A Diary Of My Journey Through Martial Arts

Thursday morning S&C

When most of North London’s residents are tucked up in bed at 6:30am on a Thursday morning, at CFS HQ the rattle of keys can be heard as the gates are unlocked and the first student arrives for their first strength and conditioning class since arriving back from holiday. Leisurely mornings in the Emerald Isle enjoying a nice cup of tea and a bacon sandwich while looking out over the Atlantic seem a distant memory as I willing step into the room that I know in about 1 hour I will we crawling out of.  

Guru D’s teaching and also participating in the S&C class today and he begins with a light warm up of 3 quick rounds of 10 squats, 10 jumping jacks, 10 seals, 10 cross over’s, 10 pogo’s, and 10 lunges. Then as he starts to place the kettle bells out and pulls the dips and chin-up bar into the middle of the room I know the real work is about to begin, the urge to turn and leg it back to Alexandra Palace where I know there’s a nice warm king size bed with a little Welsh honey in waiting for me is quickly suppressed as the blinders come down and the focus that I’ve learned to harness during the last 2.5 years of CFS training kicks into gear.

Guru D directs me to the 20kg kettle bell and we begin - 10 double hand swings, 10 right hand swings, 10 left hand swings, then 10 interchanging swings (all without putting the kettle bell down). x3 sets of these.

Next Guru “very kindly” gives me an additional 20kg kettle bell and demonstrates how to do a double clean, he makes these look pretty easy and goes on to do x3 sets of these (bearing in mind he was using 30kg bells (so 60kg in total). My plan is to try and mirror Guru’s technique and amount of reps as closely as possible and I feel rather positive seeing as I have 20kg less to clean then he does, this positivity is short lived as I just about manage to do 6 reps. I complete my 3 sets but only manage 6 reps in each, I’m content with this as the hardest thing to swallow when training is not finishing the allotted sets, I always try and do the full 3 sets even if I can’t manage the full amount of reps. It’s better to do even a little then just give up. I’ve found that a big part of the battle is training your mind just as much as your body, telling yourself you can finish the sets you’ve been given to do and actually coming out of the other side of them strengthens your mind as well as your body.

Then we moved on to x3 sets of single bell (20 kg for me 30kg for Guru D) clean and squats, after which I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror at the end of the gym and noticed that my lips had turned a strange shade of blue as the exercise sucked most of the oxygen out of my body, a chilled 60 second rest and it was back to work.

10 vertical pull-ups + 1 dip, 9 vertical pull-ups + 2 dips, 8 vertical pull-ups + 3 dips, and so-on until you finish with 1 vertical pull-up + 10 dips.

We finished off by using the Bulgarian bag (which isn’t something I’ve done much work on before) and I did x3 sets of 10 around the worlds (right and left)  + 10 push-ups. I find when I do a new exercise for the first time that trying to focus on getting the allotted amount of reps done can be difficult as your concentration is weighed more towards trying to get the technique right and this saps just a much mental energy as it does physical. Anyway, I did ok for my first time and finished my 3 sets, though I did have to stop a few times to try and correct my technique as it kept slipping due to fatigue. Guru knocked out 5 sets in about 3.5 minutes.

So that was the welcome back strength and conditioning session courtesy of CFS. Not most people’s idea of a fun start to a Thursday morning, and if someone had asked me a few years back what I thought about training at 6:30am I would have struggled to see how someone could possibly get enjoyment out of it. But when you’re a part of a team like CFS your surrounded by other people who’s drive and ambition spurs you on and allows you to achieve your own personal goals. The things you can take away from training with people like Guru David, Corey, Steve, and Andrew M don’t just relate to martial arts and lifting weights. You’ll find that the drive, focus, and desire to achieve crosses over into all aspects of your life, it can help you progress in your work place, or it can make you a better person when it comes to your family life. SO SIGN UP TODAY!!!      

Another mile stone tonight in my BJJ training, Guru D added a stripe to my white belt which brings me up to four. I’m knocking on the door of blue and hopefully this year might be the year that it opens.

Early morning CFS strength and conditioning session

5:45am – Get out of bed

5:50am – Wash face with ice cold water and soap

6:00am – make breakfast (1 whole egg + 2 egg whites, scrambled. 1 slice of whole meal toast, 1 cod liver oil tablet, 1 glutamine tablet, 1 Berocca in half pint of water)

6:15am – get changed into gym clothes and drive to CFS HQ

6:30am – light stretching while we wait for Mr. Marshall to arrive

6:35am – some light hearted banter about what we have to look forward to in the next 45 minutes (its plainly obvious that this is to try and mask the trepidation we all feel before the session commences)

6:40am – Mr. Marshall arrives and we begin with a light warm up (3 x sets of 10 squats, 10 jumping jacks, 10 seals, 10 cross over’s, 10 pogos, 10 lunges)

6:50am – Mr. Marshall starts to setup 3 work stations for a session of circuit training, the trepidation that we were trying to hide earlier requires no banter to disguise it now, we all know that the pain is about to begin and it shows on all of our faces

Station 1 – close grip pull-ups (1 pull-up, jog and touch the wall. 2 pull-ups, jog and touch the wall. 3 pull-ups, jog and touch the wall. All the way up to 10 pull-ups and then start from 1 again)

Station 2 – 8 x squats with kettle bell, then mountain climbers for 90 seconds. 3 x sets of these

Station 3 – 8 x kettle bell snatch, 2 minutes of step-ups. 3 x sets of these

Rounded all off with some pushups.

7:30am – END OF Session: Once I’ve gotten over the urge to start crying and have pulled myself together Guru D helps me off the floor and the combined relief we all feel for getting through another session is clearly visible.

7:35am – protein shake and a banana and then drive home for a shower. On the way home I drive past queues of people standing at bus stops who have obviously only just rolled out of bed and have chucked some clothes on and are heading off to work. It feels good to know that myself and the other CFS guys have already done more exercise in the previous hour then most of these folks will do all week

8:00am – Off to work for a full day of a different type of pressure, its definitely not going to be as enjoyable as what has preceded it in the morning.

A big thank you to Andrew Marshall and the time he gives us each Thursday, if you don’t want to be just another person waiting at a bus stop in the morning and want to live life to the max then start your day with a session with The Android.  

What a night it was tonight at CFS HQ for all of us, we had the great privilege of having a visit from Alan “Finfou” Nascimento whose a good friend of Guru D. 

I always like to remind myself that I’m extremely lucky that i get to train with Guru D and the other CFS family as its pretty rare to have such close access to a BJJ black belt and other highly skilled practitioners, so I know I have to be doubly thankful when we get sessions like we did tonight. Not only was the gym filled with an extremely high level of martial arts talent, it was also filled with an amazing air of positive and focused minds that were brought together as friends with a mutual hunger and drive to train and understand a martial art that we all love.

We spent the evening training some half spider techniques which were taught in a way that we all understood even though there were people at different levels in the group, this is the sign of a great instructor and mirrors Guru D’s teaching technique very closely. After training a few of us went and put our stomachs through a good workout over at the Chinese buffet where Finfou treated us to some great stories of his early steps into training BJJ back in the Brazilian favelas, he’s humble beginnings make his rise to his current status even more of an achievement, I bet there’s few of us that have had to worry about not having the money to even buy a gi to train in. What an amazing and humble guy he is and hopefully we can start to make some trips to Stockholm this year so we can go and train at his academy.

No-gi, gi, no-gi, gi, around and around the cycle goes when training BJJ!!!

The key to being a truly rounded practitioner of the art is to ensure that you understand both gi and no-gi fighting. I’m not sure who originally provided the quote but the only person I’ve heard it from is Guru David Onuma so I’ll credit him, it goes “You can’t understand no-gi BJJ without having understood gi BJJ first”, and how true this is. So having come to the end of our current cycle of no-gi training, tonight marked the beginning of both our weekly sessions returning to the gi, and following what I felt was my rather successful introduction to no-gi training over the last couple of months, I was brought back down to earth via a couple of sparing sessions with my teacher that ensured I won’t go getting ideas in my head of being able to tap out every fella that dares to cross my path : )

Today we learnt a cool little drill for getting your opponent back in guard when they try to pass it, we also drilled an intricate little process for passing your opponents half guard that after some more practice will come in very handy.

Anyway, I’m currently counting down the days until the 27^th November as its the CFS biannual seminar which offers a chance for all of the CFS Tribes from around the country to come together and enjoy a quality day of training and sparing with fellow students, click here for details if you interested in attending.

I came extremely close to getting my second tap out on a blue belt last night, again it was someone who weighs about 15-20kilos more than me and is also extremely strong. I locked off a triangle choke about 60 seconds into the 10 minute spar and gave it everything I had to keep the pressure around his neck (at one point he stood completely up and I was still hanging from his neck) but alas he wouldn’t submit. Great session anyway!!

Tonight was my first night back at no-gi training after a relaxing week with SF chilling and enjoying the food in Sicily, it was a packed house at the CFS House of Worship with 8 students choosing to come and put their spiritual resolve to the test. Religion often plays a big part for me and other students during a tough sparing session when you may often hear “Jesus” and “God” mentioned, however you would be mistaken in thinking that I had found religion when in fact what you’re hearing are cries such as “Jesus Christ, how the hell did you manage to submit from there”, or “God almighty, I’m struggling to just breath let alone try any techniques when I roll with you” (this is usually after a spar with Guru and/or Corey D).

Anyway, it was great having so many people training and hopefully another example of the ever increasing reach of CFS and its affiliated students, I even heard rumors that CFS brand can be found on top of active volcano’s now.

With it being Monday myself, Guru, and Steve drove up to Mill Hill Combat and Conditioning tonight to train with Nick Brooks and his team of young outlaws. Guru has been a friend and training partner of Nick for a while now and the bond between both their camps continues to grow as members from CFS BJJ in London, Manchester, and Bournemouth have taken up the chance to train at the Mill Hill venue on many occasions.

Mill Hill has an eclectic mix of characters and skilled BJJ practitioners of all levels and its always a pleasure to get the chance to train there. Some of the regular faces you will see and may get the chance to train with if you choose to visit the academy are Nick Brooks, Daniel Strauss, and Andrew Marshall, checkout the instructor page on their website here . I was lucky enough to get to roll with Nick Brooks (a Black Belt under Roger Gracie) and not surprisingly he didn’t have to do much for me to end the 6 min round absolutely shattered, he did take some pity on me in that he didn’t choose to make me tap out. I then had to face two purple belts who also gave me a good kicking. GREAT FUN!!!