Week of 16th of May
"Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn". Losing is sometimes a blessing in disguise...
I will refer in that post to Luke my friend and training partner and to myself. We both trained hard to take part to the BJJ British Open which took place Saturday and Sunday 14-15th of May, last weekend.
Luke went, and I had to pull out as getting there was impossible due to some problems with the competition organization.
Luke didn't do well, as he lost in his first fight, but he came back with lots of positive things to think about.
In my case, I enjoyed my No Show,I went to train on double sessions on Saturday and Sunday, on both days I was with the people I enjoy being with my PT clients and the gym members as well as the members if the Train For Life Community.
To add to the mix I spent more quality time with my family, instead of being on the road for over 6 hours, I spent the day with my boys and wife and add a catch up on FaceTime with Aziz my best friend.
All situations have always different lectures and if we look closely, we can find or make good from bad.
We both started the week with a break of BJJ, We resumed our BJJ training on Wednesday morning. I, nevertheless went to spar at Icon BJJ Norwich academy on Monday evening and saw and felt that the competition preparation was starting to bring some benefits as my BJJ has and is improving.
As we first met Luke and I on Wednesday, we reflected on what happened to him during the competition and started to work on solutions.
The best, was that him not doing well was not down to our training or our approach of the competition. It was done to a lack of competition experience. Luke last competed years ago, so there was a lot going on for him on the day.
On top of that, he realized first hand that in term of BJJ and conditioning, he was far better than his opponent! He was actually really well prepared, despite not competing for years his BJJ was solid and at "good" competition standard.
Without getting in details, we were satisfied about the outcome. As it turns out that the "negative" experience reinforced our focus.
The way we planned our training sessions totally fit to the competition context. The problem was simply linked to the faith!
In fact we plan, then we need to believe in our preparation and APPLY!
Right after our chat, we started to train again and plan our coming training sessions for weeks to come.
The moral is high, so his our energy and determination. The upsetting situation we went through had just boosted our desire to become HARDER, BETTER,FASTER, STRONGER
Luke and I, with OUR Bronze medal from the BJJ European Championship 2016. Our medal, as without Luke support, I would have come home empty handed!