Mock Tournament

One of the girls from the Women's Class is competing this weekend at a NAGA in Tampa. I am so excited. As this is her first tournament, Stephanie and I have been trying to prepare her for the intensity of a tournament grapple by putting on a lot more pressure and being a lot more aggressive in sparring. But last Saturday, we took it a step further and had a "mock tournament" during class.

(some of the girls from class)

Everyone sat along the wall. The girls that wanted to participate went up one by one to face off against me or Stephanie. Either Steph or I acted as a coach. We started off each match like it would go in a tournament, with the "ref" talking about the rules and asking each fighter if they were ready. We timed each match five minutes.

The girls have not started from standing very often, and they had never had to grapple with the whole class watching, with a coach screaming at them. It was a good exercise. They did some of the best grappling I've seen them do and they got a little taste of the adrenaline rush that they will experience when they compete. I was really proud of them!

We are going to try it again tonight, and this time I am going to have all the girls on the wall shout: half for one of the fighters, half for the other. And we are going to have two coaches, one screaming for one of my students and one screaming for me or Stephanie. Should be fun. :)

In other news, my son Noah did his first BJJ class this past week! As you can see, he is a natural born fighter. LOL

He absolutely LOVED it and can't wait to go back. I am excited about being able to do jiu-jitsu with him.