My mindset for this competition was to try to make the matches feel as normal as possible. My entire purpose in competing was to bring down the pre-match anxiety to a level equal to what I experience right before training, that is to say no anxiety. I find that the simmering emotions of grapplers waiting to compete will exhaust them before their matches, allowing cooler headed individuals to win in the moments that matter.

If I’m being completely honest, the only reason I competed was because I had a free entry and nothing better to do. At this point I was planning on just unwinding from my previous competitions. However, can’t say no to a free tournament. I ended up showing to my first match five minutes before it began with no time to warm up. I made quite the statement with the a under 30 second finish. The rest of the tournament went very well for me.

There was absolutely nothing else I could do to prepare for this tournament beyond what I did. My entire Focus for the past few months leading up to this event was on how I could be at my peak. I fully believe that I showed up and represented myself to the best of my abilities, I was a hair’s breadth away from competing in the finals and I surprised myself with how well I was able to perform. In retrospect, I wish I would have won, but that’s part of the game. However, there are never any regrets when you give it your all.

To kick off the start of a black belt tournament that had a substantial cash prize there were two exhibition matches that took place before. Mine was the first match against an opponent who I didn’t know much about, but had heard that he won a large tournament at the blue belt level. I also knew that the winner of my match would get $50. I still have the check framed.

My official rank for jiu jitsu at this point in time was a white belt with two or three stripes. I wanted to compete at blue belt however, because I had a good amount of previous experience training at another Jiu-Jitsu gym and at the CMU Judo Club. It was a big accomplishment for me just to see that I could hang with this level of competitor. My first match was not a win, but I was happy that it wasn’t a shutout. The fact that I was able to get at least one victory was really amazing. My final match, I’m just happy my ankle didn’t get hurt and I tapped in time. Having gone on to other competitions since the time of this one I can say that this was a huge milestone for raising the bar that I hold myself too.