i get my belt tomorrow.

ok. first off, i havent been able to train NEARLY like i wish i could.

between baseball practices, and baseball games for jaiden and cooper, school functions, etc..... i have been to 2 open mats, and 4 actual classes since the final black belt test day.

i have been hitting my heavy bag weekly, working on combos from my striking manuals, combos taught by shawn tompkins, greg jackson, fedor, anderson silva, and bj penn.

i have read these manuals for YEARS, but really havent had the opportunity to focus on drilling them,,, but since i've been too busy to train in the dojo.. ive taken advantage of this rest period to work these into my tool box for future sparring sessions.

mainly what ive learned from these combos is that when working combos, especially with your hands, the first 1 , 2 or even 3 strikes dont really need to have the intent on actually LANDING.

they are set ups.

if they land, yay, but, changing levels between kicks and punches, and using feints is huge.

ive always worked the body, and that is going to become more and more prevelant. mainly, like the diaz brothers, to open up the head shots.

boom.

i look forward to working alot of these in live situations.

my sledge hammer and tire have been getting a major workout, and i have been swinging the shit out of kettle-bells.

a MAJOR part of my focus has had to be on my diet.

i have gained 5 lbs since bootcamp ended, and with my reduced cardio workouts at the dojo, and actually working my strength more, i am quite happy about that #.

i feel good, made it into the stripe test last night in colchester, and abused the hellll out of myself.

and loved it.

i am very much looking forward to tomorrows cermony.

and, my main intent remains to go full on in the jiu jitsu when baseball cools out.

thanks for reading.