Big Bad Buddha Belly

.... ah, so I've been sidelined with a knee injury. And so, I've taken this as an excuse to gorge on all the Holiday Goodness, including turkey, cookies, burgers, tacos and everything else that is sugary, greasy and oh so decadent!

It was also an excuse not to post on my blog. I don't know, it's tough to post on a blog especially when you haven't done jack and squat with regards to fitness. 

I'm back fully recovered so you'll hear more from me.

So tonight, I finally practiced at Seattle Jujutsu after a long hiatus. It's been so long that I almost forgot how to roll around, throw, and I'm not so limber anymore. I wasn't as gassed as I thought I'd be, but it finally felt good to actually practice a few throws and actually feel the knee all better.

I still wear a soft brace and I'm quite careful with it. I practiced for about an hour into the two hour practice, doing some uchikomis and throws. I had to bolt at 8pm because I committed to meeting some friends before the Holiday mayhem. It was all good, and I felt that it would've been a wonderful night of practice. I do miss rolling around Seattle Jujutsu.

So, why the Big Bad Buddha Belly, well being injured gives you excuses. And when I was feeling great, I had none and was pushing myself.  I could for example have gone swimming which woudl be gentle on the joints and do some yoga and lower impact stuff.

I'm really debating about continuing soccer for the next season. The commitment required and the benefit is just not enough for me. I love hanging out with friends. I like doing active stuff with friends. But the potential for injury is quite high!

Seriously, I went to a Sambo Summer Camp and we did leg locks, knee bars and heel hooks all weekend long. Guess what? I didn't get injured, while someone was actively attacking my knee joint or ankle joint.

In all my experience, joint problems usually don't result from locks. It's from the sudden jarring movement from other contact. Now a semi-contact sport like soccer is much more dangerous in my opinion, and everyone in my club agrees. At least with full contact you know when you're going to get hit, can easily relax and go with the flow. 

Anyways, I'm quite excited that I'm fully back up to speed. My knee feels great and it's recovered. Thank goodness!

Keeping my knee warm and mobile...

I got a soft knee brace at the drug store and headed over to judo practice. It's not unusual to have people putting all kind of braces at practice. Knee, ankle. etc... In fact the normal ritual of taping and bracing goes on at practice. In fact on one side of the dojo there's plenty of tape to go around. Toes, ankles, wrists, etc... It's all normal.

I can't run. Period. My knee still hurts. So I took it easy.

I did the warm ups best I could. I could only do forward and backward throws as rotating was hard on my knees. So I did mainly O-soto-gari for fits as it doesn't hurt the knee as much. The whole rotation thing was tough on the knee so I couldn't do my favorite throw which was seio-nage.

There weren't techniques taught tonight. Tonight was mainly a workout randori night. It was great because I can only really do newaza with one good knee. I was able to get in 5-6 rounds of groundwork. I didn't do any standing randori at all and just watched.

It was good as I was working on doing guard passes tonight, and overcoming the sprawl. I did some good guard passes as well as attacking the sprawl into a pin. I also worked on my transition from pin to pin, which was really cool. Mark showed me some keylock moves from the guard. I have to see him show me again which is really cool. I'm not used to getting attacked from the guard from the top. Meaning going over my shoulder to get a keylock on my arm and doing an ude-garami. I usually post and get a guard pass. However I'm not used to getting attacked from the "top" usually attacks come from the bottom. Meaning getting an armlock, a triangle choke or something similar from the guard, not a keylock from the top while in guard.

Tonight's matwork was fun. And it was great to get the blood flowing. I think it helps my knee to keep it warm and moving, but not push it too hard. It's a fine balance. As my knee was a bit hurt, I was trying to look for leverage and openings more tonight since I don't have the usual power when I do have a good knee.

Standing randori was good to watch, and there were some good throws executed by people all around.

My right knee HURTS!

Credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Knee_diagram.svg

Anyways, the inside of my right knee hurts. I'm no doctor, but it feels like my medial collateral ligament (MCL) was bashed up. At least it's not the infamous ACL (Anterior cruciate ligament).

The good thing is it just hurts, I hobble because of the pain, but nothing too major. (I hope). It could be a tendon too. Don't know. The last time I was hurting with the shoulder injury. A couple months back here:Shoulder Injury.

That injury was caused by an upper right bicep tendon tear which just needed Motrin, time and warm stretches to heal. I'm hoping that's it.

I just could not sleep last night because of the pain. I've been bruised up before with my rib hurting for a couple of days, but that was not that bad. Sure it hurts and can't sleep, but being ambulatory is a big important of normal every day life.

Speaking of other injuries. I've got a minor cauliflower ear on my left ear, but that's not that bad, it only hurts when I sleep on my left side. Anyways, with all that aside, you play sports and you will eventually get hurt a bit. It's a normal part of life. The thing is, I did not expect it from soccer. It was after all a Recreational "D" level league, or as recreational or non-competitive as you can get.

I still love it, though and it breaks up the monotony of the normal grappling routine. Which, I do love grappling and is still my priority. However, variety is the spice of life. The last thing I want to ever do is "burn out" which I often see happen in martial arts. Someone goes hard for very long and eventually burns out, not to be seen for a very long time. I've done the same. I think I'll be good to go once again.

Which totally bums me out about my knee. Tonight's practice, I was looking forward to it after a whole week of not going grappling due to a head cold. I'm going to get a soft knee brace for my right knee and see how that pans out.

I think I'm just going to pop a few more Motrin and call it good.

Soccer has got to be one of the more brutal sports...

Soccer is fun. Don't get me wrong. But I get beat up more in soccer playing goalie than being thrown at least 20x on the mat in judo. It's just a different type of hurt, mainly the unexpected jarring movements back and forth that is very quick. I bashed up my right knee and I'm hobbling a bit, which will need time to recover. Getting thrown in judo, I'm more used to. However throwing myself and diving for the ball is another thing.

One thing that I did not do is warm up. I was just barely on time for the game, and the game starts on the dot, and being a goalie means that I have to be there as I don't get subbed. I think the reason I was so stiff was the lack of warm up, once warmed up I should be good to go. As always, when I don't warm up I get injured. Bah. I've been so careful with my ankles and knees as of late that a knee injury sucks. It's nothing bad so far, it's just that it hurts... a bit.

Anyways, it was fun. I need to work on some of the angles and keeping balls away from the middle of my legs. I have a wide shoulder width stance and a fast ball going fast is hard to block. So i have to narrow my stance a little bit closer. As usual be on the balls of my feet and keep my knees relatively close to block. The worst part is that hopeless feeling as you're trying to get a ball in between your legs, when you adopt a wide stance. THAT SUCKS. It's one thing to dive for a ball and miss, but to miss a ball in between your legs is just embarrassing.

I do like the dojo version of Judo soccer where you just dog pile one another and play, tackle the goalie and what not. And really judo soccer is not really soccer, as the ball is merely an excuse to gang up on whoever has the ball.

I was out with a head cold last week, so I did not do any judo. My head cold is gone today. It was bugging me for about a week, and the last thing I wanted to do was to give someone a head cold grappling. It's just not cool. So I've been laying low for a bit. Consequently, I've been itching to practice and practice hard. Looking forward to tomorrow's practice at the Budokan tomorrow. Hopefully my right knee should be a wee bit better.