New Venue - Nova Forca BJJ

Last night was the first class at the clubs new location and we had about 50 guys present on the mat. Due to the large turnout it made the normal warm up difficult so running around the mats was not an option. Instead we did star jumps, squats, sprinting on the spot and knee jumps but worked up a good sweat nonetheless.

We didn’t practice any techniques at all tonight instead we started with a drill where one of you sat down with the other behind with one hook in and an over under grip. When Ricardo gave the signal the person behind had 30 seconds to secure the second hook and/or get a submission. The first person I was paired with was Dan who, since I last visited the club, has gotten his black belt. Obviously I wasn’t successful in either getting my second hook in or getting the submission but I wasn’t alone in my failure as most were able to defend against this.

Our next drill had one person sitting behind the other, this time with both hooks in and a rear naked choke locking in. The aim this time was to not panic when being choked and try and work your way out of it. When I was the person doing the choking I was able to make my opponent tap and when I was being choked I tapped very quickly due to the pain on my Adam’s apple.

Our last drill again involved putting a choke on your partner who then had to try and escape. This time the person being choked started on their back with the other person mounting them. The choke was Nami juji jime. When I put this on my partner he fought for a few seconds so I leant forward to make it really tight. After a couple of gurgling sounds he tapped so I immediately let go but when I got off him I realised that he had passed out, albeit just for a few seconds. He didn’t seem too bothered about it and actually apologised to me for not tapping sooner. I was just glad that he was ok and able to continue training, which he did without any fuss.

After a quick water break we went straight in to sparring. As there was so many of us only half could spar at one time so Ricardo picked the matchups for the first fights and paired me with a stocky purple belt. He started fairly gently and kind of let me get in to a good position but after he realised I wasn’t a complete beginner he exploded in to life and had me in all sorts of trouble. At one point I’m sure he was trying to put a twister on me but I managed to escape. Near the end of our 3 minute roll he started to apply an Ude-garami on me and in my effort to escape I made a grunting noise which signalled to him that I was in pain so he let go of the submission. I wasn’t about to tap but I’m sure he could have cranked it on a bit harder so I wasn’t too bothered about it.

I rolled with a couple of blue belts afterwards but I tried to attack a bit more this week. I actually managed to get Mune gatame a couple of times and switched between Mune and Kesa whilst I tried to look for a submission. I must admit, giving up a Judo pin to go for a submission doesn’t feel right at the moment but at least I am able to get in to these positions in the first place.

My last roll of the night was against a guy who wasn’t wearing a gi but instead wore a rashguard and shorts. I assume he must be training purely for MMA. This was to be my most successful roll of the night as I secured an Americana and an armbar for my only submissions of the night.

In all I had 6 rolls of 3 minutes each and was totally exhausted at the end and yet at the same time I felt energised.

We had a couple of team photos taken at the end of the class; you can just about see me at the back (the tall blonde guy on the right).

 

Survival - Nova Forca BJJ

With DJC closed now until early September I’ve decided to train at Nova Forca BJJ for a few months to improve my Newaza skills. So on Tuesday I gave Ricardo a quick call just to give him the heads up that I’ll be coming down and as usual he made me feel very welcome. I was accompanied by Jadon, who is a BJJ blue belt, and also Tim an orange belt Judoka who trains at Guildford Police Judo club.


Before the class started Ricardo informed everyone that the club would be moving venues to the Rainbow Centre in Epsom, which is only 5 minutes down the road. The full address is already on his website for those interested.

We went through the normal warm up which lasted approximately 25 minutes before Ricardo went on to show us what would be the only technique of the night, a standing guard pass. We drilled this for about 25-30 minutes, both left and right sides. I like the fact that you really get to drill a technique in BJJ. It means that when you leave the class you don’t forget what you’ve been told and can immediately add it to your repertoire. This is probably the reason that it takes so long to grade in BJJ, with the average time spent between starting and getting your first belt (blue) being somewhere between 1 and 3 years, depending on how often you train.

Techniques aside I think the quickest way of learning is to put things in to practice and roll and that’s what we did next for the last 30 minutes of class.

Being a white belt I know my main aim is survival and my first sparring partner was a purple belt so I was not expecting to do anything but try and survive. I think he must have been working on a particular move and was maybe trying to work on some specific weakness in his game because he didn't submit once in our 3 minute roll. Yes I was being constantly attacked and if it was Judo I would have been pinned on numerous occasions but I was pleased that I was able to come out of it still relatively intact and not gassed.

My next roll was with Ryan, who used to train Judo at DJC but due to personal reasons wasn't able to train anymore. However he has been doing BJJ for a number of years now and is therefore an experienced Blue belt. This roll was quite similar to my last roll. I defended for my life and wasn’t submitted. Perhaps my Newaza doesn’t suck as much as I think it does!

My third roll was against Tim, the orange belt Judoka from Guildford. Tim is fairly small in stature, well compared to me he is, but he put up a hell of a fight. I pulled guard and thought that I should be able to sweep him but he clearly has some ground skills and controlled my legs whilst he tried to pass my guard. I eventually managed to get him in my guard and slapped on a triangle. He did quite well at defending this until I finally managed to get a good tight squeeze and he tapped. When we re-restarted I did manage to take his back and got my hooks in. I was looking for a gi choke but his gi was so baggy that I found it hard to do this and so he hung on in there until the 3 minutes were up.

My last roll was against another blue belt and again it was similar to my other rolls against the BJJ guys where I just tried to not be submitted. Unfortunately this time, with him in the north south position (I think) he managed to secure an Americana and I tapped.

I really enjoyed the class tonight and was pleased that a few of the guys there had read my blog and introduced themselves to me. It was nice to catch up with Ryan again and I may have even talked him in to giving Judo another go if he has the time. Next week I may be incognito as I’m looking at buying a cheap BJJ gi and have my eyes on a couple on eBay. On the one hand it would be nice to just blend in but on the other its nice when guys approach me and ask about Judo, which is generally well thought of  here.

Ronda Rousey Takedown Study - Judo in MMA

At a time when Adult participation in Judo in the BJA  has fallen from 23,600 pre London 2012 to 19,900 post London 2012 I thought I’d post this excellent video of Ronda Rousey’s effective use of Judo in her MMA career. I’ve blogged before about what I think some Judo clubs need to do to improve Adult participation but I think this video speaks louder than words.

Gi Review - Black Eagle Shiai

When you first start training in Judo you'll buy whatever gi your local club stocks, which is normally a cheap single weave costing in the region of £20-£30. If you're still training 12 months later you might be thinking about buying a slightly better, heavier gi which won't break the bank and that's where Black Eagle's new Shiai gi fits in the market. Coming in at £59.99 it is double the cost of their entry level single weave but is it twice as good? Well the kind people at Black Eagle sent me one to review and having owned two of Black Eagle's single weave gis in the past I think I'm well placed to make such a judgement.

The two Black Eagle single weave's that I owned had their emblem on one shoulder and on the bottom of the gi pants, which made it stand out from the crowd as per the below.

Unfortunately the Shiai is bereft of any bling whatsoever, which is a shame really.

Sizing & Construction

Straight out of the bag my size 190 gi was a perfect fit in both sleeve and pant length. But I found that it was way to big in the body and a little too long in the skirt. The pants were also quite wide around the waist and around the ankles.

This is my current favourite gi "Toraki Premium" laid on top of the Black Eagle Shiai. You can see that the sleeve lengths are comparable but the Shiai is a lot wider in the chest area and a lot longer in the skirt.

Also note the sleeve width of the Shiai against the Toraki

The above pic shows my 185 Shuurai Lite laid on top of the Shiai. Again you can see that the Shiai is a lot longer in the skirt and wider in the body. 

The sleeves of my Shuurai are a tad on the short side, but you can still see how wide the Shiai sleeves are in comparison.

Also note how much wider the pants of the Shiai are against my Toraki Gold pants which are laid on top.

Of course this was all pre-wash so, as the gi was too baggy to even consider wearing to training, I thought i'd chuck it in the washing machine for a couple of washes (30c drip dry) to see what, if any, shrinkage there was.

Black Eagle Shiai new v washed

(size in centimetres gi washed three times at 30 degrees C and left to drip dry)

                                            Overall Shrinkage after 3 Washes

A:                                   171/163/ 162                                  9cm

B:                                   96.5/94.5/ 93                                  3.5cm
C:                                    80/80/ 76                                       4cm
D:                                   21.5/21/ 21                                     0.5cm
J                                     111/104.5/ 103                               9cm    
K                                    27/27/ 26.5                                    0.5cm

As you can see from the results above the largest shrinkage's occurred in the sleeve and pant length, which for me being tall and long limbed is not very welcome. There has been a small amount of shrinkage in the width of the body making it slightly less baggy but due to the sleeve length it's bordering on the unwearable for me.


Styling


For my personal taste I would have liked a little bit more effort put in to the styling but many traditionalists like their gis white with no shoulder flashes or badges whatsoever.


Pricing


As I mentioned earlier, £30 is what you would expect to pay for an entry level cheap single weave gi and for most beginners this gi will last them a year or two before they decide they want to stick with Judo and reward themselves with a nicer looking & fitting gi. A lot of Judoka who are serious about their training will not think twice about spending upwards of £100 on brands such as Fighting Films & Adidas. However there are now increasingly a number of high end brands who are offering light weight double weaves (650-800 gram) in the £50-£90 range. Blitz have recently reduced the price of their Shuurai Lite from £70+ to £49.99, which puts that in direct comparison with the Shiai, certainly something to consider.


Summary

Due to the sleeve shrinkage this gi isn't one that I will be wearing again for training but that's not to say there is anything wrong with it. It's a well-made constructed gi with just the right amount of stiffness at 650 grams to differentiate it from a single weave but not too stiff like those early 1100 gram Blitz Olympians. If I was to describe the cut of this gi i'd say it was a traditional Japanese rather than a European cut which a lot of gi companies across the pond seem to offer. If Black Eagle changed the cut of their gi's or offered a slim fit version the shiai would definitely be one I would put in to my normal gi rotation. To sum up, if you are fairly stocky and not long limbed and like a nice clean traditional looking gi then this gi should be a good fit. If you're tall and lean you'll probably be better off looking elsewhere.



Disclaimer


This review represents my own opinions. I consider myself independent and impartial - I am not sponsored by any one company nor do I endorse any one brand.

Judo Blog Recommendation

I’m sure most of you who read my blog get all the Judo knowledge and pearls of wisdom you could ever want. However some of you may have a thirst for more knowledge, maybe from someone who actually knows what they are talking about. If that’s you, you could do a lot worse than to read the blog of Ann Maria DeMars. In case you are scratching your head wondering who the hell she is allow me to explain.


Ann Maria won her division at the USJA Junior Nationals at the age of 16 – her first major competition. The same year, she entered college at Washington University as a business major. At the age of 18, as a college junior, Ann Maria was an exchange student at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan. While there, she trained under Sensei Osawa.

She graduated from college with a degree in business in 1978. She also won the US Senior Nationals, US Collegiate Nationals and the US Open. In the absence of women's judo world championships, she quit competitive judo and studied for an MBA at the University of Minnesota.

DeMars earned her MBA in 1980. She missed the first women's world championships while in grad school, but in 1981 won bronze in the British Open and Tournoi d'Orleans. In 1982, she was ranked #1 in the USJI rankings and won the US Open. However, she did not contest the second women's world championships due to the birth of her daughter María.

DeMars enjoyed more success in 1983, including the Pan American Games and US Senior Nationals, and in 1984, winning the Austrian Open, Canada Cup (now known as the "Rendezvous"), and the US Senior Nationals. She came out of retirement to win the 1984 World Judo Championships, becoming the first person representing the United States to win a World Judo Championships (her name at the time was Ann-Maria Burns).

Ann Maria is now a 6th dan and has a very interesting blog called The Business/Judo of Life. Oh and one last thing I thought I should mention is that she is also the mother of Ronda Rousey, former Olympic Bronze medalist and current UFC Bantamweight champion.

Go check it out now. Click here

Edward

The reason I haven't posted anything for the last two weeks, my baby boy Edward, born on the 1st July.

Brian Jacks at Yoshin Ryu

The fact that I am still blogging should tell you that baby is still yet to make an appearance, 8 days overdue now. In hindsight it means I could have attended the Brian Jacks seminar at Yoshin Ryu but hey I wasn't to know that. Anyway the below was posted on the BJA Facebook page a couple of days ago so thought i'd share it.

Click on this to find all the photos taken on the day.



In other news I bought this the other day from here

I'd been looking for some Judo clothing for a while now but most of them say things like "I love Judo" or "Judo Rocks" which is not particularly cool especially when you consider the wide array of cool BJJ and MMA related clothing on the market. Anyway I thought this t-shirt was a simple and nice design and have recommended it to other people at my club.

My last bit of news before I sign off for a couple of weeks is that my next post will be a full review of Black Eagle's new Shiai double weave Judogi.