After a hectic last week, including my university convocation (BSc at age 20, little premature wouldn't you say?) and news of my acceptance to UBC business school, I have gotten back on track with training. My Mom's visit had some perks, other than her company, of course, including a brand new set of extra douchey spandex workout gear. As much as I am opposed to people working out in beaters and tank tops, I have to admit, for MMA training, there is nothing like Nike Dryfit and other brands of rash guards for mobility and functionality; that being said, I'll keep my muscle shirt under my T-shirt when I work out, I don't want to be a hypocrite and a douche bag in one fell swoop.
I'm gradually approaching my weight target, hitting 175 while still staying in shape. I can't stress enough how much effort MMA athletes put into cutting down to weight classes. I'm experiencing a very slackened version first hand and I have the utmost respect for these athletes. For a fighter in peak physical condition to cut 15 pounds to enter a new weight class is unbelievable; for me it might be a case of trimming down my doughiness, but these guys have no body fat and still manage to look athletic and no emaciated. 10 more pounds will be tough for me to cut, but I only hope that countless hours on the god-forsaken treadmill will pay off.
As I mentioned above, my acceptance to UBC came last week and with it was the contingent agreement that my parents would help me make my way to Thailand to train upon enrollment. UBC was kind enough to offer a $10,000 grant due to my citizenship and undergraduate degree, which only made my parents following through that much easier.
So, for now, I'll be doing more and more snooping around the web for tickets and supplies for the trip, of which I have a list that is 50 items and several hundred dollars long in the most conservative estimate. Tiger Muay Thai, in Phuket, has given me a lot of exciting news that I hope to share once things are set in stone in the coming weeks and all I can say is that if things go according to plan I can hope to have 1 or even 2 fights in thailand and an unbelievable experience in MMA.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
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3 comments:
Sounds like you got things moving for you... It will be interesting to hear how you cope when you get back from Thailand and get into the UBC work trend.
I am about to finish my PhD in London, and I am actually looking at post-docs at McGills, I have herd alot of good things about Canada and particularly montreal...plus I could continue to train at the highest of standards.
How expensive did you find training? in London nothing is cheap, but generally it is affordable to train and still have some fun.
Espelho
London, Ontario or England? Quite the change of scenery either way. As for training, I trained at GAMMA which is well known for its high caliber BJJ. With muay thai and BJJ I was paying 100+ for 3 nogi, 3 gi, 1 MT class per week.
Honestly though, I regretted training there at all. Tristar MMA is GSP's home gym and houses some amazing fighters such as David Loiseau and many, many TKO fighters. They have an amazing MMA program, whereas GAMMA is strictly BJJ with MMA tacked on very sparingly.
GAMMA is at the downtown core of MTL, 5 minutes from McGill campus, whereas tristar is a 20-30 trip by subway. The cost is comparable if not cheaper, but the instruction is infinitely better -- I learned nothing at GAMMA that I didn't teach myself or force someone to teach me.
London, England! I didn't even know there was a London in canada! lol.
But the change is actually what I am looking for and a few Canadian friends of mine suggested to me Montreal as the place to go, not only cz of the city but also cz generally you get the whole 4 seasons...its not just shades of winter and autumn ( I am greek so sun at least once a year is obligatory!!)
Training at Tristar would be awesome, but still I would have to see how convenient it would be to fit work with training. That is a bit too much money for me to pay prob but it is not extorionate if you are training 6-7 sessions per week. Realistically I would only manage about half that with my work load.
Cheers for the info though! look forward to the next post!
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