After my last tournament I went right back to class the following night.  When you fall off you have to jump right back on that horse right?

I went to the no-gi class but wore a long sleeved compression shirt since I had a little mat burn on my elbow from a couple of weeks earlier.

I can’t say for sure that it was from this class, but the following morning I noticed my elbow was really red and swollen around where I had the mat burn.  It was nearly two weeks old and since I cut it, I always wore a bandage and sleeves (or a gi) so I wasn’t expecting it to get infected.

Worried, I called up my doctor and was able to see him that morning.  Turns out it was staph and he put me on some antibiotics.  About three days later, it was only getting worse so he gave me a new prescription for a different type of antibiotics and marked on my arm so I could easily tell if the infection was spreading.  At this point, halfway up my forearm, to about halfway up my upper arm was red, swollen, and in extreme pain.  It was worse than my shoulder surgery I had about a year earlier.

My doctor gave me a 48 hour window to monitor the progress.  If it didn’t get any better I was instructed to check into the hospital for iv antibiotics since it was likely a MRSA strain of staph that is extremely resistant to antibiotics.  After 48 hours the progress was minimal, so I gave it another day.  I’m glad I waited because the following morning it was MUCH better.  It took about a week for it to fully subside, but it’s 100% now.

The worst thing was staying out of the gym for a month.  I could have gone back sooner, but with the holidays I was getting a little lazy.  I plan on returning soon.  Oh, and I’ll be wearing my new rash guard, since those Nike/Under Armour compression shirts don’t seem to block out bacteria like a real rash guard.  Looking at them side-to-side, you can really tell the difference in the material.

This weekend was my third tournament.  Finally time for me to win a match right? I mean afterall, I’m now a two-stripe white belt! With more tournament experience than most of the other white belts at my gym.  Well, it didn’t quite work out.

No Limits hosted a tournament and the turn out was pretty good.  With most of my training focusing on the gi lately I opted to not compete in the no-gi division.

My first match was against a fellow white belt who pulled a great throw on me right off the bat.  I hit my head on the way down and literally blacked out.  The next thing I remembered was him with his knee on my belly scoring points then transitioning to mount and pulling out an armbar.  I later found out from one of his training partners that he is a Judo brown belt.  I don’t know if that’s considered sandbagging or not but he definitely had an advantage with the takedowns.

After that, I had to go up against one of my training partners.  I pulled guard on him (my favorite. Ok, more like the only thing I am comfortable with.  He managed to sweep me into full mount.  I used my favorite sweep to end up in his guard, rather than full mount (I’ll post about that soon, it really works out well for me and I seem to be able to pull it off very easily against most people).  During the sweep though, he managed to get ahold of a gi choke that I couldn’t get out of.

For the rest of the day I filmed some of my training partners in their match.  Since we had our belt promotion the day before, many of our members were competing at a higher belt level for the first time.  I think it showed as overall, the recently promoted guys didn’t do all that well.  That’s ok though, everybody seemed to have fun and it was even the first tournament for quite a few of us.

The major downer for me was that I received a mild concussion from that throw.  For the rest of the day my head was pounding and I was extremely dizzy.  I got home around 7pm and passed out for over 12 hours.  Not a good idea!

So needless to say, I’m going to be focusing on keeping that chin tucked when going down to the ground! I’m usually good at it when pulling guard or with any of my takedowns, but getting thrown like that totally caught me off guard.

After three tournaments, my record is a lopsided 0-7.  If you’ve been reading this blog though, you know I don’t take it too seriously.  I love training, but I never expected to be competing like this when I started out so it’s really just for fun.  Win or lose, have fun.  Right?

I was both surprised and honored Thursday night when my teacher told me he was promoting me to two stripes.

It may not be that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things, but it feels nice to be rewarded after all this hard work over the past four months.

The ceremony today was nice. We had around 100 students show up and all of the instructors were there. The best thing was that our teachers’ professor was there all the way from Sao Paulo, Brazil to give them another stripe on there black belts.

He gave a speech in Portuguese that was obviously translated into English for us. One thing he said really stuck with me. He told us that if we felt like we deserved a higher rank, then to keep working hard and prove it to them for re next belt promotion. If we felt like we didn’t deserve the rank (I fall into this category) then the instructor obviously sees something in us and wants us to work up to the level we think we should be at. Needless to say, I’m going to continue to work as hard as possible and be the best I can be.

I don’t know if there is really an actual tournament season for jiu jitsu but with the two that I am competing in within one week sure makes it feel that way.

As if I wasn’t tired and beat up enough from Sunday’s tournament, I did two classes on Monday night and another one last night (Tuesday). About halfway through last night’s class I began to get really sore. I was useless when we began rolling.

One of the good things about my gym is that we have multiple instructors. They all teach different things and I learn new techniques all the time. In the first class on Monday we drilled some great counters when getting swept. They are very useful and I wish I had learned them sooner. I used to prefer to learn new submissions when I train but now I am realizing that positioning, sweeps, counters, and defense are key.

I was planning on doing my lifting routine this morning and no-gi class tonight but my body is wrecked and needs to recover. Hopefully I can make it to the gym tonight and lift then do a gi class tomorrow. It’ll be my last one before Sunday’s tournament.

If you are in the Orange County area you should definitely come to No Limits for the tournamnt. I should have a camera for this one so I can film some more low-lights (a.k.a. my instructional series on what NOT to do).

I did a lot better yesterday than my last tournament.  Granted, I went 0-4, but I actually performed to the best of my abilities and earned some points.

When I arrived at Big John’s he and the girl working the registration desk talked me into also competing in the absolute division.  I’d still go against white belts, but there was no weight classes.  I reluctantly agreed since it was free but I was pretty nervous about it.

I started with my weight class.  The first guy was my weight (155) and I jumped into guard. I have terrible take downs right now so that was the best I could do. I went for a triangle and he escaped and passed to side control. I got into half, but he got back out and took mount. I swept him and got back into his guard then he pulled a triangle when I was trying to pass and I had to tap.

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I’ve had some good training over the past month or so despite taking a week off because of the flu. Wednesday night I rolled with my black belt instructor for the first time. He toyed with me for a couple of minutes while I tried to pass his guard. He pulled a sweep I’ve never seen before and ended up in mount. It only took a couple of seconds before he cross-collar choked me. It was a lot of fun though.

I’m currently sitting at Big John McCarthy’s gym waiting for a tournament to start. I decided to come at the last minute and drove up by myself this morning. I’ll be sure to post my result later. It’s a gi competition today and I am far less experienced with a gi but as I said before, what do I have to lose?

We are having a tournament at our gym next weekend so I hope this is some good prep to let me know what I need to work on this week.

Octagon at Big John McCarthy

This video is courtesy of Mikey Triangles on the Sherdog grappling forums.

The triangle is one of the most common submissions and it was the first one that I learned. I really like how intricate it can be with the different ways to set it up. In this video Mikey shows an advanced method to land a triangle — by flying up after a duck under.

It’s sick and must be viewed, especially if you’ve never seen it done before. I don’t think I’m ready to try it quite yet but I’d like to practice it soon!

I’m a little late on posting the results of the tournament.  Watch the video below to see why.  Read the full post to read more about it. (Click here to watch it in 720p HD)

My first BJJ Match from Jeffery Patch on Vimeo.

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I’d been on a cut diet over the past couple weeks ever since I knew I would be competing in this tournament and managed to get to 148lbs (from 155lbs) for the featherweight class.  Only problem is that the second day of the tournament required weighing in with your gi AND being 2lbs lighter for the same class.  My gi weights 3lbs so that means I had 4lbs to cut.

Here’s how my day and weight cutting went:

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This weekend will be my first tournament. I’ve been training about two months so it may be a little early, but everybody recommends trying your hand at competition. I don’t have high hopes if winning anything, but I’m sure I’ll learn something.

If you want to check out the tournament, head over to iGrap. It is part of the Southern California Martial Arts Convention being held this weekend in San Diego.

I’ve been training hard over the past two weeks to prepare and my jiu jitsu has improved a lot. It’s pretty surprising when you start feeling comfortable rolling and advancing position or landing a few submissions. Definitely a good feeling!

Wish me luck.