One-on-One

Karate doesn't work for me on Saturdays, but Jiu-Jitsu is starting to.

At Karate, there were only two people present. One was a White Belt, and the other was me. He ended up getting a private lesson. I wouldn't mind at all, but that's how Saturdays usually run lately. This is not efficient.

At Jiu-Jitsu, it was my first private lesson in almost a year. It was the start of my accelerated training plan.

The lesson went really well. I feel confident I can now work on the material by myself and properly learn it.

The instructor had to leave right after my lesson, and the guy that was supposed to be there for the open mat time didn't show up. I agreed to lock up at the end so the instructor wouldn't have to come back later.

Saturday open mat time is usually pretty dead. There were three of us there. One was a Hapkido Orange Belt, working on his stuff off to one side.

I offered to do whatever the Jiu-Jitsu White Belt wanted. I was somewhat surprised that what he wanted was to free role. I agreed, as long as he would agree to take it easy. I know I wouldn't hurt him, but I don't need any of my old bones cracked.

Off we went. Like most people inexperienced in rolling, he was far too tense and hyper. In no time he noticed he was risking exhaustion, and geared down a bit. To keep it light, I'd stop the action every so often and show him something. Then back at it. We kept going for the better part of the hour. It was nice and playful, which is part of the Gracie philosophy.

I like seeing patterns in things.

Today I was a one-on-one teacher, and a student, and a training partner. It was three hours of training, with one other person at a time.