As usual, I spent most of my time engaged in social media and chats. Cool to catch up with BJJ Globetrotters friends, plus Tom from Liverpool, who went to the Artemis BJJ Camp a couple of weekends ago. It was especially nice to hang out with my Winter Camp buddies John and Eva.
There were also lots of terrifying wrestlers at the event, most of them training in Hamburg. They were booked in for their own shift from 1pm to 4pm. No way in a million years I would want to spar with any of these monsters (I like my limbs where they are), but it was fun to watch. Also yet another reminder of just how much more intense wrestling is by comparison to BJJ. ;)
I continued to just watch and chat in the daytime and afternoon, then into the evening as well. Annoyingly my phone data doesn't seem to like going outside of the UK these days, it's own personal Brexit. It is a relatively old phone now, so perhaps I need to upgrade to get proper data. I need to call the phone company to get that sorted. John, who is a techy guy and had a look, confirmed that the setting were all in place. He engaged in a mighty Battle of the Beards at 6pm.
As it got into the night, I could put my plan into action. Surprisingly, my plan actually worked: try to nap at 9:30pm, sleep until around midnight/1am, ready to roll when it gets quiet at 2am. I spent 1.5hrs rolling with Ana, Eva and Lilo. Which was cool, although they were super tired, so not a very balanced roll. Something I'll remedy at the new camp I see them at. ;)
Lots of fun, trying to work on a tight mount, head up passing and my usual framing from guard. 😉
This is when I started to appear in the photos. Ana set a pattern of a photo every hour, much like at the Southampton GrappleThon that the Rainha crew did back in the UK a few months earlier. It's a nice idea, I might start instituting that at my own events. That meant I got to be part of the early morning crew photos. ;)
Ana ran an impressively well organised event, particularly given this was her first one. I hope she makes it a regular thing at Nexus Fighter Academy, it's an awesome excuse to head over to Germany. Helpfully spaced between my usual camp activities too: Winter Camp in January, some kind of GrappleThon at my place a few months later, then Ana's, then my camp, onwards to Summer Camp, another GrappleThon and/or Artemis BJJ Camp, Halloween meetup, then we're back into Winter Camp. Perfect solution to stopping those nasty Post Camp Blues. ;D
