Happy Monday Team!
Fresh off another competitive weekend in which we saw a number of our grapplers make some noise at Grappling Industries this Saturday.
Big congrats to the veteran competitors Paul, Madison, Isis, and Gianna for their predictably strong performances.
Jason and Joe both competed for the second time, which massive improvements in their game.
And debut athlete Andrea made some waves on the mats with some seriously impressive matches.
Thanks to all the students who step out of their comfort zone to showcase all the hard work we do here at the academy. It shows!
Competition is not a necessary part of training, and in fact only a tiny percentage of us at North Star will step onto the mats, into the ring, or into the cage. However, maintaining a strong competition culture keeps us sharp — if we are winning, we know what we do is working, period.
I also want to touch on our curriculum choice in our Striking 201 program for the next few weeks. I’ll be honest, one of the reasons Jiu Jitsu is so fun is due to our ability to safely spar on a daily basis. This allows us to actually develop realistic fighting skills without all the damage that comes along with it.
We will be making a big push to get ALL of you ready for some level of sparring (not necessarily full contact competitive sparring, of course!). A big part of this is etiquette — basically, understanding the how and the why behind certain approaches, and being able to separate our egos from our performances in practice.
Muay Thai sparring is incredibly fun, and is the pinnacle of all training. Pad work, shadowboxing, contact drills, etc — these are all precursors to getting in there and developing your literacy, your timing, and your personal style through technical, smooth rounds of light contact.
I look forward to the next few weeks working with you all. Please make sure to bring all your protective gear, and pick up a mouthguard ASAP.
Again, we will not be doing any hard contact to the head during our regular class, so no worries there — but owning and maintaining clean, quality gear is an essential part of being a Nak Muay and building those habits takes time.
I’ll see you all on the mats!