No jammies

Two teens and four adults. That's the number of White Belts qualified to attend the Saturday morning class. One of the adults is me.

I've attended three of the Saturday classes so far. At two of those sessions I was the only White Belt there, and it turned into a private class. The other Saturday I had to share the instruction with one other White Belt.

Haven't seen either of the teens there yet. The two of the adults haven't shown up either. OK, one of the adults has a rib injury and has been away for a while.

Last night, another teenager reached the point where he was invited to start coming Saturdays. Will he come? Will he stay home in his jammies watching cartoons? He seems keen.

I like group classes more than private ones, but nothing beats the solo sessions for speed of progress.

I hope none of them show up until after I've completed my Blue Belt exam. I want the best preparation possible.

After that, I hope they all start coming. I'll even start nagging them at the evening classes to start attending on the weekend. One of the rules is that students need a dozen Saturday classes as part of their qualification to test. Never come, never test, never move on to the advanced class.

At the weeknight classes, we usually work on one standing and one ground technique, and a number of variations.

On Saturdays we do all the techniques that are related. It might be all side mount stuff, or all guard, or side mount, or standing. We rapidly go through all the tricks in rapid succession. It is about ten times harder, and three times faster. The four groupings also correspond exactly to what we have to do when testing, with a fifth part being freestyle fighting (which is really just an unscripted run though of any and all of the techniques for 5 minutes).

If I were both a bajillionare and already retired, I'd like to go spend a few months in Los Angeles training at the main Gracie Academy. They have 11 White Belt and 11 Advanced classes per week. I'd attend as many as my old hide could take, and also do a bunch of private classes.

I don't see how the jammies and cartoon thing is more attractive than training.