Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Journey - The beginning

It's coming up for a year that I have been training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. My friend Kerry introduced it to me at a womens open mat. It was something different and I wanted to try it. In March 2011 I received my Kickboxing black belt, and had mastered (almost) stand up fighting techniques. So I wanted to learn to fight on the ground. For most, when a fight goes to the ground it's over, but in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu it's just the beginning.

It took me a while to fit BJJ in to my schedule as I still loved training in Kickboxing and Muay Thai and I was trainig for a K1 fight. I managed one class a week and 6 private lessons with Kerry and our coach Alain on the lead up to the English Open competition.

I lost my K1 fight after months of hard training. I was pretty down about it, so I put a lot of time and effort in to BJJ. There was something addictive about it and I couldn't put my finger on it. Learning something new is always quite a buzz and when it clicks in to place, the buzz feels so much stronger.

My first competition in BJJ was to see how I would do and go for the experience. I didn't win, I lost both fights on advantages and points, but looking back, I didn't know anything, but it was still great fun.

I came back from the comp and learned more, trained an extra day and stopped muay thai.

I had got the jits!