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| *as in the pizza eating ninja not not the genius painter /inventor |
Dan worked hard to shape the team with an enhanced Nogi programme, extra sessions, structured drills, tons of sparring and inspirational rants that eventually devolved into character assassination on whoever was foolish enough to miss the sessions.
Oh and guillotines, Dan loves guillotines!
By the time of the tournament we were a team, a cohesive fighting machine, a happy few, a band of brothers. We were even supposed to have custom rashguards but were let down by the manufacturer who clearly didn't want the publicity of a dozen podium pics.
Lacking any viable means of transport I managed to blag a ride with Dan along with my teammate Michael Hawkins. Dan had messaged me to ask if I was allergic to dogs so shouldn't have been surprised when he turned up with one yapping away in the front of his car. I was put on dog protection duty or rather car protection duty, tasked with sitting in the passenger seat and ensuring that the dog at my feet didn't make contact with the plush leather interiors of Dan's BMW, I was given a basket and used it to erect a dog proof blockade while trying to maintain a comfortable balance in leg room between the dog and myself on the journey down to Dartford.
We had a bit of an incident on route when a cheerful van driver took exception to Dan's driving, this quickly escalated to slanging match at the lights with both parties goading each other to get out of there vehicles. I was trapped between the two combatants, sitting completely deadpan with a dog on my lap praying we would get to the competition without Dan choking some poor guy unconscious in the middle of the North Circular. Yet another reason for not starting fights with strangers, you never know if the other guy is and ADCC competitor. Thankfully the lights changed and we speed off, once again cutting up the van driver.
Arriving at the venue I was impressed by the level of skill shown in the white belt division as I followed the progress of my teammates. One guy who had been desperately cutting weight in a sweatsuit thirty minutes before was wearing a groin guard (illegal) under white vale tudo shorts and clearly no underwear (super illegal and really gross). Having already armbarred two guys the referee finally spotted the infringing object and gave him two minutes to remove it, as he went to the changing rooms I was praying he'd come back with some pants as the last line of defense had now been stripped away.
Our two white belts made it to the bronze medal match and decided to fight each other in the spirit of friendly competition. This started out with a bit of back and fought, a flowing series of positional exchanges that got progressively harder as the match progressed, like when you say you'll roll light but by the end of the round its turned into the Mundials finals (ok maybe that's just me?).
In fact the whole team did fantastic with too many great performances to note, (although if I don't say how well Mike did then I'm liable to loose an arm) we came together providing support and advice where appropriate or just shouting the time.
As for me, I managed to take gold in my division, starting off slow in the first match I managed to catch a couple of half guard sweeps ending the match 6-0. My opponent was attempting to guillotine me but I didn't feel they were dangerous, opting to use his resulting lack of base to come on top and work to pass.
My second match was over quickly as I was able to use my faithful triangle set up (details of which are too secret to mention here). In the final I managed to sweep and pass before it ended up back on the feet after a scramble.There was a quick medical break to attempt to stem the flow of blood from my opponents ear, I wondered at the time how it happened but remember now my attempts to go knee of face (a rather painful technique but it's a Carlson Gracie run competition so it would be rude not to). After the restart I worked my way to my opponents back and sunk in a rear naked choke.
I also had a disastrous run at the absolute division, initially drawn against one of my teammates we managed to switch the brackets which put me against an ultra heavyweight. I was able to break his closed guard and was moving around his open guard when he wrapped my foot, the referee warned him that he was close to reaping but given the weight discrepancy even at this point my knee made an audible pop and both myself and my opponent stopped what we were doing leaving the referee bemused. I moved off the mat and spent the rest of the afternoon sitting with an ice pack, a bit of a downer to an otherwise great day.
Video courtesy of Louis Coakley
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