[baitandtrapbjj]

I'm so happy that I just had to share with my friends here at JJF. I have been training at a new school for 3 weeks.

I didn't train for 1.5 months prior to moving to this school, so I think that vacation has something to do with the way my game has changed too.

When I first started here I literally sucked. I feel like I broke a lot of the rust off now though. A couple of the guys at this gym even questioned if I was even worthy of 4 stripes (which is completely ego driven by them, to be sure). Now I am passing those same people back up. They didn't think I heard them apparently, or maybe they didn't care.

My new school (Royce affiliate) is a great match for me. We have 3 blues I can hang with in free rolls. There is 1 three year blue who dominates me, his game is tight. 2 purples, one of which is my coach, he has 8 years. And a bunch of fresh or mid level whites. It's in a college town, so when school starts the numbers will grow even larger.

My coach focuses on transitions and positional top control more than anything else. This actually complements my Gracie Barra training perfectly. Under my old Barra professor, we focused on guard work and all around submissions alot. Besides the Barra fundamentals self defense curriculum that is.

Noone else trains MMA here, so I get individual sessions with my coach and a 5 year Muay Thai fighter who trains my coach.

Not to mention our parent school is run by a 4 stripe brown belt testing for black in December at a black belt summit he was invited to. That means I can still compete in IBJJF's big 2013 tournaments. It is only twice as far from me as my main school. And their gym is HUGE, an old ice hockey rink converted to a school.

Besides all of this, I think my game has skyrocketed in terms of seeing openings and seizing them quickly. Not to mention I can finally transition from one position or submission to another smoother than ever before.

The upper belt's answer questions by telling the concept behind the technique ALOT. This is such a welcome change for me.

Now I'm gonna shut up and train. Thank you letting me rant.

[12]

Nice! I live for those moments, when your game seems to come together and you can notice improvement all the time! I am 180 degrees out of phase from you in BJJ, and feel like I haven't made headway in a while. Luckily for me, I am still making good progress in Judo, and this keeps me both happy and motivated (in both arts.)

6 weeks is a long time to take off, and I glad your back into the swing of things. Even when I am overwhelmed in life, I still try to make it to class at least once a week. Barring that, I try to do footwork drills when I am watching my son, just to try and keep things fresh.

[Passenger]

[buhriyon]

Good for you, it sounds like you are going about things the right way. Don't let what anyone says about your game bother you and it seems like you didn't, keep it up.