Copa Cyclone pics & Cauliflower ear

Cauliflower ear...

Well my cauliflower ear is growing a bit bigger so hopefully Dennis will be able to drain it tomorrow. Should make for some nice pictures and a video for another post. Andre also kindly exchanged me his headgear/ear guards for some açai money. I was contemplating leaving it for a bit, as a "badge of honour" kind of thing, but then I thought the chicks might not dig it. Plus memories of that time Kimbo Slice popped James Thompson's cauliflower ear with a punch... nasty stuff *shudder*.

Training & Daylight savings...

Today I just did two sessions of training. Morning 8am class and the no-gi class. I rocked up right on time at 8am (or so I thought) but there were already guys, mainly the older guys, there that looked like they had been rolling for a while. I was kind of confused but just thought that the older guys decided to start earlier today. But then the muay thai guys showed up early too and started their class early AND later that afternoon while watching Dennis and the guys train the 6:30pm class showed up early as well.

Finally I found out that my time was 1 hour behind and there had been a daylight savings change that I was totally unaware of. Which is lucky or otherwise I would of continued showing up late to classes by an hour haha. It was a strange day, time wise.

No-gi was good because Zé Mario was there at the no-gi class again, which was cool to see, and also because Antonio Braga Neto took the class today. Neto's a really nice guy (I think all the Brasilians I have met so far are nice guys) and greeted us (the gringos) when we were at the Copa Cyclone competition, wished us luck and told us to relax etc.

We drilled an escape from mount and how to reverse a guard pass. Then did some positional sparring then normal sparring.

Pretty much all the guys in there are black belts too. Well except for some purples that come and the blues, but I'm the only white belt that's been going there atm. Definitely learn a lot each session and I'm curious to see what my no-gi game will be like by the time I leave.

Mario Sperry...

Every time I see him there he's always giving some tips to the other guys or showing them something "new" or a variation. I can't understand the whole explanations, but sometimes it sounds like the other guy would be doubtful on how a position or technique would work then Zé says a few words and you see the look of realisation/understanding on the guys face.

Copa Cyclone Tournament...

Anyway here are a few pics from the Copa Cyclone Jiu Jitsu Tournament 2009. I'm going to load most of them onto my facebook and then post a link to the album once I'm done. The tournament was over two days, Day 1: whites-blues-purples, Day 2: browns and blacks.

Leozinha (on the right) before his match...

and looking at the guys giving advice while working for the guard pass

Zoro and Leozinho

Tarsis (guy on the right)... won his match on points. Tarsis is a really a top bloke, he remembers my name (real one, not 'Pacquiao" :)) always greets someone with a smile and introduces me to any people I haven't met before.

Neto winning his match... I think he finished all the guys in his matches. I kind of feel sorry for them because they probably thought they'd do real well till they found out he was competing.

Anyway I'll save the rest for later. If there's any topics or suggestions people have on what I could blog about please let me know. Also please feel welcome to leave some comments and feedback on what you think of the blog so far.