Winter Training

It can be hard to be retired. Actually, I'm lying. It's great.

For the first time ever, Helen and I were able to take off for the months of January and February. We live in a place that doesn't get “real” Canadian winter, but those months are normally unpleasantly cold and packed with rain.

Off we went for two months to Los Angeles. We like the area, and visited the beaches, Disneyland, Hollywood, and much more. Mostly, however, we were there so that I could train with Rener and Ryron Gracie and their team at the main Gracie Academy.

I would very much like to repeat the visit every winter. Two months were too much, considering the way I trained. I attended every class aimed at my level. That added up to 101 classes. In the same period a dedicated, but normal, student might attend 24. A month would be perfect.

Winter here really starts in November, and runs until March. Those are the cold, rain, and cloud months. We always want to be near home for Christmas, so December is strictly off limits.

For this coming winter of 2014-2015, the current plan looks like we will have two California visits. One will be a week of training in LA tacked onto a holiday with friends in Arizona. The other will be an LA-only training trip of about three weeks duration.

A winter of 2015-2016 training trip might be interesting. If my next two minor promotions happen exactly on time, I might just be ready for evaluation by the Gracies for Purple Belt. Such a promotion cannot be given by one's home school, but must be by direct evaluation. Being ineligible to test due to time-in-rank would move Purple a full year farther away to a winter 2016-2017 visit.

It would be possible to be evaluated earlier, say at the annual Seattle weekend seminar that happens each September, but I wouldn't do that. I don't like “tests”. If I did it in LA during an extended visit, they would watch me for the 3 or 4 weeks I'm there. They would pay attention to me during sparring sessions, evaluating every day. That's how they do it for their local students, and being there long enough they could do it to me, too. I like that.

So either the winter of 2015-2016, or 2016-2017 is my target for a Purple Belt.

No plan yet at all for the winter of 2035-2036.