Jaeimseu
3rd Black Belt
I experienced my first actual BJJ class tonight. Although I pretty much knew what to expect, it was still awesome. I live in Korea, and the class is taught 100% in Korean, so I can't understand the explanations in their entirety, but fortunately I have a long martial arts background, so I am able to pick up a lot by observing the instructor do a technique, and I was able to feel whether or not things were working, both when I was doing something and when something was being done to me.
It was a great experience for me to be a white belt again. The instructor is also a longtime Taekwondo practitioner like me, and everyone was chill and friendly. The class was relatively small (6 students) and we were all white belts. I'm not sure how many non white belts there are. This is a new school.
We worked entirely from the ground tonight. i had a lot of fun. I got a mental and physical workout. It's really quite amazing to feel so helpless when someone puts you into position correctly.
We finished by "rolling" with the instructor. It was comical to me, because all of us knew going in that we were going to get "killed." Two things struck me. The first was just how quick and agile the instructor was from his back. I felt as if I was at a disadvantage, even though I began from a standing position and he was laying on his back. Of course, there were ground rules in place so I couldn't attempt to punt him or anything, though I got the impression that it might not have made a difference. He was able to read my body and anticipate where I was going to move when I was at a certain distance, and he was able to feel where I was going when I was close. It put me in the interesting position of just trying to hold off the inevitable. The second thing that really impressed me was how little energy he had to expend. He took on four guys, one after the other. Two of us outweighed him by at least 10 kg, but it didn't matter. Each of us was breathing heavily after just one "round." At the end, he wasn't breathing heavily at all. He looked like he could have just kept going all night.
I can't wait for tomorrow!
It was a great experience for me to be a white belt again. The instructor is also a longtime Taekwondo practitioner like me, and everyone was chill and friendly. The class was relatively small (6 students) and we were all white belts. I'm not sure how many non white belts there are. This is a new school.
We worked entirely from the ground tonight. i had a lot of fun. I got a mental and physical workout. It's really quite amazing to feel so helpless when someone puts you into position correctly.
We finished by "rolling" with the instructor. It was comical to me, because all of us knew going in that we were going to get "killed." Two things struck me. The first was just how quick and agile the instructor was from his back. I felt as if I was at a disadvantage, even though I began from a standing position and he was laying on his back. Of course, there were ground rules in place so I couldn't attempt to punt him or anything, though I got the impression that it might not have made a difference. He was able to read my body and anticipate where I was going to move when I was at a certain distance, and he was able to feel where I was going when I was close. It put me in the interesting position of just trying to hold off the inevitable. The second thing that really impressed me was how little energy he had to expend. He took on four guys, one after the other. Two of us outweighed him by at least 10 kg, but it didn't matter. Each of us was breathing heavily after just one "round." At the end, he wasn't breathing heavily at all. He looked like he could have just kept going all night.
I can't wait for tomorrow!
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