This was supposed to be the 2nd sub only event of the year for us, but The OJA one in Kitchener got shut down by the snowmagendonpocalyse that was a minor snow storm. It was pretty disapointing for everyone involved, but there was nothing the OJA could do, the venue shut them down. But, this post isn't about that It's about last weekends road trip to Montreal.
It started out like a typical drive to Montreal, so that means horrible traffic from Mississagua to Whitby. We headed out around 3pm, and got to our hotel at around 10:00pm. Which isn't actually that bad, we made great time past whitby, and only took 1 gas/food/pee stop.
We stayed at the Novotel near the Mirabel airport. It was only $100+tax per night, and had free parking and wifi. The parking and wifi are two of the biggest factors when I pick a hotel. It's great that a hotel is like 75 or 80 per night, but if parking is 15 bucks (or 20 or 25, or even 35) and there is a fee for the wifi, suddenly $100 looks a lot better. The room was quite nice, the headboards had cool lights built into them, that we didn't discover until we were heading out in the morning. We couldn't hear people in the hall, the beds were comfy, the room was big enough, and the bathroom was quite nice. The pillows were kind of flat, and there was only 2 on each bed, so that kind of sucked, but if that is the worst thing about a hotel, I'll stay again. The bathroom doors were weird, and there wa s a gap in them, which meant zero sound proofing. I swear, this is the one thing hotels can't get right. We DON'T want to hear everything that is going on in the bathroom!
Anyway... We did our ussual morning routine for these events, go weigh in for the very start of weighins, then head to Cora's for breakfast and back to the venue intime to digest, relax, and get ready to fight. Cora's is a bit pricey, but it's realiable, never very busy, and pretty close to the venue.
The event started with a 20 minute sub only super fight between Gabe Sagman and Steve Shipinkas. It was a pretty entertaining match and ended in a draw. Steve did get a penalty, which the reff used to award Gabe the win, but that was changed right away, since it was only 1 penalty, and it was sub-only, ect. Neither guy dominated enough to be declared the winner so a draw was a fair outcome.
Next up after the super fight was the GI Super Absolute. This was IBJJF ruleset, open belt, open weight, open gender and it was an extra $10 to enter. I admit, some of the match ups that happened were pretty interesting, but I am not a huge fan of the concept, especially the guys vs girls thing. I'll be the first to say that women should be allowed to compete in men's divisions if there is no one in theirs, but to hae the potential for a 120lbs white belt women to fight a 250lbs purple belt guy, It's just asking for injuries. There were quite a few girls in the nogi version, and none of them made it out of the first round (that I saw). I admire them for giving it a go, but It's not something I will ever do. Toronto's Sub only coming up in March has the trips as prizes for the super absolutes and I am pretty disapointed about it.
Anyway... The format for the tournament was round robin, where you get 4 (ish) fights, and then there may or may not be tie breakers. A win by sub got you 3 points, decision got you 2 points, and a tie got you 1. This worked pretty well, but got a bit tricky when you ran into people who didn't show, and people who dropped out to injury. These were treated as decision wins, and got the "winner" 2 points. I think, down the road, they would be better of re-doing the draws after weighins closed so that no-shows were eliminated and everyone got a fair shot at getting the full 12 points for 4 sub wins. After the round robin, if there was a tie, we did tie breaker matches. If, after the first 5 minutes, there was no clear winner, they fought another 5 minutes, and another 5 after that if there was still no clear winner. I only had a few of these come up, and almost all of them had subs in the second 5 minutes, or were clear cut after that 5 minutes. I don't think anyone ended up in the 2nd overtime.
I reffed for the first 1/2 of the morning, while switching off and watching a couple of new(er) referees. The I competed in my division (blue+ open weight) and went straight back to refereeing till the end of the day. My second fight was a real eye opener for me. I fought Ashten, and she is really tough! It made me see that I really need to tighten up my game and never give an inch. it was a really good match, and I look forward to competing with her again down the road.
As you probably know, grappling industries uses really small mat areas. It's something I've complained about as a competitor and a referee on many occasions. I know mats are expensive, and they have limited venue space, blah blah blah blah, but it is DANGEROUS to have such small areas, with such limited safety areas between them. Especially with inexperienced referees who cannot control the fighters they are refereeing. On Saturday, I saw fighters repeatedly ending up on the mat beside them, and even once, on the mat beside that. This is ridiculous. The referees need to be more assertive, and have better positioning, the fighters need to have better awareness of where they are, and the tournament needs to have bigger areas and/or bigger saftely areas between them.
This issue was highlighted by a situation that happened to me, while refereeing min-afternoon. I was standing at the edge of my mat area, keeping myself between the fighters I was refereeing, and the mat behind me, focused on those fighters, when, out of the blue I got full on taken out from behind. Thankfully, my fighters were still standing, were paying attention, and stopped and waited, while the fighters from the mat behind me climbed off me me (while i was pretty much face planted) and I dragged myself up. I rolled my ankle and got some pretty awesome bruises from the whole ordeal, which isn't to bad, all things considered, but it could have been MUCH worse and should NOT have happened.
On to happier things. Pura had a pretty great day, we had 4 people competing: Steve, Jon, Andrew and myself, and took home 6 medals. Steve won gold in gi and nogi, Andrew won gold in gi and bronze in nogi, Jon won Bronze in gi (did not compete in nogi) and I won gold in gi (did not compete in nogi). Steve was on fire, subbing all his opponents handily. Jon had a bit of a rough day, he'd been sick for over a week and was still quite under the weather, but he still managed to put a guy to sleep. Andrew dominated his gi division and looked good in his nogi division as well. His gi final was a tie breaker that he won after overtime by decision.
I'm not entirely sure what happened, but the gi absolutes for the guys just didn't happen. My division was already combined, so I didn't have one. Since there were supposed to be "Season Passes" for the winners of the absolutes, Andrew and Steve were suposed to compete for them. They both ended up getting a seasons pass, I guess because they were the only ones that followed up about it, or they gave all the winners one, I don't know. I also earned a seasons pass by winning my division (which was, in reality, an absolute). Having the season pass will be a nice cost saver for us, since we attend so many competitions and they add up quick.
As the day was winding down, some mats finished way before others, the mat I ended up refereeing at for most of the afternoon somehow had way way way more matches then the others, so I pawned a few off on 2 other mats. Then I ended up being done before one of those mats (the other still finished ahead), so I got some of them back. The guys were giving me "can we go yet" faces for about an hour and a half, so I found one of the other referees who had not started till later in the day, and got him to take over for me. Thank You for that! It made me get home at 2am instead of 3 or 4 am!
Yea, 2 am. We left the venue around 5pm, and it was snowing. Surprise, a snow storm, when we are on a road trip to Montreal. If we are going to Montreal, between Oct and May, there WILL be a snow storm. It's a fact, it's science, and it cannot be disputed. The 401 was snow covered and kind of drifty from Montreal to Kingston, where there was a bit of a break, then again from just past Kingston to about Ajax and sporatically on the outskirts of Toronto. Once we hit Toronto proper it was just went so we could make decent time. In the snow covered bits, we varied between about 60-80km/h. We saw a bunch of cars in the ditches, and a plow that looked ot be stuck as well, which is kind of hilarious. I was having flashbacks to last february's nightmare trip TO Montreal, but the good news is, my car handled the snow fine. It stayed out of my air filter, so I am confident we are going to get to the trials without any car trouble this year.
The event Photographer did a really great job taking pictures. He got a good mix of the mat areas, and got some great shots. You can see the album here on facebook. As ussual, there are plenty of pictures of me looking stupid while refereeing. I swear, not a single picture exists of my refereeing where I don't have a stupid look on my face, or am in an awkward position, or am just generally looking stupid or fat or something. I might have to open up a bounty for event photographers: First one to get a good, flattering, not ugly picture of me refereeing will get a prize.
That's about all I have to say, overall it was a pretty good event. It ran surprising quickly considering the format, but I would like to see longer matches, I think it would end up with less draws, but, then we need more mats, more refs, more staff, more space, or we would be there all night. I'm looking forward to their Toronto Event on March 29th.
Coming up next for me is the Abu Dhabi Pro Trials in Montreal on Feb 22nd. I'm attempting to cut to the -145lbs weight class, and let me tell you, my body is not a fan. It's not a fan of middle weight, let alone 145 with a gi on, but I think I will make it. I SHOULD be able to given what my scale says my body fat is, but who knows, time will tell. We have a pretty good size crew from Pura heading out for that Trip, so it will be a fun weekend!
Also coming up, just confirmed, announced, registration opened. Is Ascension on March 1st. This is one of my favourite tournaments of the year. Omar puts on a great event. I think I wil just be refereeing though, since Pans is only 2 weeks later, and last time (Ontario Open last year) I competed that close to a major event, it didn't quite work out my way, and thousands of dollars were wasted. Wasted might be a bit harsh, but I ended up on the sideline for months, wasn't able to compete at worlds, and wasted over a week of vacation time on the trip.
See you on the Mats!
Showing posts with label submission only. Show all posts
Showing posts with label submission only. Show all posts
Wednesday, 5 February 2014
Saturday, 13 July 2013
OJA Sub Only July 13th 2013 (recap)
Today was the OJAs first sub only tournament. They were supposed to have one in the fall(i think, maybe winter), but it didn't happen, trouble with finding a venue, scheduling, and who knows what else made it not happen. It seemed like this one wasn't going to happen either. It wasn't announced/confirmed util about 6 weeks before it, and information and details were slow to come out and sparse at best.
It was small, probably only about 50 competitors, but the ones that showed up fought hard and fought well. There were no ladies fights (other then a couple kids who were in mixed divisions), and no brown or black belts. The biggest division I think had 5 or maybe 6 competitors in it. The ladies mostly showed up last weekend to the mat militia sub only show, it was free, and announced way before this one.
The tournament started on time, and ran on schedule and ahead of schedule. There was 6 mat areas, but we probably could have finished the tournament just as quickly on 4. There was a lot of down time on the mats due to the divisions being small, and the posted schedule fairly spread out. It wasn't intolerable, and was actually a nice pace.
The kids divisions showed some great jiu jitsu. They were only allowed to do arm bars, and chokes where the referee can see the other kids face, like RNC, triangles not pulling on their head, collar chokes, and so on. Not a lot of kids came out, and I can totally understand kids(and their parents/coaches) not wanting to do the sub only format. I think they should probably not have kids divisions next time. That being said, I refereed Ever vs Liam, and these kids showcased amazing jiu jitsu, great cardio, and great heart. I was really impressed with both of them. There were also some younger kids on the match beside us that showed amazing transitions and flow. The future of BJJ in ontario is very bright!
There were some amazing fights in the blue and purple divisions to. I didn't get to watch a lot of the white, so I can't say for sure. But I did ref one between two guys who obviously knew each other well. They had a good fun match, probably should have focused a little more and chatted less. But it was cool to see the comradeship and whatnot. I could have gone without the coach(err friend, who really knows if anyone actually considers Mike a coach) heckling and whatnot, but whatever.
The blue belt absolute had some crazy matches. Myles triangled Sean Kent quickly in the 2nd round and everyone was in shock. Myles has a ridiculous guard and I hope, for the sake of all the up and coming blue belts, he gets his purple belt soon. The podium for the blue absolute was gold/silver closed out by Kevin and Kofi from gringos, with the bronze medals going to Matt from pura and Myles from united.
The purple absolute podium looked like this:
1 Alasdair Barr Pura BJJ
2 Greg Deniken Matador BJJ
3 Adam Blackadder Matador BJJ
3 Lonnie Warner Gracie Humaita
There was even a white belt absolute! Which the OJA doesn't usually do, but did anyway, I think because it was a sma turnout and we had time or it. Here are the white belt winners:
1 Donnie Mckenzie BTT Canada
2 Dean Wheeler Kumo Jiu Jitsu
3 Mark Riley Bruckmann MMA
3 Nick Routier Gringo BJJ
Here are the complete results.
There were a few hiccups, of course. This was the first event of it's type in ontario. There have been other sub only events. But they were invitationals, or open weight only, or more like shows. This was the first tourament, open to everyone, with divisions and whatnot. There were some complications which deciding and sticking with how long the matches would be, but it all worked out in the end. If the silly boys had just listened to me when I said the original way they were doing a few things was unfair and didn't make sense, it would have saved me some headaches and probably others. But hey, it all worked out in the end, and no adult fights ended in a draw. (any that DID have a time limit didn't hit them).
I think one of the really important things that kept the double dq from happening and got us home on time was the fact that you could lose by stalling. We called staling pretty quick, and they stacked up like they normally would in a regular match. So there was no stalling out to rest or keep a dominate position. I don't think anyone actually got dq'd for stalling, but knowing it was possible kept people active.
My team mates had a pretty good day. We only had 3 guys out, but they managed to place second in the team rankings! Yes, it's a small tournament, and gringos, at #1 was way ahead. but still, there were a bunch of teams with the same or more competitors.
That's about it for this event, it was a short day, so it gets a short post!
Next weekend is the grappling industries summer havoc. Round Robin, early weigh ins, and smooth running make this an event worth showing up to. They did raise the prices, but there is no sanctioning/organization fee so it's basically the same as it was before. They are giving away a bunch of trips to 2 different ibjjf events. Mostly for the guys, but 2 for the girls. All you ladies need to get out to that event because it's such a good opportunity to get lots of matches, and maybe win a trip to a cool tournament in a new city. I hate that I can't fight, but refereeing is going to give me more then enough trouble with my arm as it is. Today wasn't to bad, because there was no points to give out, but when i raised one guys hand with it, he was excited and swung it way up fast, and that hurt like a mofo.
Two weeks after that is the IBJJF Toronto Open. This event was a bit small last year, but well run, and a good event. I'm hoping it grows a bit this year, and we can one day rival the New York, Boston, or Chicago open (of course, the ontario open rivals them, but it's not an ibjjf event, but it's just as good as them).
A couple weeks after that is grapping industries sunshine blvd. Then the GTA Classic. I don't have a link for that yet.
Lots of good stuff going on in the GTA for the rest of the summer.
See you... around, mostly on the sidelines.
In case you are not up to date on my shoulder situation:
1. I have an MRI scheduled for Sept 26th
2. Every medical professional (2 very experienced physio therapists, the best sports doc in the country, and his resident surgeon) all came to the same conclusion about it. That I have a torn labrum, possible torn rotator cuff, and a highly unstable shoulder. That all have said it will probably need surgery, but they won't order it without an MRI. I sure hope I can get a cancelation, or can pull some strings to get that MRI moved up, because at this rate, I don't even want to think about when the surgery will be and how long after that I'll be back. I generally love our health care system, but it's times like this that I curse it.
3. It was feeling better 2 weeks ago, then I trained a bit, and it got very bad again. I accidentally slept on it a couple nights and it hurts really bad in the morning when I do that. I thought maybe the injury had been in my head, or that it wasn't as bad as it seemed, or that i donno, it was't as bad as it seemed first off, but the way it's been the last week makes me think It really is that bad :(
4. I'm trying very hard not to get horribly depressed about it. It's difficult because I am a total endorphin junkie and being so inactive is really difficult for me.
Tata for now!
It was small, probably only about 50 competitors, but the ones that showed up fought hard and fought well. There were no ladies fights (other then a couple kids who were in mixed divisions), and no brown or black belts. The biggest division I think had 5 or maybe 6 competitors in it. The ladies mostly showed up last weekend to the mat militia sub only show, it was free, and announced way before this one.
The tournament started on time, and ran on schedule and ahead of schedule. There was 6 mat areas, but we probably could have finished the tournament just as quickly on 4. There was a lot of down time on the mats due to the divisions being small, and the posted schedule fairly spread out. It wasn't intolerable, and was actually a nice pace.
The kids divisions showed some great jiu jitsu. They were only allowed to do arm bars, and chokes where the referee can see the other kids face, like RNC, triangles not pulling on their head, collar chokes, and so on. Not a lot of kids came out, and I can totally understand kids(and their parents/coaches) not wanting to do the sub only format. I think they should probably not have kids divisions next time. That being said, I refereed Ever vs Liam, and these kids showcased amazing jiu jitsu, great cardio, and great heart. I was really impressed with both of them. There were also some younger kids on the match beside us that showed amazing transitions and flow. The future of BJJ in ontario is very bright!
There were some amazing fights in the blue and purple divisions to. I didn't get to watch a lot of the white, so I can't say for sure. But I did ref one between two guys who obviously knew each other well. They had a good fun match, probably should have focused a little more and chatted less. But it was cool to see the comradeship and whatnot. I could have gone without the coach(err friend, who really knows if anyone actually considers Mike a coach) heckling and whatnot, but whatever.
The blue belt absolute had some crazy matches. Myles triangled Sean Kent quickly in the 2nd round and everyone was in shock. Myles has a ridiculous guard and I hope, for the sake of all the up and coming blue belts, he gets his purple belt soon. The podium for the blue absolute was gold/silver closed out by Kevin and Kofi from gringos, with the bronze medals going to Matt from pura and Myles from united.
The purple absolute podium looked like this:
1 Alasdair Barr Pura BJJ
2 Greg Deniken Matador BJJ
3 Adam Blackadder Matador BJJ
3 Lonnie Warner Gracie Humaita
There was even a white belt absolute! Which the OJA doesn't usually do, but did anyway, I think because it was a sma turnout and we had time or it. Here are the white belt winners:
1 Donnie Mckenzie BTT Canada
2 Dean Wheeler Kumo Jiu Jitsu
3 Mark Riley Bruckmann MMA
3 Nick Routier Gringo BJJ
Here are the complete results.
There were a few hiccups, of course. This was the first event of it's type in ontario. There have been other sub only events. But they were invitationals, or open weight only, or more like shows. This was the first tourament, open to everyone, with divisions and whatnot. There were some complications which deciding and sticking with how long the matches would be, but it all worked out in the end. If the silly boys had just listened to me when I said the original way they were doing a few things was unfair and didn't make sense, it would have saved me some headaches and probably others. But hey, it all worked out in the end, and no adult fights ended in a draw. (any that DID have a time limit didn't hit them).
I think one of the really important things that kept the double dq from happening and got us home on time was the fact that you could lose by stalling. We called staling pretty quick, and they stacked up like they normally would in a regular match. So there was no stalling out to rest or keep a dominate position. I don't think anyone actually got dq'd for stalling, but knowing it was possible kept people active.
My team mates had a pretty good day. We only had 3 guys out, but they managed to place second in the team rankings! Yes, it's a small tournament, and gringos, at #1 was way ahead. but still, there were a bunch of teams with the same or more competitors.
That's about it for this event, it was a short day, so it gets a short post!
Next weekend is the grappling industries summer havoc. Round Robin, early weigh ins, and smooth running make this an event worth showing up to. They did raise the prices, but there is no sanctioning/organization fee so it's basically the same as it was before. They are giving away a bunch of trips to 2 different ibjjf events. Mostly for the guys, but 2 for the girls. All you ladies need to get out to that event because it's such a good opportunity to get lots of matches, and maybe win a trip to a cool tournament in a new city. I hate that I can't fight, but refereeing is going to give me more then enough trouble with my arm as it is. Today wasn't to bad, because there was no points to give out, but when i raised one guys hand with it, he was excited and swung it way up fast, and that hurt like a mofo.
Two weeks after that is the IBJJF Toronto Open. This event was a bit small last year, but well run, and a good event. I'm hoping it grows a bit this year, and we can one day rival the New York, Boston, or Chicago open (of course, the ontario open rivals them, but it's not an ibjjf event, but it's just as good as them).
A couple weeks after that is grapping industries sunshine blvd. Then the GTA Classic. I don't have a link for that yet.
Lots of good stuff going on in the GTA for the rest of the summer.
See you... around, mostly on the sidelines.
In case you are not up to date on my shoulder situation:
1. I have an MRI scheduled for Sept 26th
2. Every medical professional (2 very experienced physio therapists, the best sports doc in the country, and his resident surgeon) all came to the same conclusion about it. That I have a torn labrum, possible torn rotator cuff, and a highly unstable shoulder. That all have said it will probably need surgery, but they won't order it without an MRI. I sure hope I can get a cancelation, or can pull some strings to get that MRI moved up, because at this rate, I don't even want to think about when the surgery will be and how long after that I'll be back. I generally love our health care system, but it's times like this that I curse it.
3. It was feeling better 2 weeks ago, then I trained a bit, and it got very bad again. I accidentally slept on it a couple nights and it hurts really bad in the morning when I do that. I thought maybe the injury had been in my head, or that it wasn't as bad as it seemed, or that i donno, it was't as bad as it seemed first off, but the way it's been the last week makes me think It really is that bad :(
4. I'm trying very hard not to get horribly depressed about it. It's difficult because I am a total endorphin junkie and being so inactive is really difficult for me.
Tata for now!
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