It’s about one week from the U.S. Open and i’m really beaten up. In the past few weeks, i’ve been choked out by Juan, strangled by Hesam, and got literally thrown onto my face by Mike. It’s been fun and also a great learning experience to train with these guys as we all prepare to compete.
I’ve been going nearly every day since my hand recovered which has left me pretty injured. One thing that I forgot was that unlike most striking gyms where you’d spar at around 50-60%, it’s easy to go nearly 100% in grappling and do it in a safe and repeatable manner. This meant that it was easy for us to fall into that mentality and constantly push hard at each other during training. It allows us to learn a lot faster in a shorter period of time, but fuck if it didn’t hurt like a bitch. I’m pretty much injured everywhere in some way and i’ve definitely started performing worse due to just general exhaustion.
It all ends next week though. Wednesday, the 21st will be my last day in the gym before the Open. Tom and I agreed that we’re going to need some time to heal up or else we’re not even going to make it to the tournament. It’s been an awesome ride and i’m looking forward to seeing if I can perform well with everything i’ve learned.