Next Goal

Was out of town for a while, but back and on the mat in time for the start of the training week on Tuesday.

Did two classes that day, and also on Wednesday and Thursday. That's the end of our organized group classes, but I was training Friday at open-mat time, and again on Saturday.

Sometimes I run out of steam when training on my own. I'm way better with a partner, which is why I love it when my friends have found Jiu-Jitsu goals for themselves.

Saturday Cosme came, and wanted to run through his final BBS1 exam technical drill. That kept us fully employed for the entire time doing quite intense training.

The school is normally closed down totally on Sunday and Monday, however this is not the case this week.

Yesterday, Sunday, Koko and I got together for a couple of hours to work on her BBS1 exam first drill. We are doing so again today, and hoping to get it filmed and done.

After that, it's Tuesday and the regular class schedule kicks in again. I think it will be 11 days in a row of training for me.

I love it when other people have goals that get me more quality mat time.

I'm trying to come up with one of my own. Exams like Koko and Cosme are working on are totally optional. I did the one they're on back at the end of 2013. That was the highest exam available then, but a little over a year later BBS2 was released. Instructors have to do them, and I was part of the team that helped Shawn get his successfully completed through January and February.

I think I should get started on that thing for myself, although I don't have to.

The one I did do was the hardest exam I've ever taken. I trained with the exam in mind for over a year, learning each technique as we cycled through in an intense fashion. It's different than when we work on something in class without that motivation.

As hard as that test was, the BBS2 exam is worse. It covers about 20% more technique, and those are of a higher and more difficult level.

I've been once all the way through the BBS2 training cycle, and part way through again. I think after Koko's test is done, I'll switch over into pre-test mode.

The BBS2 test is divided into three parts. Perhaps I'll get right to work on the first drill. I've been through that stuff twice. It shouldn't take too many weeks to get it all reviewed and made sparkly. If that works, I would film it even though the entire process will take from now until well into next year.

Getting a successful film can take up to a million attempts. The weird thing is that it becomes relatively easy to do after that. If I get one done in say, October, I would keep right on doing them. I feel it's a bit of a cheat to do the drills months apart and submit them together for grading, although it isn't forbidden.

I would keep making recordings of drill one every couple of weeks until all of the others are done, too.

The class will finish the second drill material in our current cycle (my second time through) in October, and then I'll get that stuff ready, and filmed. Like drill one, I'll keep recording it every so often.

We'll finish the cycle before March, and then I'll give the final third drill the same treatment. The only difference is that this one will only get successfully filmed once. It, and the most recent versions of the other two will get bundled up along with the three mandatory sparring videos, and all uploaded to HQ for grading.

That will fill up every spare moment of training for me for a long time. It changes the way I learn in class, and I will be unable to “not get” any part of a technique. I'm pretty good at using open-mat time productively, but this will see me hurrying to get going and then doing so at a focused and intense level. It will see me practising things on unwitting bodies before and after every class.

Then, after an incredible amount of effort, and paying the $135 fee for the privilege to try, I just might pass the exam.

That would get me a little white piece of cloth with a few words on it which would replace one of my dull, boring, plain white belt stripes.

Can't say it's really about getting a different stripe.