Last night I had my first amateur MMA fight, and it was amazing. Turns out my opponent had a fight before, against a guy from my gym at 170lbs. They fought at the last event we held, which I have on dvd so I got to scout him a bit. Although he had cut down to 155lbs, I had cut plenty myself so I wasn't at a size disadvantage.

Just getting in the cage was a hell of an adrenaline rush. With all the people screaming and my corner yelling last minute instructions, my heart was going a mile a minute. As soon as the ref signaled us to start, we came out and touched gloves, circled for a second or two, then both simultaneously threw and landed a jab. We exchanged for a little while, then I took him down. My exact memory of how it went from there is a bit fuzzy, but I kept control of him for most of the round. The second round was more of the same, I landed more punches and was able to take him down at will. He did reverse me a few times to get on top, but I was in control the majority of the time I think.

I was bleeding pretty heavy from the nose, which isn't a surprise for me at all. My nose always bleeds when it gets hit, so it wasn't a big deal. Just looked cool, haha. Between the second and third round, it was obvious he was really tired. I was a bit gassed myself, but I think I was a bit fresher. The round started just like the rest of the fight, a few exchanges on our feet, then I took him down. I ended up passing to full mount, and started flurrying and pounding him pretty good. He was just covering his face while I beat on him, and the ref was standing over us telling him to improve his position or he was gonna stop it. He turned over, and I made the mistake of going for the rear naked choke instead of continuing to pound his head.

I went for the choke before I got my legs in to spread him out, so I got too high on him and he reversed me, getting into full mount. His jitsu was pretty bad and he was trying to pound me, so I turned over to my back. He went for the choke, and my arms were exhausted from all the ground and pound I had just done. At first his arm was over my chin, so I focused on trying to turn into him instead of hand fighting, another mistake. He ended up sinking in the choke and submitting me.

It was a really good fight, but I really should have won. I completely had him when I was ground and pounding him, should have just kept punching. Oh well, live and learn. Apparently I was up on the judges cards going into the third round as well, so I'm a bit disappointed. But it was a really good fight, everyone was telling me I did really well for my first time in the cage.

Oh yeah, almost forgot. You shoulda seen my face right after the fight, it was crazy. Blood all over, nose swollen, dark swelling under my right eye, and dark marks all over my forehead. The cameramen were all zooming in on me to get good looks at it. Waking up today, the swelling on my nose went down, but I got a pretty good shiner going under my right eye. It hurts a bit, but I like having some marks from the fight.

It was amazing just getting the cage, and I can't wait to do it again at the next event in late May/early June. Till then, Sunday is a poker day!

I rarely read the e-mails I get from Full Tilt, but this one was actually well worth. There's no real strategy pertaining as to how to play your cards, but it's something every player needs imo. Give it a read if you feel like you're game is stagnating, or maybe you don't enjoy the game as much as you once did: http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/tip-email-180-deposit?utm_id=387

I'm taking most of the weekend off from fight training, and getting back in the gym tomorrow. I want to make sure I'm not overtrained heading into my fight, but I'm still gonna be working my ass off in the gym till then. I just can't wait, I'm so psyched for this.

On the poker side of things, I've won back about half of what I lost from my terrible session almost a week ago. I'm not worried about it anymore, I'm winning back at a normal clip, and the rakeback for this month more than covers everythings and already has me in the black for the month. As long as another catastrophic session doesn't come alone (I'm pretty sure I'm going to set up a stop-loss for myself, more on that later probably), I will be well on my way to moving up to nl100 within the next 4 weeks or so.

March 28th is right around the corner, and I can't wait to whoop some ass. I was sparring at the gym Tues night, and my hands feel great. In one of the rotations, I got matched up with the 205lb champ. He's a wrestler/submission guy, and his standup isn't great. I flashed him with an overhand right when he was going for a leg kick, and he went down like Liston. All the guys watching us in the cage were screaming and laughing, and he quickly got up and took me down and pummeled me. Totally worth it, haha.

My weights already down where it needs to be, and I feel comfortable with my strength and power at 155lbs. I'm gonna try to start doing sprint intervals to train my proper energy systems for the bursts of anaerobic power necessary for an MMA fight. My overall cardio is solid, I was doing marathon training this summer/fall. I just need to adjust that a bit cuz I won't be going any longer than 15 mins. I've also stopped any alcohol intake from this last weekend up till the fight. Sucks for St. Pattys day and Chicago South Side Irish Parade, but oh well. It'll be worth it when I crush my opponent in the cage.

As for poker, I had a terrible downswing (at least for me) a couple sessions ago. I dropped 9 buy-ins, 8 coming from big all-in hands, 3 of which I got it in better than a 70% fav to win. I know these things happen and I'm not gonna whine about it, but such huge losses really made me question my game. My poker friends who are better than me and play higher just kinda laughed when I was sulking about it, telling me its not a big deal at all and I'll make it back as long as I learn from it. They're right of course, but doesn't make it any more fun.

I've reviewed the session a couple times now in HEM. How seemingly solid regs can call large 3bets out of position with small pocket pairs (only 100bbs deep) is beyond me, I've always thought implied odds for sets was a pretty easy thing to grasp. A couple of sets in 3bet pots stacked my overpairs, I'm not really sure what I think about my play on those hands. I guess I could have found a fold, but with an SPR of about 3.3 and an overpair, I think folding is almost always going to be a mistake. And of course I ran kings into aces twice...I guess I was just destined to lose that session.

Since then, I've put in a couple winning sessions and plan on grinding my ass off tomorrow. I'm on spring break and it's my only day off work, so might as well grind a few thousand hands right?

No training today, unless you count the hour of mixed cardio I did during one my activity classes today. It wasn't too bad I guess, lots of jumping rope and plyometrics, so I guess it kinda counts. My jaw is still sore from a knee I took on Monday. Note to self: don't take predictable shots against a muy-tai fighter. Oww...

Not much going on today, whole day/night was wasted at class then work. It gets harder and harder to go to work every time. Like most college students, I have a part time job payin just a bit more than minimum wage to cover my monthly expenses (which are ridiculously high for me right now, but that story would need its own blog...). It just doesn't seem worth it at all to go work for $8.50/hr doing mindless shit that won't ever help me advance to anything in life when I make about 5-6x that playing poker now. I know the guarranteed paycheck is nice and all, but it just feels like it's holding me back a helluva lot more than it's helping me.

Not gonna lie, almost didn't go into the gym today. I don't usually train at the gym two days in a row, because we always end the day going almost full live fighting, and obv that will make you really fucking sore the next day. But since I can't go in any other days this week cuz of work and school stuff, I figured I had to. We started the day with some pretty hardcore conditioning. We started doing 20 pushups, the 20 roundhouse kicks to bag, then 21 pushups, the 21 kicks, etc. until we reached 30 of each. Then we did 125 straight leg situps, and then 3-3 minute rounds on the mui-tai bag with 30 secs rest between rounds.

After all that fun, we rolled in the cage, no striking today thank god. My jaw is still sore from last night, haha. The guys there tonight weren't much bigger than me, so I had some good rounds. I did get tapped by a guillotine, cuz I'm just a big dumb wrestler who leaves his head up on shots. We only went two minute rounds, so I didn't tap anyone but I did pass all the way into mount on a couple guys. Like I said before, I much prefer ground-and-pound and would have owned some souls tonight if we were striking as well.

My trainer told me he's got my match all set up, I'm gonna be fighting at 155lbs, not 145. So fatty can eat a lil bit more, yay. He doesn't know anything about the guy, except that it's his first fight as well and he knows his trainer. I talked with my trainer for a bit after everyone else left. He's seen alot of guys go into the cage for their first fight, and was telling me what NOT to do. Apparently this event is at a pretty large venue, they're expecting about a thousand people will be in the audience. Add to that the fact that I have practically all my friends coming out to see me, and nerves could definitely be a problem. He says he's seen too many guys come out and try to fight to impress their friends, instead of focusing solely on their opponent. Once they do that, they've already lost. They come out and try to get fancy and worry more about looking good than about utilizing all the technique they've trained in for the past months/years.

I guess it's kind of applicable to poker. To play your A-game, everyone always emphasizes cutting out all the distractions around you, like the TV, surfing the web, AIM, having friends around while you're playing, etc. Focus is always something I've had problems with in poker. I had full blown ADD when I was younger, bad enough where they made me go on ritalin for a while. They say you grow out of it, and I'm certainly not the spaz I was back then, but focus is something I'll probably always have a problem with.

Poker wise, last night went pretty well for me. I was up about 4 buy-ins an hour in, but only ended up about 2. I ran KK into AA all-in pre in a button vs blind situation for 150bbs, so I guess it's not that big of a deal. One hand I've talked about with a few of my poker friends was pretty interesting...

SB open limps into my BB, I raise it up with K3o, he calls. Effective stacks 120bbs. Obv I'm just playing position, I usually play pretty straightforward, I'd say its about a 50/50 open for me with such a weak holding. I play on Cake, so no stats on the player, but I noticed him open limping quite a bit. He's open raised from the SB a couple times already, so I'm putting him on a very marginal hand here. I've been playing my standard TAG game, but have been very aggressive in position on this table, and this player has taken the brunt of it being on my immediate right.

Flop AQ3r, he checks, I fire $3.50 in $5, he mincheckraises to $7. I immediately call bullshit here. I don't see him open limping the SB with an ace hardly ever, certainly not one that can stand much heat, same deal with pocket pairs. The ONLY hand he could rep here imo is Q3s that he called for some reason with pre, maybe A3. So I 3bet to $19, and he INSTA calls.

Turn comes a T, completing the rainbow, he checks. Now I'm kind of confused, and start thinking maybe he did something weird preflop trying to trap me since I've been playing pretty aggro against him. I haven't seen him do anything too out of line yet, so I pussy out and check. River 8, he checks, and I check again figuring I probably couldn't rep much after the turn check. He shows A6o to take it down. My read was partially right in that he had a pretty weak holding, I just didn't follow through with the plan. fml

I have my first sanctioned MMA fight coming up on March 28th, and I figured this would be a good way for me to keep a log of my schedule and workouts leading up till then. Of course, I also play alot of poker and will be recording my progress on the poker front here as well.

Quick introduction: My name is Jarvis, and I've been playing poker for about 2 and half years now, 2 years online. I am in my last semester at Northern Illinois Univ, graduating with a bachelors in exercise science this May. I was mostly just a recreational poker player up until about a year ago when I started taking it more seriously. I am now a 50nl grinder, and am consistantly buidling the roll up so far. I currently play on Cake, because the rakeback is awesome and the games are generally pretty easy (although alot fewer games run than on FT or stars so it's not uncommon to have 3 other decent regs on most my tables which sucks sometimes).

As for the fight game, I have a boxing background (boxed competitively for many years when I was younger, and have always done boxing workouts since cuz I love it), and I wrestled all through high school and one year at NIU. I only have about 6 months experience with jiu-jitsu, and that's where most of my training right now is geared towards. Since I'm mostly a wrestler, I got triangled/guillotined all day long when I first started MMA training. I can say I'm much better at avoiding submissions now, but it's still my weakpoint. I'm not great at getting submissions myself, but the wrestling background helps keep me from getting swept most of the time. Oh well, I much prefer ground-and-pound anyway.

I'm either going to be fighting at 145 or 155, I'll know for sure within the week. I'm 5'9, and have cut a helluva lotta weight to make it this far (weighed in at 158 after todays training session). I weighed over 200lbs as recently as August, when I decided I wanted to start fighting competitively. The reason for cutting so much is cuz my striking sucks against guys much taller than me, and at lightweight I don't have to worry about it as much. I wrestled at 152lbs in high school, and 157lbs in college. I've only gotten bigger since, so I'm honestly pretty huge for these weight classes now.

As for todays training session, I got my ass whooped. My main training partner, Steve, is a 145lb fighter who's had two fights already. I can usually stomp him pretty good in every aspect, and I was doing just fine in the standup today. But he's pretty solid on the ground, and I just couldn't catch him in anything at all today, and he came damn close to finishin me with an arm bar before I finally got out of it.

All the other guys I faced today were much bigger (a 185lb'er whos at 200lb right now, a 190lber, and the 205lb champ who was at 225lbs today), and two of em just destroyed me in the cage (the 190lb guy kinda sucks). I musta gotten tapped 6x today, which is at least double the norm for me. It's pretty frustrating when you get in on a good shot and can't finish, and then get reversed and tapped. I know I shouldn't worry too much about these bigger guys beating on me, but it still sucks, kinda killed my confidence for the night...

Well this is long enough for now, I'll be back to post tomorrows training session and probably a bit on how the poker goes tonight.