Check the WGC website for details about the camp coming up July 20 - 24 in Minneapolis, MN.
So I wrote this draft like 4 months ago, but I kept not posting it because I kept adding people and events and details. WGC coming up this month made me think of this draft so I decided to post it as-is. I can never finish it; it was futile to attempt. So, again, lest I fall into the time trap and never post this...here goes:
Drafted Feb 2011
Women's Grappling Camp was an amazing experience, for which I would like to write a worthy testimonial, but at the moment I am *almost* at a loss for words. I never did "camp" when I was younger, so I didn't know how amazing the immersion and the camaraderie would be.
I guess I'll try a little chronological brain dump. My coach, her 2 daughters, and I went down Friday to catch the Friday night meet-and-greet dinner and we left Monday morning around 11:30 so a nice 2.5 days. This whole deal was very cool for a few reasons. First, car time with my coach (Kelly) who was asked to be an assistant coach. Secondly, I've always wanted to get to know her daughters better, who are growing up in a jiu-jitsu family as Kelly and her husband Marc own a BJJ school in Truckee. I kid you not when I say her youngest routinely betters my jits game when we spar because she *thinks* in jits. Her older daughter I've never rolled with, but is a technician in her own right. And not to leave out their youngest, Keegan, who I'm pretty sure doesn't even get an accelerated heartrate during competition because he's done so many and done so well. Since it was Women's Grappling Camp, Marc and Keegan were left to fend for themselves over the weekend and have man-time. They were still alive upon our return.
We arrived 4ish on Friday to Felicia Oh standing on the balcony. Felicia Oh. Did I say Felicia Oh. Everybody knows who Felicia Oh is, but I did a little additional video homework on her before coming, about which every few minutes I had to point out details like "um, did you see that, let me rewind it, look how she chose to go that direction, did you see, did you see, how do you even go there. So, we arrive and I meet Felicia Oh, who, at this point, seems pretty normal, like no wrath of deity at her fingertips. Meet and greet was genius, a really nice opportunity for everyone to meet, well, everyone off the mats and get the warm-camp-fuzzies started. A nice opportunity to get names and backstory. I fear starting into any specifics about each women I met lest I leave anyone out, but what is cool is that over the camp I feel like I did get to know everyone. And I am not that person at a party or an event or get-together. It was just so easy. I got to know everyone enough to know that the camp experience attracts exactly the right kind of energy. The range was from white belt through black and from competitors to hobbyists.
Saturday we were up for some breakfast with my teammates Lena and Rita, who I was very happy came to this also. Let me also, as gently as possible, say that Rita is a woman of color in a city of very, very few people of color. At breakfast I was making her laugh with my experiences as the minority in some of the schools I went to in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. I just wanted her to know she isn't alone and I've got her back. Lena, poor thing, was slumming it with us as she is used to a more upper-crust accommodation so we teased her mercilessly about being a little princess. Pretty sure I'll pay for that soon.
At the school, which was beautiful, it was all energy and a little tiny bit of nerves. Everybody was ready to go and difficult to round up because 8 or so mini-groups of chatting about BJJ or kids or training had all broken out. It was often like mingling at an overwhelming cocktail party. Like, seriously, the most awesome cocktail party you can imagine. Saturday was set up as gi in the morning and no-gi in the afternoon and then Sunday was the reverse. Felicia Oh pulled us in for some intro and warmup and we were off. She showed a cool warmup drill and a technique involving posture and escape from bottom half guard. I don't want to slaughter her carefully crafted details so I won't even go into my pitiful notes.
Imagine when the instructor says, "Okay, pick a partner and drill this" how cool it would be if you could literally just look to your right or left and bam there's a partner.done. No looking around the room trying to do the size-up and choose game. No getting the cold shoulder from the guy beside you who doesn't want to get paired with the girl. No looking at the person next to you wondering when that gi was last washed. So easy, partner picking was like, some eye contact, little hand gesture and we were off drilling the technique. "Switch partners"; look to your other side, shoulder shrug, okay, done, drilling. Very cool to have a room full of drilling partners. So cool!
A break was factored in for some hydration, snacks, notes, whatever and then we were back at it. Building from where we left off, situational drilling, etc. A long-ish lunch break left plenty of time for shower and food. After lunch we were back in for no-gi, which I enjoyed about a thousand times more than I expected to. In general, once I decided to start training with the gi, I literally never trained again without it so I expected no-gi to be all frustrating and ridiculous, but it was fun, fun, fun.
Felicia Oh (yes, I must use her full name everywhere, get used to it) opened the afternoon session with some additional warm-up drills that extended the morning series and included movements we would use in this session. And when showing us a neck warmup she just posted on her head and toes like it was nothing and did some yesno's. Hi, I can't hardly do that on my knees with my hands on the ground. So, hello brand new goal. Then more technique picking up where the morning session left off although I had to squint through the blinding light that was Felicia Oh.
Lily Pagle opened her school to this event, and then she opened her home to us for a dinner/potluck which included bonuses like an outdoor hot tub; heaven. Lily is a woman that knows how to live. It was in aforementioned hot tub that we solved major dilemmas like how to control my high five anxiety and there was some tattoo show and tell as I'm pretty sure this community has a greater than average incidence of tattoos.
Sunday morning Valerie Worthington, Valhalla, arrived. I was very excited to meet Valerie, as I've said before, hers was the first BJJ blog that I read end to end. Don't be fooled by her constant, and I mean constant, stream of jokes, [and, ahem, attempted jokes], as she is a serious technician. She basically hit the school straight from the airport and got us all kicked off on flow rolling. We alternated through until we had flowed with everyone in the room. Which was easily my favorite, favorite, favorite time at camp. Flow rolling is the.best.thing.ever. I love flow rolling, and if you're reading this I'm going to assume you understand, and thus save us all from me trying to explain it. I got to flow roll with my, well I'm not ashamed, hero. It was short, but there was a "very good" or some such praise in there, which was great. I obviously can't explain it except to say that higher belts feel like they're melting around you and then you're tapping.
And a small handful of shout-outs:
Susan - is so tall that she gives spider guard a whole new meaning; in fact I may start calling it Susan guard. So happy to meet a comedian after my own heart.
Denise - I always love rolling with because she is so strong and aggressive, but her heart is perfect. This is a wonderful mix and I sincerely appreciate it.
Brandi - we got in some weird places where neither of us knew what to do, but we kept our sense of humor about us and trucked on.
Sasha - was taking it easy, so a cool mental game unfolded.
Hedwich - you say frittata, I say love.
