. From what I could tell absolutely nothing happened apart from some mild breezes and very light rain (and im NOT under exaggerating).

So the monday morning nogi class starts at 7.30. Which meant I was up at 6.30 (thats right, 6 fucking 30 !!!! believe it or not !!!). This gave me enough time to tidy up the apartment as the owner was back today, and pack all of my stuff back into my suitcase. I managed to consume all of my dooms day supplies which left me nothing for breakfast apart from some vitamins and a scoop of Jack3d. I left my bags in the apartment and would come back to get them after the class.

So I get to the gym, get changed and get on the mat. Only a few people there. One of the guys tell me that the class doesn't really start til about 8 despite what it says on the timetable and that John doesn't do a warm up so get warm now. I stretch a bit and another guy comes up and asks if I wanna roll a bit, I agree. The guy is older, probably mid 30’s. About 5’7, 80kg and solid. I assume hes a blue or purple as hes just wearing a regular T and non branded shorts (smart eh?). Anyway I intend to roll light and just move around a bit, as im still half asleep. Of course after a few mins that goes out the window as the guy tries to pull me apart. He is extremely strong with a monster base. He doesn't do much but is hard to do anything to. But does one thing really good; horrible chin strap control, he keeps reaching around my neck, clamping onto my chin and bending me around to pass. Its very uncomfortable to say the least, this leads me to believe that he is a wrestler, god damn Americans and their wrestling. Anyway we roll for a bit, no much happens apart from my guard getting passed and then me recovering. The class is about to start so we stop, once again I feel like ive been roughed up a bit but a strong wrestler low belt and im a bit pissed. I ask him what belt he is; black.... ok makes more sense. Been training 10 years. I ask if he wrestled; yes, for 9 years before starting BJJ. Ok, makes more sense now, and once again I feel slightly better about myself. I make a mental note to not judge peoples belts on what they look like anymore.

The class has filled up a bit. Probably 15 people (apparently very quiet and theres usually 30-40 people). The instructor walks on the mat, and guess who it is in his famed attire; John Danaher and his rashguard. This is great, ive always wanted to be taught by John. For those who dont know who John Danaher is (you are fools, but I shall explain anyway). John is a legend amongst the BJJ and MMA community. Despite never fighting he is widely regarded as one of, if not THE best grappling coach in the world and some of his more famous students include the likes of George Saint Peirre, the current UFC welterweight champion. Im excited to say the least to have my first class with the legend.

He starts off with some takedowns, a very nice adjustment on the single leg position (I shall not be going into details on any of the techniques I learn out here, if you wanna know you just have to come to one of my seminars when im back ;D ). Then a counter to a defense of the single leg. We then hit the ground, we do a very slick way of taking the arm from the turtle position into a kimura, then armbar. His details on the techniques are very specific and taught brilliantly. Then its time to spar. We do four six min rounds. I spar with a whole lot of guys, mostly blue belt. One of the guy im about to start rolling with I assume is a blue belt due to his rashguard (for the most part the students wear rashguards coinciding with their belt rank). But then I remember my mental note and ask him his grade, he is a black belt hahahaha. Thats one of the weird things about training here; the sheer number of black belts on the mat, that you don't even realise they are! I guess that what happens when the sport has been around in the country for so much longer, I suspect it will be similar in the UK in 5 years or so. I have a good roll with the black belt, but he is a bit smaller than me (a rare occurrence here).

Anyway we finish training and it was a good session. Afterwards I thank John for the class and introduce myself. We start talking about how blown out of proportion this “storm” was. Some yanks come over so we start to mock them about how much the city over reacted. We end up sat around in a group chatting for about an hour. The conversation topics go something like this: You guys made such a fuss about nothing, which led to talking about the Japan earthquake and how amazing the Japanese people were. That led onto how America would of acted much worse which went into talking about “when shit hits the fan”. That turned into talking about guns, that segwayed into knives and swords. Then into killing people/animals. Then into ancient battles, into cutting peoples heads off. It was a interesting discussion to say the least. (Which also made me think I need to move to America so I could buy a load of guns).

After the morning session I went to get my bags out of the apartment. The superintendents wife buzzes me in and lets me into the apartment room. I walk in a realise that the owner has already come back, and is face down a sleep in the bed (studio apartment so nowhere to hide). I switch into ninja mode, pack up my stuff, zip my suitcase up and exit swiftly and silently (my definition of silent anyway) the guy must of been a deep sleeper because he didn't move an inch. I head back to the academy, dump my stuff off, eat, go pick up some sheets and a pillow for my mat bed and get ready for the 1oclock nogi class.

Unlike the morning class this is packed. At least 40 people on the mat maybe more. I comment on this and am told that this is still small and theres normally 10-15 people more!!! There where a tonne of black belts on the mat and MMA fighters including current UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar. John is taking the class again. From standing we do stuffing the single leg attempt into a forward throw, backwards throw and stomach to stomach toss. Very nice stuff, which when demonstrated by John is made to look unbelievably elegant and effortless (not so much when I did it). On the ground he explain a principle in BJJ about how when a guy goes to attack he has to extend his limbs, this means that if the attack fails there is a small moment where the limbs are at risk and can be counter attacked. We did two techniques based off of this principle. One from a arm bar defense into a counter achilles lock and one from a triangle defense to counter heel hook. Both techniques were AWESOME. And I hadn't seen either set up from those position before. Then it was onto sparring. Sparring was good, I didn't go too hard as I had already done a full sparring this morning. I did spar with one older guy called Gene, now this guy was not only a awesome black belt but he was fricking enormous!!! 110kilos and solid as hell, just one of these simply massive people. He rolled amazingly nice, it was like a grizzly bear play fighting with one of its cubs. Its all very nice, but the whole time I had the feeling he could rip me in two if he felt like it. Very nice guy.

Anyway Class was over, I stretch for a bit, and then watched some of the other guys rolling. I find the black belt fights at the mundials unbelievably boring, you wanna watch some good jiu jitsu? Come and watch the guys rolling during and after the 1pm nogi class at Renzos. Amazing to watch. Then John Danaher started rolling with a very high level black belt. Wtf..... it was amazing, he wasn't putting in ANY effort and was just mangling this guy up repeatedly, I’ve never seen anything like it. He's so smooth, so fluid, so precise in his actions. And emotionless, the whole time he's throwing this guy around it looks like he's doing tai chi.

Anyway, time for some more food. Then its chill out for the rest of the day. Try and make my room a bit more homely/comfortable. Excuse me for the long post. Also, Renzos been in Brazil and just got back today, saw him earlier and said hello. Hope to see him on the mats soon.

Ape out