Choose Strong
For Tim.
Over three and a half years, it felt the sport had broken every part of my body
and miraculously nature pieced them back together, with no permanent damages. As
a result, I had indeed become stronger, in most parts.
Nov 28 open-mat was a treat, but the moment I stepped out of the gym, I felt
pain in the upper back rib cage as if the inhaling lung ballooned to push from
the inside into something broken. What went wrong and why? I had no clue, but
what followed was a sleepless night. I hiked as planned with my nephew on
Saturday and reaching the top of Mission Peak, the pain seemed gone and that
night I got my sleep back.
It turned out to be a nagging pain, however, and into Dec, I started to suspect
a broken rib. It hurt each time I propped on the right elbow to get up. I
seriously thought my jiu-jitsu days were over. But by Friday, the pain was
finally gone and I went to the gym feeling good as new.
On the non-training days, I follow a 333 weight-lifting plan, three days a week,
three to five sets a day, and three to five reps per set, and cossack-squated
with a 40lbs kettlebell. I chose this move because my glutes and quads sored
after every hard sparring session and I thought they were my weak link. So far,
so good.
Learned the electric chair with Darren and Brian showed me how to break the
opponent's posture in reverse x-guard before entering the saddle.
Middle of the month, my left knee acted up. Pressure on the inner thigh close to
the joint hurt more than that on the other leg. Sliding at certain angles
underneath in sparring seemed to hit that spot. Sometimes, when relaxing, e.g.,
right after waking up in the morning, something inside the knee joint throbbed.
It alarmed me and reminded me of my top priority.
Christmas day, the gym was packed. It seemed our open mat was getting more
popular every week. People I knew, like Cha and Ron, came all the way from the
East Bay. Darren was happy and we had a great roll and I did on him a
lapel-choke which he taught the week before.
After my 48-hr annual holiday fast, I biked to the gym on Sat Dec 28 and had fun
drilling some de la riva moves with Max. During our spar, I elbowed Ryan's nose
and it took more than 10min for the bleeding to stop. It was the first time the
two of us rolled and, a three-stripe blue belt, he was more skilled than me.
Nonetheless, I felt terrible.
In the locker room, E broke the news to me that Machine, our instructor, flew to
Wuhan to meet his girlfriend. ``He'll be back second week in January,'' he said.
``Unless he got married and grounded there. He is a quiet person, very private,
as you know, and he thought his love life a secret but it was the worst-kept
one. Everyone knew!'' We had a good laugh. I was sincerely happy for coach.
Due to the injuries, Dec 2024 saw me only 10 times on the mat, my lowest
attendance except for the month I took off last year. I felt totally okay,
however, as this was a long game for me. It reminded me of the game of trail
running: when the ascent's getting steep, just shorten the strides and lower the
step count per breath cycle. I'd rather stay a one-stripe blue belt training for
the next five years than a purple belt quitting with a broken knee.
