Connection Rio – July 23rd, 2010

23^rd july 2010 connection rio blog

·         Diet for tournament- This is one of the hardest parts of competing in most sports the diet i went from 82 kg to 74kg in 3 weeks, i mostly stuck to clean foods vegetables and white meats lots of water running for 20 mins before breakfast no carbs after 8pm and 6 small meals including nuts and protein shakes, this gives me a lot of energy and i never really feel fatigue, but i get very short tempered and snappy.

 

·         Training for tournament, was tough but not as tough as the last one, i didn’t have my training partner i had last time (mike tousingnaugh) a good purple belt wrestler from U.S and Dennis has been really busy but no excuses i have a gym full of bjj black belts in brazil and its down to me to push me but i know the next one ill be training 100% harder.

 

 

·         Day of tournament was an early start every one shuffling around nervously asking questions about techniques  ect i put the covers over my head and waited till it was time to leave checked my weight and packed my bag full of post weigh in snacks and got a taxi to the tijuca tennis club 28 reis we later realised we could have got a 2.35 bus there but you live and learn at the tournament everyone fought really hard and the house brought back a few medals i personally didn’t but i have posted a video of my fight up so you can all see my 1^st loss to submission and what better place than brazil.

 

·         I have been thinking a lot about how i can get the most out of my training here in brazil and how i can also learn the most and i think i may dedicate myself 100% to BJJ and just have one MMA fight while I’m here as I’m still young and opportunities like this are hard to come by i.e. being in a house full of BJJ guys and girls living 2 mins form the gym in a sunny city right next to the beach so ill still be training MMA but i will just do the one fight for now until i leave brazil.

 

·         The aftermath (pizza) after the torni we all went to our favourite pizza place Fronteira 25 reis and you get all the pizza you want, what’s that i hear you say, what about dessert jack, well try chocolate covered pizza and various others and free refills this place is a must after any dieting of weight cutting, we all walked home full bellied and hit the sac early that night.

 

 

·         Next day back in the academy (very important). I woke up with a bit of a head ache from the flying armbar attempt (you’ll see in the video 2:19) at 7am perfect time to get breakfast and a coffee before training at 8:30, then i went home arranged to train with Dennis at 12-1 and then again at 6:30pm……….over training no i just think after a loss a win as well but especially after a loss the best thing to do is get back in the academy and work on what went wrong while its still fresh and before you and your friends have made 1000s of excuses as to why it went wrong