Three Friend Saturday

One of my pet peeves struck again.

I was in the city on Saturday to train at the North Vancouver Bazilian Jiu-Jitsu school. The class was excellent, and there was a generous amount of sparring at the end. One of the people I got to roll with was an old friend who moved to the city about a year-and-a half ago.

She didn't train at all for the first year after her move, and then started up at the North Vancouver school. During the roll, she apologized for not having improved.

At the time, she was giving me all sorts of trouble.

If she had not progressed at all, I could have run rough-shod over her.

I was better than her back then, and I've improved a lot in the meantime. I have trained for hundreds and hundreds of hours since her move. I know a lot of stuff now that I had no clue about a year-and-a-half ago.

The version of Elizabeth that I rolled with on Saturday would have been able to easily dominate and submit the version of her from the middle of 2015. She has gotten better, even if she can't see it. Sure she could have progressed more with more consistent training, but she has still improved over what she had back then.

Another friend of mine, Tobias, was also there, dropping in. He often feels himself getting stuck in a plateau situation, and not progressing. We rolled, and it was vastly fun. He has it all over me in athleticism, and our skill sets are pretty close. He hasn't brought the topic up lately, which is good, as I've never seen his progress stagnate.

It would have been wonderful enough to be able to train with two friends, but it was a very good Saturday indeed. There were actually three of them there. I got to train with Koko, as well. She never complains about lack of progress. She has been living in the city for a few years while attending university. During breaks back home, she practices like a crazy person (almost like me), and when at school she trains with the SFU Judo club. Some things get rusty and away from her. It has to happen in her situation. She just accepts that, and keeps her basics solid as stone, and then works some of the fun stuff when she's home.

By chance, all three of my friends wear three stripes on their Blue Belts. Their very next promotion is the last that they will receive before making the transition to Purple Belt.

They do not award Purple Belts to people who are not up to standard.

When the time comes, all three will be seriously able to kick that test's butt.