Goodbye, Vegas.
Vegas was another short, but interesting destination on my trip. It was cool to stay with Martin Kampmann and his wife and get a glimpse of the life of a full time professional fighter.
I know that many people dream of standing in the cage in front of thousands of people, but not many have an idea of just how much time, work, sweat, blood, pain and dedication it takes to get there. I had one MMA fight back in 2003 and quickly admitted to myself, that I don’t have what it takes to do it. I highly respect those few who manage to keep up that lifestyle and Martin is one of them. He is in my eyes one of the most intelligent and technical fighters in the UFC at this moment. The last two fights have ended in close decision losses, leaving him with losses on the record but a lot of new fans.
Watch out for him against John Howard on June 26th!
Can’t decide on travel pace
I am sitting outside Xtreme Couture, trying to decide on where to go next week. I have been traveling at a very high pace since New York, visiting more than ten places in the last two weeks. It has been really fun and interesting, but I don’t know if I should keep going like this or slow down a little bit.
I have the option of getting a cheap ticket directly to Panama on Monday. One of my options is to spend the next month only in Panama, Colombia, Paraguay and Brazil. But I could also squeeze in a couple of more destinations, such as San Diego, Mexicali, Ciudad Obregon and Mexico city. It would take some time from my visit to Brazil and also demand a lot more from me in planning and finding the right tickets. Not to mention the extra costs of going to these many places.
Suggestions?
Early training at Xtreme Couture today
I felt really tired this morning, when I woke up. Have definitely been a little too hard on my body lately, but I decided to go train a little bit in Xtreme Couture nevertheless.
It was just me, Martin and Kyle and we did lots of situation sparring for a couple of hours. Rolling with guys like this who are in really good shape, I can really feel how my strength has declined on the trip, not having done any physical training for more than three months. It was really good training though and when I first got warm and up in gear, I felt pretty good.
I will rest now before the competition on Saturday. I will be interesting to see how I feel, if this is enough time to recover. I probably should have stopped training a few days ago, but I didn’t want to miss out on training with Martin in the gyms here in Vegas. A good, solid warmup and I will be fine hopefully :D
100 days on the road today!
Today was my 100th day on the road. Looking back, it is weird to think that I have traveled for so long. In some way it feels like it has been a short trip and in other ways like I have been going for years.
One thing is for sure though, the trip has exceeded all my expectations. I have been to 35 places so far and met a ridiculous amount of fantastic people. Still over a month to go and I can’t wait to see what it will bring.
I have become extremely comfortable and confident in traveling. Moving around, meeting people, talking to strangers and figuring things out in far away countries has all become second nature. In some strange way, I don’t feel like I am away from home. Where ever I am at a given point, feels like where I want to be.
More training in Vegas tomorrow, rest Friday, worlds Saturday and Sunday, then on to the big South American adventure!
Made it to Vegas, trained at Drysdale’s first thing.
I left San Francisco early this morning after two good days there. It was a short flight to Vegas, where my friend Martin picked me up and we drove directly from the airport to Drysdale’s gym for a few hours of high intensity no-gi training. Robert was teaching a class on the guillotine which is something I have been working a lot on on this trip, so it was very cool to get some input there from one of the best in the world.
I had some good rounds of sparring. I feel a little tired and also didn’t want to go too hard at this time, but it was still very good. Lots of high level guys there.
Now we are resting a little bit before going to Xtreme Couture for evening training. I may or may not skip it, since I don’t want to risk training too hard only three days before competing at the Worlds in LA. I’ll see when I get there.
Made lasagna then trained with stranger from airplane.
I had the pleasure of not having to fly or go anywhere today, so I had a good night of sleep then just relaxed a little bit. I spent the afternoon making lasagna before it was time for training.
I had a lot of options for where to train during my short visit here, but one of them was more interesting than the others. I got an email from Tom, who had apparently been sitting next to me in the flight from Atlanta to San Francisco the other day, and noticed that I was looking at my blog on my iPad. He seemed to remember reading something about BJJ globetrotter at some point and looked it up. He trains near by where I was staying and invited me to come train, so that’s what I did tonight. Proof that BJJ is everywhere, even next to me in the airplanes :)
The gym was One World Jiu Jitsu Academy in Union City, CA. It was a small class with a handful of good guys with who I went some nice, relaxed rounds of sparring with. Very friendly people and a nice looking gym too. Lots of room!
Thanks to Tom for stalking me in the airplane, then inviting me to come by for training, that was awesome! :)
Location:Kingston Ave,Oakland,United States
