Montreal Grappling Sept 15

Yesterday was the last road trip to Montreal for the year for me, and it turned out to be quite the grueling adventure. What should have been a 6 hour drive took 8.5 hours. A bad combination of rain, construction, and accidents left us driving at a crawling speed for the majority of the way there.

 Then, on the way home, what should have been a quick in and out stop for a bite to eat at shoeless joes in Cornwall turned into a 2h+ horrible experience of waiting, being neglected, having hair in my food, and then having to wait some more. It was terrible. I am never going to eat there again. I think we will stick to Pizza Hut in Kingston from now on.

 The hotel was an adventure as well. When we got there, there was no indication of where to park, so we were a little lost on what to do, Matt ran in to ask, and after waiting a while and stuff was told I had to come in and check in, and then we could park. Well, that took a while as well, but we got it sorted and headed down to the underground parking. It was mega sketchy but after an 8- point turn I managed to get the car parked. 

We got up to our room, and it smelled pretty bad.  I don't know what happened it it, but it was smelly,  like a diaper, mixed with mold and i don't even know what else.  I tried to stay positive about it all, and whatnot, but it was terrible.  The room was also insanely run down, and the bedroom door had a hole in it!!  after a few minutes we decided we couldn't stay in it and went down to the lobby to ask for a new room.   After humming and hawing the very nice lobby guy gave us a new room.    It was WAY nicer!  It seems the hotel is in a process of renovating all the rooms.  The sofa bed was unsleepable,  but the sofa it self was quite comfortable for sleeping.   All in all, it was fine, but I'm not sure I would stay there again.  It was pretty cheap, but for obvious reasons. 

Alright, On to the tournament!!

We had 6 people from Pura compete this time around, which is a new record for us at these tournaments.  It was great to have so many friends make the trip down together and be there to support each other.   

Brad sporting his hard heard silver

Josh pulling a Rafa Mendes armbar

Brad competed in the -150 intermediate no gi, and blue -150 gi.   He placed 2nd in the no gi and did great in the very competitive gi division as well.    It was a lot of fun watching Brad compete.

Josh competed in the -150 advanced no gi, and blue -150 gi divisions.  He had a bit of a rough go in the no gi, but seemed to be enjoying himself anyway.  Gi went better for him and he placed 3rd. (Montreal Grappling only does medals for 1st and 2nd, so no hardware for Josh :(  ).

The goofy newfy ruining someones day with a sprawl

 Stephen, the goofy newfy, competed in -170 advanced no gi, and -170 blue belt gi.   He also had a bit of a rough day, but I think it was a good learning experience anyway.    There is no better way to learning then competing, and you win much more from a loss then an easy win.








 

Matt playing deep half guard. setting up a sweet sweap

Matt competed in the +190 advanced No gi, and the +190 blue belt gi.  This was only Matt's 2nd competition as a blue and He fought well!  In the No Gi he competed against Alex Fraser, a black belt in judo, and blue in bjj. Alex has already won 1 trip from Montreal Grappling, and Matt gave him a run for his money.  I was really impressed!  The other guy in his no gi division was a brown belt. I know Matt wasn't to happy with how his day went, I've been there, done that. But he did really well and should hold his head high!

Alasdair after the gi final

Alasdair had a great day again.  He placed 3rd in the No gi, and 1st in the -170 gi.  He made it to the final of the blue belt Gi Absolute, then lost a very close fight to Alex Fraser.    The final of the -170 was a great fight to watch.  The guy he beat was also a judo black belt and had ridiculous base and posture.  

 Alasdair and I chatted for a bit about winning.  There is a lot of pressure on us to win, because we've made a bit of a habit of doing well.   A lot of people just kind of expect us to win and don't realize that It's just as much work and just as hard for us to win as it is everyone else.   It's nice to have a team mate like Alasdair who understands what that's like and has the same kind of pressure to preform. 



I had a pretty good day as well.  I went in with a plan to try to work on parts of my game other then arm bars, because, if you know me, you know I love to arm bar. arm bars from guard, arm bars from side control, mount, triangles, half guard, I don't care, I'll try them from anywhere.   In my first fight, I stuck to this, and won with an american from side control.   Linda was super tough and fiesty,  She'll be a force to reckon with in her own weight class!

  In my 2nd fight, I got disqualified for reaping the knee. OOOOPPPS  It was a stupid mistake on my part, and I didn't even have my foot touching her hip before i was like "oh no leg doesn't go there" and took it back, but the ref saw and called it right away.   It's good to see the refs on top of the rules, but it was pretty frustrating for me because I hadn't put any pressure, and had moved it off before it was even called.   This is probably the one rule in BJJ that I find the most ridiculous.  It should be a warning, or even an advantage for the other person the first time, then 2 points the 2nd and then a DQ.  and instant DQ for it is kind of crazy.

My 3rd fight didn't happen because the other girl was injured in an earlier fight.  I hope she's ok!!  In my fourth fight I threw out my original game plan because I needed to win it to move onto the final because of my stupidity in the 2nd fight.     So I was all business and won by arm bar.       This made it so that we had 1 girl that was 4-0 and 3 of us that were 3-1.  So we did a 4 person bracket after the round robin. 

I was paired up with Stephanie for the semi final.  She had looked quite tough and dominated in most of her fights so i wasn't going to mess around to much with her.   I had locked on an armbar, and though she tapped on my leg so I eased off, but I guess it was only 1 tap, so she kept going, so I kept going,   shortly after that I slapped on another one and she tapped verbally.

In the final, I fought the girl who I was dq'ed against.  She had won every other fight so far today So I knew I had to take her seriously.   We had some good stand up exchanges and I got a throw in.  I don't remember which one though.   I actually don't remember much about a lot of my fights,  good thing the videos will be on youtube soon.   Anyway,  like in my semi final, I got an armbar,   she yelped so I eased off, but the Reff didn't hear, and she didn't stop so shortly after I caught her in another,  but she tried to roll, and the way she rolled it ended up going on way tigher, and she tapped mid roll, but the way we went, I couldn't take the preasure off.   I felt so bad, and was pretty frustrated with the whole situation.

  I absolutely HATE it when people get hurt doing jiu jitsu.  I know it's part of the sport and shit happens, but so many times it's avoidable by taping sooner!   I try to always give people a chance to tap when I lock on a submission before I start to really put the pressure on, but so many times girls will still try to escape and then I have no choice but to put them tighter!  I'm not a mean spirited person, I'm not out to hurt people, but I'm not going to let you out because you can't admit when your caught.    I feel so bad when girls have to ice their elbows after fighting me,  It makes me want to quit jiu jitsu. 

Mandy and I after our gi fight

In Gi, there were only 2 of us.  So we had 1 match.   Mandy is a brand new blue belt, and smaller then me so I went back to my game plan of not doing arm bars.   I worked a bit of De La Riva,  and some guard passing.  I got to side control a few times and was trying to set up a brabo choke but after a while realized I was setting it up all wrong and abandon it.   She had great defense to all my attacks and when I heard my team mates yell there was 30 seconds left, I set up an armbar for the finish. 

Team Pura

So that was our day.   All in all, Montreal Grappling ran a great event as usual.  We started on time, and ran smoothly the entire day.  The super fight was very entertaining with an amazing come from behind finish!    Congrats to Jon-Taine Hall on the great finish and the new baby!! 

Dainis going for a triangle from the bottom.

One other thing,  My Friend Dainis made his Montreal Grappling Debut this weekend!  He fought in the -170 advanced no gi, and the purple and up absolute.  He is always a pleasure to watch compete as he is so technical and calm in his matches.   He ended up winning the -170 and placing 2nd in the absolute, losing a very close match to Alex Fraser.   In the Purple and up absolute, It was a small division and he had a great match with the giant brown belt that Matt had fought earlier in no gi. 

 

The next Montreal Grappling Event is November 10th.  Sadly, we won't be sending a team because we are having a big team thing that day.   But you should check it out.    Also coming up from Grappling Industries (the people behind Montreal Grappling)  Is the First TORONTO GRAPPLING GRAND PRIX.  This is the tournament to be at this fall.  They are giving away a pile of trips,  it's going to be round robin. and It's going to be amazing.   I can't tell you how excited I am for this tournament to be coming to the GTA.  You NEED to be there. 

Next weekend is the GTA Classic(formerly Bravado).  It should be a really good event.  They run a top notch tournament and i'm really looking forward to it.  We have quite a few people from Pura registered and I'm really looking forward to watching them all compete.   I'm registered in blue medium heavy, and I'm all by myself right now.   I'll gladly move up to heavy if someone registers there.   I am slowly working my way down to middle,  hopefully by Provincials I'll be there!     Also coming up is the next Zombie Leauge Event, It's No-Gi this time, and they are planning on having a ladies only division.    I don't think I will be attending because I have a dentist appointment that was set up like 10 months ago :( 


I'm going to be running some kind of contest here on my blog soon.  The prize will likely be one of the prizes I won yesterday at the Montreal Grappling event.   I've just got to figure out exactly what the contest is going to be, so keep your eyes open for it, it's going to be something fun. 


See you on the mats!