Guest Christmas Blogger - Andy Grodynski

Being a master of persuasion, I managed to get Andy Grodynski to write me a little piece for the blog. Andy is a good friend who has packed up his life and moved to Australia which is a little sad as we don't get to see him much any more, still there is a holiday friend to tap up when I get to Oz! Andy has more passports than James Bond and Jason Bourne put together... He is a little bit British, Polish, Indonesian and Australian. Pick one of those four for a place to set up shop and its not a surprise he has headed down under to show them how to do some engineering. He is only back for three weeks and managed to get a wrestling session in, which was great fun.

Before I let you read any further I should state that Andy was "emotionally compromised" from excessive alcohol consumption at time of writing and claims to have been lurking in a dark place on Struggle Street. 

Thanks for doing the Blog Andy, I appreciate it and hope you have a safe trip back home to Brissy!

All the best

@shocksjr

Grod vs.Shocks but really vs. Simmo

Andy Grodynski        -             Shortround

Mike, or Shockers, as I’ve always known him, managed to appeal to my competitive side when he said Aran Simm’s guest blog entry would be a tough one to beat on the hits!  So, here we go… I’m Andy, otherwise known as Grod, or Short Round, due to my slight resemblance to Harrison Ford’s sidekick in Temple of Doom. 

I first met Mike nearly six years ago, making my debut for the Scotland U18s RL side, where he was part of the coaching staff.  I must have been doing something right because he encouraged me to get along to play for the Edinburgh Eagles and the Napier University side.  A handful of Student and Amateur caps and 4 Grand Final wins later, I’m now playing rugby league in Brisbane, and have much to be thankful to Mike for getting me involved in the early days.

I made the escape to warmer climates just over year ago and have missed a big year for Mike and his family.  I left not long before his son’s first birthday, missed out on his stag doo and had to be content with viewing his wedding through photos!  And then there was the announcement that he had taking up wrestling!

At first I thought the pressures of parenthood and married life had hit him really hard – so I had to Skype home to make sure he was feeling okay!  However a thirty minute chat, and a bit of assurance from Emma, it was clear to see he was intent on giving the wrestling a real go.  He has done really well to get a great back-room team up and running for him very quickly – he’s got fantastic facilities and a great team at work, and I know Emma and Cameron are rooting for him at home.

I already knew I would be home for Christmas, so as well as making sure I caught up with him and Emma, I was definitely going to get along to one of his sessions to see how it was all going.

Napier Rugby League league winners 2008/2009

I rocked up to the Friday night Wrestling session not really sure what to expect.  There was some chatter amongst the other guys about different techniques; ways to win points; ways to win more points; ways not to lose points; and very quickly I was aware I didn't have the slightest clue about any of the rules!  The speed of the session was good for me – after a quick warm up we went through an hour or so of technique work.  I was fascinated by a lot of the drills we went through, which ranged from take-downs, headlocks and some counter moves.  I had no idea that the sport was so technical, as I thought wrestling was just about throwing your opposite man into the ground.  Some of the techniques were transferable to rugby league, but I’m not sure how legal the headlocks are in my game!  I think I've forgotten a lot of the technique stuff already, and whatever I did manage to retain got thrown out of me when the session moved into a few bouts.  The bouts were fun to watch – there were an obvious variety of different fighting backgrounds amongst the other boys and it was interesting to see them fight against each other.  I was a bit apprehensive about taking on Mike as he’s got nearly 30 kilos on me in weight, but (I think) I held my own and came out in one piece!  As there’s no video evidence, I might try and tell people I dominated the bout!

Proof that there are headlocks in rugby league

I was very impressed by the session and the setup at the [EN]GAGE centre at Sighthill, and really enjoyed my short session there.  I’d love to be able to do more to support Mike his bid for a spot at the games - I’ll definitely be keeping a close eye out on his progress from across the globe.  Although his foray into the wrestling world may seem a bit left field to a lot of people, he’s made a huge amount of progress in a just a few months, and has a big year of graft and training ahead of him.  The Commonwealth Games in 2014 is a huge incentive for him, and I know he’s got the added personal incentive of doing it for Emma and Cameron.  

I hope a few more of his friends can get behind him and give him the support he deserves to ensure that the next time I’m back in Scotland, it’ll be 2014 and I’ll be cheering him on from the stands at the Commonwealth Games!


@the_grod

Getting used to wrestling and my SPOTY predictions

Its been a fairly quiet couple of weeks, I hit training again hard, had some great sessions in the gym and managed to get in some full weeks of wrestling, there is so much to learn and its all about figuring out and being familiar with what you can do when you're put into different situations. I am getting better every week and learning some new techniques. I was describing wrestling to someone last week and its really all about levers and momentum, learning how people move and how you can make people move. For example, when someone pushes against you, use that momentum to your advantage and drag them or manipulate them into a position where you have an advantage. 

I'm starting to get better with the moves from standing, I wasn't great with that and was more comfortable working on the floor using headlocks or gut wrenches, both perfectly good moves but I wanted to be able to take people down or get behind them to get more points in a match. I'm doing alright considering its only been 3 months.

I've had an interesting couple of weeks, the last Wednesday I was through in Glasgow - to start I got to do some video analysis on Nikos, my wrestling counterpart at [EN]GAGE he has been getting in some extra training! For the session,  I was again working with Sean Keogh, who was teaching me some of the basics and some new trip moves that I hadn't done before. He is ridiculously good at them and they are pretty uncomfortable. The latter part of the session was a circuit for the institute athletes and that meant that Martin and I got to work with Vio (Scotland Assistant Coach) who was showing us some things that we can do from standing, much like a rugby tackle. The feedback Martin and I got from Vio after the sessions was fantastic, Martin - I think is close to institute level, his commitment is outstanding and he is a very good wrestler. For me, the feedback was "You are beginning to move more like a heavyweight but more dynamic, I see a lot of potential." I was pretty happy with that. Vio is from Moldova and Eastern Europeans don't beat about the bush, so that's good feedback

Sean Keogh - headlocking

My heavyweight friends, or just friends in general are lacking a little at training at the moment, I could do with a partner to train against on a Monday and a Friday who is over 100kg. So I will put out a little plea to anyone who is available, if you have a bit of time get along to the sessions and help me out. The session on Monday, Michael Cavanagh (coach) was my training partner, that was an experience, its always a little daunting going against someone who is coaching you but we did all right, we even had a two minute bout at the end, I managed to score which was good but Michael shucked me and he managed to level, so in that fight we finished with a draw. I'm happy with that!  It was nice to see Scott Hislen trying his hand at wrestling as well. This Friday though, I've got Andy Grodynski coming down to Wrestle, He isn't in my category but he has been in Australia for the last year and wants to see what all the malarkey is like! There have been mutings that Mr. Gordon Cox will get down to training to complete his year of sport, but i'm not going to hold my breath, a former uni rugby player at school he moved to shooting, so I think the chances of getting him on the mat are slim to none!

Really want to wrestle Gordon
Friday Coxy?

Steve Cote, has been helping out a lot with the coaching, Steve did collegiate style wrestling in the states and has some beautiful moves that he has been showing us, there is some really good stuff in there that hopefully I'll be able to nail down and use. We also figured out that i'm a bit of an anomaly, my stance is left but I would attack with my right foot making me awkward (story of my life given that I run like a camel). We did the first session with the kids, they loved it and were trying to get back for more this week. It's just something different.

I'm now two weeks behind weight training, which is annoying. I really enjoy the hypertrophy and am beginning to see the results, the guns are slowly coming back but at the same time, it is very difficult. I've had Alex pushing me on which is great but my shoulders from last week are still in tatters. I'm trying to get in as much as possible but there seems to always be something that gets in the way, work is essential but i've always said that Family comes first. Unfortunately the Bambino has had his first real bout of man flu and has been chucking up and his nappies aren't much fun, which has kept me busy, I was hoping to avoid catching it, its not been pleasant to watch but alas as I write my throat feels like its being stabbed in the glands, i've got a fever and generally feel crap! I did manage to present a break out with Iain Stewart from Strathclyde at the Scottish Student Sport Christmas Seminar about community engagement. We did a good amount of work on it, I felt terrible and my head was a little all over the place but got through it. It was at the Glasgow 2014 HQ in merchant city, pretty cool, decent offices, it was buzzing for the short time I was there.

So as we move towards Christmas, I will be watching what I eat. It's always dangerous when you head to your parents and in-laws for some reason people seem to like to make sure I have enough food which can result in overfeeding! i'm staying clear of that trap for Christmas 2012 and trying to protect my waist line, I do need to think of a clever alternative for training though because the centre will be closed for a Christmas!

SPOTY - Got to be Wiggo

2012 has been such a great year for British sport, you would think you would be hard pressed to pick an outright winner for SPOTY. Personally, I think it has to be Bradley Wiggins to win Sports Personality of the year, what he has done is incredible and think that although Andy Murray finally won a Grand Slam and Olympic Gold, Wiggo is still best placed. There is a lot of talk about Jessica Ennis, great athlete of course and again fantastic achievement but is it something that really beats winning the tour de france, not in my view. I think the Olympians did something amazing and wuldn't want to take away from that but I think you need someone who has personality and has done something truly incredible, hence wiggo! My second choice I think should be David Weir (Weirwolf) I really enjoyed watching him do his thing on the track and on the road, pretty impressive stuff. That said, im not sure if it was just the camera but the personality seemed to be lacking a little bit, was a bit boring to listen to but his accomplishments are amazing. Third would be Andy Murray, just to get a Scotsman in there! Its a tough one, but I know who I want to win!


I'm not sure if there will be another blog update before Christmas, so I will take this opportunity to say - Merry Christmas! hope you have a great time with family and friends. All the best for the New Year!

Thanks again for taking time out to catch up with #mission2014

Cheers

@shocksjr

Back to the grind - Money, Money, Money

This week has been okay. I say okay and not good because although I have done a lot of work in the gym trying to build some muscle, I haven't done so great on the wrestling I missed Monday's and Wednesday's session much to my dismay.  We did however have a cracking Thanksgiving Roast and we made it to Nicola Todd's 30th for a good catch up with folk in 52 Canoe Tiki Hut, Great bar by the way... So it wasn't all bad!

You may remember a few posts ago I mentioned that there seems to always be something to pay for, well last month it was the soccer mum car I drive (not complaining - but it is) this month, in the words of Champ Kind we have been hit by a Triple "WHAMMY!" - The Boiler packed in which left us £280 lighter than we would normally be, plus I had to stay home hence missing Monday Wrestling, then there was the TV license fee to pay George Entwhistle off. Finally, Cameron starts nursery next week at a cost of £45 a day. I was under the impression that kids didn't cost as much as people say, but i'm going to take this opportunity to make a sharp u-turn and join their bandwagon. They are cheap enough at home but as they get older, they get more expensive. It won't be so bad when I have to buy him a PS3 or an XBOX360.
Its funny how quickly your money goes, every month we budget and try to find ways to cut outgoings but there is never anything to cut and there is no way i'm getting rid of Sky. Anyway, I digress yet again from the point. 

This does relate to me not training... because I literally couldn't afford to spend the cash to get to Glasgow to train on Wednesday. Friday's session two weeks ago was okay as well but think it could have been better from me. Donald came along which as great, he took a bit of a push around and I accidentally injured him. He went for a leg attack and dropped his eye onto my thumb. Hope his vision is back to normal soon but it was at least a week off.

If only I could do this!

We are currently in week 2 of Hypertrophy and wow! The first week almost broke me but especially as I'm still not feeling quite 100% I have got some type of lurgy, its not taken hold yet and i'm trying to break it through my current addiction to Yorkshire tea.
Hypertrophy! let me take you on a scientific journey back to Standard Grade Biology of why this stage of training is so hard and where a lot of people will throw the towel in. A wise man told me that If you aren't in pain during your hypertrophy phase then your training programme isn't working. 

For those of you who have absolutely no clue what i'm talking about allow me to elaborate. I'll put my Sports Science degree to good use:

Hypertrophy is effectively the term used to describe the increase and growth of the muscle cells. Initially when you start training, like I was doing for the first 10 weeks you get an increase in nerve impulses that cause muscle contraction meaning I was getting stronger but perhaps without any noticeable changes to the muscle size. 

I'm not going to go massively scientific because one, most people wont be interested and for some it won't be scientific enough but suffice to say Skeletal muscle adapts to regular increasing loads. Progressing that load means stressing the muscle and forcing an adaptation. It adapts by increasing the size of and amount of the contractile proteins (actin and myosin). These are in each muscle fibre which in turn increase size and strength. Russell et. al. 2000.

Crash course in SES.

Having missed Wrestling sessions earlier in the week I was really looking forward to Friday. We had a bit of banter on facebook as Simmo was back in town with his brother Dave and they were coming to wrestle. Dougie T threatened to come but was making a cake for Nicola and couldn't get there. To be fair to him the cake was pretty damn good.
We went through the basics and I was keen to see the two brothers wrestle, they had a wee dance around the place for the first minute, almost like a ballet. I wrestled Simmo, no video unfortunately and I think I got the better of him this time although to his credit, he managed to get a roll in. I was trying to do anything I would normally do, I couldn't gut wrench, I couldn't leg lace and I certainly couldn't roll the big fella so it was a case of pushing out and stealing a point here and there. Dave was really good, for a complete beginner he got stuck in is pretty strong and quite quick. I have since found out that two hands on the back of the neck is illegal, as is choking, as is palming in the face. Noted for next time! 

Dave Simm - Legend

Nikos, was there as well and we had an awful fight as you'll see. The stance was awful and we both picked up on that. I was having a nightmare with my leg attacks all night, they just weren't working and my gator roll on Dave failed, hence I left myself in a bit of trouble and gave a point away. 

Steven Cote, was coaching, he is a European Silver medallist and an awesome guy to have shouting instructions to you, his knowledge is fantastic and he passes it over really well. I'm going to do a little feature on him in the next few weeks, maybe even get a guest blog out of him. He has some interesting stories!

Now its probably worth noting again that some of the technique in these videos is absolutely shocking, this was after an hour of pretty intense training so we were pretty tired. The one thing I really want to draw your attention to is the end of the video i've posted and the direction my left knee folds - I put it in slow motion, its pretty painful watching back and I have no idea how there is no damage. I can pretty much guarantee that 3 months ago my knee would have blown out if it had been bent like and its testament to the programme that Alex has me on that i'm not currently on the waiting list for another reconstruction and this whole adventure would already be over. So thank you to him for that. 

The other news from the week was that I had an appearance in the Edinburgh Evening News and the Scotsman which was pretty decent, I had a phone interview with Nigel Duncan who wrote up the article and did a great job. I don't think I have ever been quoted so accurately but he was a little generous with the headline in the written paper "Wrestling is whole new ball game for Rugby League Star" - if you didn't see it on-line here it is - ARTICLE

After Friday I wasn't best pleased with how I had wrestled, every time I went for a take down I seemed to be getting caught and I couldn't figure out why. So I looked back at the videos and found that I was diving in like a rugby player to try and tackle and you can't do that in Wrestling. Its way too easy to defend. So on Monday's session Nikos and I wanted to practice keeping our wrestling "power stance" which we did quite effectively, I was much happier with this Monday session and think i've made progress in fact I loved Monday's session. I was working with Mark Ross and Michael Cavanagh gave us some really useful tips and we learnt the cradle pin which I really like, think it could become a stock move. Sport is a funny thing, one week your good and on form, the next you are struggling but i'm back to the good this week and much happier for it. I'm going to beast it in the gym as get to all three sessions - No pressure to actually make the Scottish Wrestling team now that the Scotsman have reported on #mission2014. I will up my game and train harder. That's a promise!

So, what next - well yesterdays session saw Mark Ross appear, again he enjoyed it. I learnt a lot including some new moves and had a great bout against Nikos, we have both been doing this for the same amount of time and are both progressing nicely. Hopefully we will continue to do so and that pretty much rounds up the last two weeks. Mixed fortunes I think, now I just need to win the lottery and Karma will be restored!

Thanks for all the support so far folks, I appreciate there is a long way to go but we are making progress. 

As always, feel free to share the blog and if you want to keep up to date you can follow me on twitter. Also, if you fancy coming along to a wrestling session you don't need any experience. We train on Monday's 12:30pm - 2:00pm and again on Fridays at 6:00pm - 7:30pm both at [EN]GAGE. Hope to see some more faces down soon.

Cheers

@shocksjr

Hypertrophy - good and evil!

Sorry for my lack of blogging last week, I'm trying to keep it interesting and last week, wasn't that interesting. Not much to feedback on. However, after my full on Wrestling week two weeks ago, I hit the wall over last weekend and ended up with a nice bout of man flu. I was off work for a couple of days and annoyingly I was supposed to be starting the hypertrophy stage of my training, but as I was away at the end of the week as well we decided to put that on hold until this week. So I did actually manage to get a rest week in...kind of...

My saving grace at the moment - Optumus Massage

The increase in wrestling sessions has taken its toll. I am absolutely loving it, I wish I had been introduced to the sport about 10 years ago but after that week I felt the beginnings of niggles creeping back in. After the Friday wrestling session at
[EN]GAGE with Ash, I thought I may have damaged my knee again. If you have ever had a knee injury you'll know all about the dread you feel when your knee starts twinging. 

Que - Pav (Optumus) to check it out and fix me up. As it turns out, the clicking that I was having around my knee was actually the origin of my calf (gastrocnemius) and that was causing me massive problems around the knee joint. Pav was barely touching my calf for a massage and through gritted teeth I was trying not to scream. Normally... i'm pretty reserved regarding my expression of massage. Meaning I don't let on if i'm in serious amounts of pain. I've seen my mate Giler get a massage from Pav before at rugby and he screams and I've always wondered whether it was low pain threshold or just incredibly tight. I now know! I wasn't far off his reaction last week. Pav sorted out my back and calves last week which have been much better and almost had immediate improvements in my back rotation afterwards.

The tension that had built up in my calves was simply because I had been doing a lot of work on the wrestling stance and been training in positional instances. The good news is its beginning to click and i've finally got a rough idea of what i'm doing. I can tell that i'm getting better each time  I go to training and start to do something, its all about practice, as i've said before practice makes permanent. 



Little Nicky having a snooze



The massage heralded the last of my proper training last week and it was deemed my proper rest week to let the body recover and just chill out. I headed out for my first night out since September and it got pretty messy as expected. It was the Bear's birthday and we hit the Grassmarket, Hanover Street before heading to Shanghai to see Stevie Winton (manager) the bear bought Vodka which was nice and we all got pretty steaming. Bear even posted a video on facebook of my passed out on his sofa. I was snoring like "Little Nicky". 

Luckily I had booked in for some time off on the rest of the week and headed southwards to pay a visit with Emma and Cameron to her grandparents. It did mean a hung over / tired trip to Blackpool way. We had a great time down there but on Saturday, we had a slight issue that resulted in Syd (Emma's Grandad) being taken to Hospital, he is fine and on the mend but it was the event that kicked off a crap week. I should state that it was a crap week but on the wrestling front its been great. The reason its been so crap is that the freezer has packed in at home, probably the thermostat. I can live with that... it would be useful but its not the end of the world. Yesterday our Boiler broke, meaning no hot water, no heating and no washing machine. Rage!!! #risk25 sometimes you just can't catch a break bad things come in threes - and I didn't win the Edinburgh Napier Alumus of the year award last night either, although it was great to be nominate so i'm chuffed with that.

Anyway we headed back up to Scotland, late on Sunday night, I had the best sleep i'm maybe ever had that night and it was all back to normal on Monday. Wrestling on Monday was good fun, I managed to drag in Donald Grant, from the mighty Edinburgh Eagles Rugby League, he was training at [EN]GAGE anyway and he had his introduction to Wrestling. He was another one of the guys who loved the physicality of it and found it to be quite useful and transferable to rugby, think it was probably more physically demanding than he thought. 

I started phase 2 of my gym programme on Monday- Hypertrophy and it was straight in there with Squats, straight leg deadlifts, walking lunges and bench press to name a few all for four sets at varying weights and slowly to get a solid concentric contraction and activate the slow twitch fibres. It was physically exhausting and heavy loads with a decrease in weight but increase in reps. I had instant muscle soreness after day one, there was no delay making it OMS and day two Tuesday had me in pieces, I could barely walk up the stairs at home but the worst thing was the I went to the toilet at about 2:00am and ended up getting pins and needles in my legs which combined with DOMS is perhaps one of the most horrible experiences i've ever had. I was stuck for about 10 minutes before I made it back to bed. The best thing about it though was i've finally been allowed to do some bicep EZ curls and tricep push downs! brilliant! Love Beach Weights!

Sean Keogh (red) in action at 84kg

Wednesday had me back through travelling with Martin to the Palace of Art in Glasgow for some intense wrestling with the institute guys. No traffic this time but it did mean we got there about 45 minutes early. Only one thing for it, massive stretching session! I was happy to stretch and felt a lot better for it. I was in real pain. Vio (Scotland Assistant Coach) arrived and informed us it was a conditioning session for the evening which was fine, I was working with Sean Keogh (Finished 5th - 84kg 2010 Commonwealth Games). Was fantastic to train with him, he is a good guy and taught me a lot. He has come back from a series of injuries which is good, but he is back fit now and will be a medal hope for 2014. We worked on loads of stuff, mainly positional training, defence and attack which was great. This is where I realised that I actually knew more than I thought I did. We finished off the session with a 9 exercise conditioning set which we did twice with 3 sets on each exercise (all wrestling specific). I could have almost been sick and my legs were physically shot. I pinged my calf on the final exercise and I need to get that looked at ASAP but i can't tell if its just a strain or a relapse from last weeks tightness. The KCR from Laura, sorted me out and again there were some abnormal sounds coming from the hip flexors and back. I do rate KCR as a protocol, think it helps to relieve alot of the pressure.

 

In other news though, my friends Paddy and Louise had a beautiful little boy this week, which is fantastic for them, Congratulations to them and I wish them all the best as a new family and hope they enjoy parenthood. They are in for some great fun! Hopefully we'll get to see little Jack soon.

Next week we have Simmo and his brother heading up for a wrestle. I'm exciting about that one. Simmo was a guest blogger for me last month and Dave, his younger brother used to play rugby league with me and went down to Crusaders in Wales. My money is on Dave at the moment but you never know. For those that were asking, my first competitive match will probably be in April, i'm going for the British Novices and hoping to be in ridiculously good shape with some good Wrestling knowledge to do some damage and get a medal.

www.tysonfitnessnutrition.com

 Finally, Thanks to Paul Tyson fitness. I've just ordered my latest batch of supplements and they should be here soon. Thanks for your support. Its much appreciated!

Thanks for taking time to read, feel free to share and if you want to keep up to date you can follow on twitter @shocksjr

Cheers,

The Palace, [EN]GAGE and the Return!

So, despite having a "rest week" this week, I have been pretty busy on the wrestling side of things, which if nothing else makes a nice change, even if it is just mixing things up a little bit. The "rest week" was of course to allow my body to recuperate after the last 10 weeks of preparation before hitting my first 6 week block of hypertrophy (muscle building). The week hasn't really been that, if anything i'm more sore just now than I have been in the last 10 weeks!

The reason for this soreness is in fact the number of wrestling sessions that i've been able to get to this week. As usual we start on the Monday, It was a good session as always with Michael Cavanagh at the helm. The warm up drills were pretty standard, normally I avoid coming last and manage to avoid doing push ups which is a bonus. But there is one exercise that is all about strength and flexibility. It's hard as nails and works better for the more dainty of people. Not the big rigs! 

Its hard to describe but basically one person is on their hands and knees anchored into the mat, the other clasps onto their chest and flips into a bridge position before pulling themselves over into the start position. It is pretty much as hard as it sounds. I did it a couple of times and my back made some noises and cracked in places I never knew existed.

Leg-lace - never get caught!

The session was great, Nikos loves getting stuck into the physical side of things and always gives 100% and he is strong! I managed to get a couple of good takes downs during the sparring at the end but I have got probably 30kg on him which makes it a lot easier for me - if we were the same weight, it would be a proper battle! We did a lot of work on Leg laces. This is a basic tie up of the legs that is brutal and effective to score points, quite good fun to do as well! Best never ever to get caught! Example left - if you get into that, you are in serous trouble. I love it!

Monday's session took its toll on me but as Emma and Cameron had headed up to Aberdeen for a few days I took full advantage and decided to head through to the Palace of Art is Glasgow, its the Scottish Institute of Sport centre of excellence and where Scottish Wrestling base their programme out of. Before going, I had to get my back looked at, I had KCR from Laura to loosen me off, it certainly helped but I was still struggling a bit and decided that a trip to the gym was in order to speak to Alex. Triggerpoint therapy and stretching was the order of the afternoon and Wow, I don't think I have ever been so close to tears in a gym! The x-ball that you use replicates a forearm massage and I had to put that in my back, glutes and also in my hip flexors. That plus some deep stretching had me grimacing, trying not to scream. 

I went to the Palace of Art with Martin King, an Edinburgh lad, studying in Dundee who is also embarking on his own #mission2014 but in the 66kg category. He is a good lad, had been wrestling for a couple of years and is really good to watch whilst he is sparring.

Sighthill - Hermiston Gait = 1 hour!

I don't want to get into a rant on traffic at this time of year. So, I will leave it at this... on Tuesday it took me an hour to do the journey to the right to get to Glasgow and combined my time stuck in traffic jams over 3 days was 6.5 hours! that's almost a full day at work! Those Journeys combined should have taken 1h 40

Anyway, we made it and I was introduced to Viorem (Vio) Etko, former GBR wrestler (originally from Moldova) who is now the Scottish Wrestling Assistant Coach. He was doing some crazy warm up stuff, handstand walks, flips, you name it the man is strong and agile. I obviously don't really know him very well yet, but we got on fairly well and he seems like a dead on guy. I also met Pedram, Iranian Junior Champion, who was my partner for the session. Pedram is still learning English but he gets his point across quite well through demonstration, he is obviously a very natural wrestler and was throwing me around a fair bit. I loved the session, I learnt a lot and it was good to meet some of the people involved. The key thing I learnt was to relax the shoulders and just enjoy it and take my time - technique = slow to ingrain it. They were the key points Pedram wanted to get across. 

Too Much Red =
Miserable night, miserable journey

Wednesday hailed an altogether different story. Martin and I road tripped again, this time with in the Luton van to pick the remainder of the wrestling mat up from the Palace. We got it, left at 4pm and guess what... traffic jam! I hate the M8. We arrived at the Palace at 6:30pm.

The session when we got there was stretching to start with one of the Institute staff, it was fluid and surprisingly tough. Volodymyr (Head Coach) was there for this session and offered some good advice and as it turns out, i'm a little bit unique. I'm right handed but lead with my left, which makes me a bit of a weirdo when it comes to wrestling, so from now on, i'm going Rocky Balboa and fighting South Paw. Vio, took me firmly under his wing on the Wednesday session and I got a good bit of one on one coaching, more about getting in close and how to use my weight and get control. It was great to have that time, a bit of banter and again I found myself learning a lot. Kindly, Vio said and I quote "to look at you I wouldn't think you were strong - but you do have strength." to which I was at first surprised because I think I look and feel quite strong but then as you find out very quickly in this sport - looks can be very deceiving. Volodymyr also complemented me before I hit the M8 again and said I was pretty quick on my feet for a big guy and that the night was a good start! I don't think you can get too much more positive for an hour and a half of getting thrown around. There is a heck of along way to go but I feel good and meeting the coaches encouraged me to work harder. 

My only negative comment on my experience from the palace is that I would like to know where all the Institute Wrestlers were! There are 18 registered on the institute and in total over the two days I think I met and trained with 8 of them. I'll see how many rock up next week!

The Wrestling mat at [EN]GAGE in all its glory!

I mentioned briefly the mat we picked up, well it for lack of a better expression is a beautiful piece of kit that took its place at [EN]GAGE for Friday night, my final session of the week. I had a special guest. Mr Ash Carroll, my former coach at Edinburgh Eagles and Ash was also the assistant coach as I finished my Scotland 'A' career in 2010. Ash is a strong man, he would be classed as a heavyweight and was a good contest for us both I think. Ash did really well with the standing up simulated drills and some of the take downs. I identified that my grip isn't strong enough and that is something I would like to work on. That said, I think my ground work and attacking from the ground is probably the strongest part of my wrestling at the moment. I managed to get a few throws on ash including a gut wrench which was good (maybe not for Ash). I'm covered in bruises and in a massive amount of pain so Ash must have been doing something right and more importantly, I think he enjoyed it.

This is the stage that I probably dislike the most with any sort of training regime, I was the same with rugby league. I'm not sure if its the intensive learning and the frustration of not knowing everything, or whether its that I have the goal of Commonwealth Games and really don't know a massive amount about the sport and haven't had a competitive fight yet. I have to keep on pulling myself back and remember that I am still in training and there is plenty of time. I'm not into my physical best yet. I won't be until about March after I have gone through Hypertrophy and Max Strength and Wrestling skills wont come over night. Like I said, there is a long way to go but I think we are on track at the moment, its just a little frustrating!

Finally, I had a bit of a news flash this week as well! The Titan - Simmo is returning to [EN]GAGE on 22 November for a re-match. His comment "get used to looking at the yellow!"

What he doesn't realise is that if I can see the mat and the yellow, he will be looking at the lights on the ceiling, and in that position - in wrestling - its all over! Bring it big fella.

That's all for this week folks. As always, Thanks for taking some time out to read the blog. Hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to share it and a big thank you to all the guys who are taking time out to help and sponsor me for #mission2014 you can find out more about the team and sponsors by clicking the links

Mike
@shocksjr

The Pancake, the Weeble the Gator and the Bear!

It's been a week or so since Simmo guest blogged about his experience of wrestling. If you didn't catch the video of that "big rig" contest its here. That was probably the first session where i've really gone at it and wanted to beat someone being focused on what I was trying to do. It would probably have been a different story if we were standing up, maybe a bit more agility from both of us or maybe not. I've had two very differing opinions of analysis from that video. The first was from S & C coach Alex who thought that my agility and speed were very good and I showed a decent amount of strength. Pretty positive overall.

Love you really Simmo

The second and not nearly so technical was from my mum who suggested that Simmo, who she did state was a lovely "young" man was a bit like a weeble toy. Which had me in stitches for a little while... Here is a still we took from the wrestle last week (left).
Simmo's feedback has been fairly positive... I think what i'm finding with the wrestling and trying to get my mates involved is that once they try it, they like it. It is quite similar to rugby in many ways as I keep telling folk. You don't really think about it and the preconception of wrestling is in a ring with a oiled up tanned muscle machine in speedos with a steel chair.

After Grappling with Simmo. I was pretty sore, for me it was tough because Simmo has got a few more Kg on me than most people i'm training with, i'm still hovering around the 114 - 115kg mark at the moment. I was in pieces on the Tuesday after a bit of DOMS set in so decided to call the repair man to fix me up. Pav from Optumus popped round and basically violated my shoulder, it was effectively rape. He got deep into the rotator cuff and tried to sort that out for me. His massages are great to be fair, the difference from before to after was insane and I had much better range of movement. 

My shoulder has been giving the most amount of jip over the last couple of weeks, I must have tweaked it a little and its not had a chance to recover, the problem is that I keep on hurting it doing ridiculous stuff... taking the child seat out of the car or lying on it funny whilst i'm sleeping. Anyway, i've got prehab stuff to do with it using therabands which is helping! With a combination of massage and KCR from Laura, I'm feeling pretty good and pretty chilled out even after hard sessions. The noise my back made on Friday when Laura did her therapy on it was pretty impressive!

So after, wrestling last Monday and doing quite well, I was hoping that I would have someone to take on the next week. I text bear, given that he has been along to throws training with Jig and has been in the gym a couple of times over the last two months. The response I got was typical Bear and along the lines of:

"are you just going through your phone book and finding you fat friends?" 

A little harsh I thought on him and Simmo. Although for me the closer to my weight the better for training. It's tough because both of them are quite strong. Bear did manage to get to Wrestling last week and we were going over head locks into gator rolls. It was fine and we were shown how to counter and escape before you were thrown. Unfortunately, for me at least, I got myself into a stupid position where I knew exactly what was going to happen as Bear had my head locked up and was pulling my arm underneath me. There was a slight pause, it was one of those moments where through your mind you knew what was about to happen and for some reason  I couldn't recall the counter quick enough. I remembered as I was about a foot off the floor that I should have rotated before being rotated and thrown. Annoyingly for me... it happened twice! So I will concede, given that i'm being truthful in this blog that I was well beaten by bear on this occasion. 

That said, I realised something about wrestling this week and that is that its a fluid sport and its all about building up your repertoire of moves available to you, I think i'm getting better at it, but more mat time is needed. I find myself in some situations not knowing where to go next and that is all down to inexperience. So, i'm trying to figure out where I am and what i'm doing but it really is all practice. Que - Favourite quote about Practice "Practice makes permanent not perfect".

That Monday session hailed the last in my 10 week block, i'm moving on to a rest week this week followed by two 6 week blocks of Hypertrophy. I can not wait. This is where the muscle mass should in theory come on and put me back up to 120kg. I still need to shed a bit of fat around the mid section but that will come and to be honest although it would be nice to get rid of it from an aesthetic point of view, its not essential. The end of the 10 week block had me lifting some relatively good weight, I blasted a set of 3 x 180kg deadlifts and would probably hope to have a 1RM of approximately 200kg. My back is strong at the moment. That on top of Overhead squats at 8 x 55kg. (horrible exercise). Had me in a happy place (minus Bear's Ego dent as mentioned). I've included a snapshot of week 10 training to give you an indication of the types of exercise I was doing and the weights at the end of week 10 from circuits 1 & 2.


circuit training week 10 - weights and exercises

I even managed to top the week off with some family time - a chat on Skype to my brother Adam is wife Karen and son Nathan who he has taught to call me "muppet mike". Had lunch with my other brother Paul with his wife Nat and my Niece and Nephew, Ava and Josh. I even caught up with my folks and the in laws. It was great to see them all but i'm pretty sure Paul thinks i'll be wearing a mask, have a stage name and a finishing move. I have explained, so hopefully he has that out of his head! If not i'll bring him in for a session (he is going for second dan Ju-jitsu after all).
So, after 10 weeks... where does #mission2014 go from here. Like I mentioned, it goes to hypertrophy. I still have a lot of work to do and i'm not stopping until I get there or I don't. I still think it will be surreal to get to Glasgow 2014 and its a massive goal that does seem at times seem unachievable, everything has gone pretty quick and to be honest the support from friends and family has been terrific in places. I don't know if it is realistic target, but i'll stick at it and hope that in just under two years I will be representing Scotland on the mat in the Commonweath Games. How funny would it be to read this blog back having been to the Commonwealth Games and dare I dream with a medal of some description. I digress, I daydream. 

I'll be getting Tyson Fitness on the nutritional case over the next week to get my diet on track to make sure I can pull off the hypertrophy sessions, from what i've seen its going to be fairly intense i'm sure they will be hooking me up with all the good stuff I need but i'll let them decide (new protein shaker wouldn't go amiss!)

[EN]GAGE Wrestling Club

I've started the Wrestling club on a Friday night at [EN]GAGE Sports Centre (18:00-19:30) which was great on Friday, one of the guys Steve leads the session and his knowledge and method of coaching is a valuable asset and we certainly found it really useful especially in simulated situations, like the one I struggled with. I was training with one of the guys, managed to get a nice "pancake", a "gator role" and a pin. I did have a weight advantage though. For those who don't know what a "pancake" is, it's basically the defending of a double leg attack where you basically rotate them onto their back. The beauty of this move is that you can use the bone on the knuckle of your thumb on the jaw line, which apart from being very uncomfortable releases the grip and allows you to throw. It's pretty rough, but pretty effective!  

This week is pretty full on for me, I have Wrestling 4 times this week, I'm finally getting to the Palace of Arts to meet the national coach and let him know what my ambitions are and to take some guidance off him. I'm heading there Tuesday and Wednesday and will be familyless for those days as they are all away, allows me to catch up on sleep!
The hope for me would be that I would like to eventually like to fill one of Scottish Wrestling's institute places and get the support that I need to keep this up, travelling to Glasgow will take its toll, mentally and financially and of course the work and training at ENGAGE is also keeping me busy! but where there is a will, there is a way! I've got loads of hard work and some matches to win before I get to where I need to be with that, but fingers crossed.

My final thought for the day shifts back towards work, I've been nominated for the Edinburgh Napier University Achievement awards, nothing to do with wrestling but about all the stuff I did at uni for sport and for what I have been doing since I graduated. The awards aren't until the 15th November but its really humbling to have been nominated for doing something that you love doing, so fingers crossed for me on that one! Even if I don't win, its a great thing to have been put forward for and one that I would love to win for a number of reasons. 

Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed the update - feel free to share it around and if you want to get involved in wrestling in Edinburgh let me know. Engage Wrestling Club is on facebook just click the link and as always you can follow me on twitter.

@shocksjr

I decided to go back to this one, got confusing with the others. The reason I had two in the first place was because I was trying to keep it separate but thought, what the heck... who cares!

Cheers and thanks for taking time to read the blog!
P.S - Happy Birthday Bear!

Aran Simm - Guest Blogger - Fancy a Wrestle?

Whilst I'm doing this blog, I guess it could get quite monotonous having to read me spraffing on about what i'm up to, so i'm going to mix it up every now and again and get a couple of other perspectives from friends, family, colleagues. Whoevers' arm I can twist into writing something for me. I might even throw in a prize for the best one! Anyway, the first one is from Aran "Simmo" Simm, he made it to wrestling on Monday and got put through his paces. Thanks for coming and making up numbers...only kidding... but seriously, thanks for taking time out to write for me, hope everyone enjoys Aran's contribution to the blog.

You fancy a session of wrestling Simmo?... Why not, how hard can it be smashing you up?

Shockers and I on Napier RL Knights Night

After 3 days of nagging Ive finally got around to writing this blog for Mike. My name is Aran, i'm one of mike's  good friends, often known as "Simmo" or T-Rex (supportive, character building picture received from mike in 2011, below) due to my very short arms. I''ve known mike for about 9 years. I live in Bristol now and  I was a "very drunken" groomsman, for his wedding to the beautiful Emma, back in March. I first met him when i was told that some guy wants to set up a rugby league team at Napier University. Being from Wigan, ( and already bored of Rugby Yawnion) I decided to get in touch. We've had many a drunken night together as the picture to the left will show you, think that one was 2004/2005, those costumes aren't as good as when we made our own out of cardboard the year before.

 Shockers sent me in 2011 with  a message
 "saw this and thought of you"

To start I was invited along to a Rugby League 9's tournament once and was playing for Edinburgh against Scotland Students, I recognised the guy known as Shockers and thought I'd see how tough he was so from a good 8 metres out from the line i dropped the shoulder and surged forward with the ball and scored, right under the sticks and right underneath Shockers., HAHA, after much gloating..........Scotland then went on to smash us 6 tries to 1. I think Shox scored 2, so he was always a good rugby player.


Anyway on to the wrestling...

When Mike first mentioned #mission2014, I was a little reserved, but as his friends and others got behind his bid and I kept reading his blogs and I thought, well next time I'm up in Edinburgh, I've got to go and see just how he's adjusting. After my very early triumph against him all those years ago in the rugby (which continued for many years) I was keen to see if I could still smash him UP! I turned up a little late and was escorted to the mat, my shoes and socks were off. Very quickly we were practising a take down move I can only describe "as the duck under with a pirouette , after  many times of getting my face on the floor we then moved onto the hook the ankle with a choke slam. On a personal note I excelled at this move, throwing a hand-off into Mike's face was quite fun,  until Michael Cavanagh (our coach) kindly informed me how sloppy my technique was and it was more a bicep push to the face.

Injury inflicted by Mike at Paintball

We then moved onto the defensive escape were you had to quickly get off the floor and spin around on top of the guy who was pretty much lying on top of you.  This move I called the "elbow joint stretcher", it really makes you feel the burn and drop to the ground. Mike is known for his no mercy tactics, after once hunting  at a paintballing event on his stag, shouting " Where are you boar?" before inflicting the injury below. (I would like to put on the record that the "Boars" visor had steamed up and he had no idea where he was #nomercy. As demonstrated here:

So I didn't do well with this drill.

We then finished with a grappling drill, The intensity was huge!, where the same instances of me getting an early win, and Mike following this up with about seven take downs on me, as shown in below video continued.

In short, #mission2014 is a massive journey and just one session has left me with enough bruises, I'd love to go again to help him train, I'm personally gutted that I only get to do this whenever I'm back in Edinburgh, so I'd encourage anyone to go along to the sessions at the ENGAGE centre at Sighthill. #mission2014 is do-able and I know Mike will give it his all.

Good Luck pal, #getinvolved

@asimmshady

Road to 2014: impromptu update

I wasn't planning on updating till later on in the week but... I found movie maker on my laptop and got a little bit excited this evening after I was sent some video. Hopefully my counterpart in this movie Aran "Simmo" Simm will be writing a guest blog section for the next update with a few of my thoughts thrown in there. 

Now what you are about to witness! Please bare in mind that this was our first proper grapple. Probably also worth noting that Simmo on a couple of occasions fails to abide by Wrestling etiquette (a friendly slap before starting  - tut tut). We will let him off though because he was good enough to come to the session today and put in a shift. 

It's on our knees grappling trying to throw and pin. Not bad for big lads! hope you like it an let me know what you think of my movie making skills! haha.

Will update properly later in the week but for now ENJOY...

Road to 2014: Skinfolds, Sweats and London

I know what your thinking! long time no read, where have you been?  Are getting lazy in your blogging and training? Well the answer to that is of course no.

Sometimes you hit weeks where you are just mega busy that you just haven't got time to think or when you do stop your brain is fried and you don't want to think. Like I said on day one, I still have a job, I still have a family and I think i've still got some friends out there, not that I see them that often these days.

After my last post a couple of weeks ago, remember when I killed myself on the watt bike then couldn't complete a circuit. Well I took that a little bit to heart and absolutely beasted myself the following week I hit all my sessions running a couple of miles 4 circuits at increased repetitions and weight. It felt awesome! and I really feel like i'm getting stronger. It's a bit annoying that we aren't hitting any of the big weights on the chest or the guns but i'm going to sneak in some beach weights at the end of a session every now and again. I did have a terrible experience last week when I was training and it's something I am going to try never to do again. I forgot a spare pair of boxer shorts for after training. It's a horrible feeling getting back into soaked in sweat boxer shorts after a session. Properly minging!

I have this perception of myself as carrying a fair bit of timber and I think i'm a little bit self conscious at times. So, when I was asked to go do a skinfold test my immediate thoughts were S**T, I really don't want to do that. I think last time i did a skinfold test up at Heriot Watt before the Student Rugby League World Cup in 2008 I was sitting at something like 28% fat. which was pretty big.



Skinfold testing sites courtesy of getfit21.com

 This time I went through the whole shebang and had it done by Russell (Technician at Edinburgh Napier University Sports Science Dept.) he went through his protocol and we had some good chat, Mr Ross was there as well showing me how it all worked and making sure everything was correct. Russell noted that my back was massive and fairly muscular, so the results wouldn't do me justice.

Anyway they measure body fat at different parts of the body as represented in the diagram to the right (I have no idea why this guy doesn't have  a penis, unless its a butch bald woman).

Skinfold calipers - I haven't got a belly button piercing

So, let me assume for a minute that you have never had a skinfold test. It's basically for determining body percentage of body fat. It's a good baseline test to see how fat you are at the start of a programme and if you do it later in the programme you should in theory have decreased. They use calipers like those on the right. I probably don't need to but that is not me in that picture, despite me not having a belly button piercing, i'm not that thin and I I certainly have more hair! Anyway from those readings you get an overall percentage of which mine was a very respectable 14.3%, needless to say I was delighted with that. It's within good levels. For those who are more scientific the sum of 8 which is regarded as the more important measurement was 146 I think. still a bit high.

So with 92 weeks to go until the commonwealth games, we have met Clyde the official Glasgow 2014 Mascot. I don't particularly mind the mascot but love the fact that representing Scotland we have a weed. I find that quite amusing. I'm sure Clyde will be getting about a lot more in the future and we'll see more of him. The other celebrity I saw this week was at the British Institute for Facilities Management Awards (the university was short listed). I went to London with the mangers from my department at the university, Clive Anderson was hosting the evening, I drank my bodyweight in red wine and had a slap up meal at the Grosvenor Park Lane but I missed breakfast the next day. My wake up call never came and got me.

The best part was that Clive Anderson ripped the piss out of everything, could barely say facilities management and almost had to present an award for a new feminine hygiene disposal product. It was priceless.


Awards Venue BIFM 2012 - Grosvenor, Park Lane

 So where am I now, training is going well, we have progressed onto week 8 of 10 the maintenance phase. Back squat is at 75 for 12 reps which is good. and I'm push pressing 50kg at the moment. I can not weight for hypertrophy! its going to be so good. What has been disappointing is that once through lack of child care and once through work I missed 2 wrestling sessions at [EN]GAGE. I actually can't wait for Monday's session. We picked up the wrestling mat from the Palace of Arts in Glasgow last week and I can't wait to get on it! Really good of Scottish Wrestling to give us a loan of it and hopefully we will be able to increase our wrestling provision at the centre. I'm still talking a good talk about getting through to Glasgow to get training with the National Squad boys and will be doing that in the next month. Just waiting on a few of the coaches getting back from holiday and finding out when I can travel through to Glasgow, its a big time and financial commitment for me to do that but needs must!

In fact i'm going to go do a session now to get rid of the cobwebs from earlier in the week now the hangover has finally subsided. It's only fair that I absolutely beast myself. In other news, it was great to get a bit of a let your hair down session at Dave and Rea Simms wedding the other week, had a lovely time. had a few drinks with Hendy,Giler and Mikey before getting a little too drunk as usual. I cant hold my booze these days! Mikey even turned up to Wrestling the following Monday.

I'm still hunting sponsors, I've been a bit lazy over the last few weeks with that and do need to pick up the pace, there has actually been some interest and i'm trying to build on that to make sure I can deliver but all help is appreciated.

I'm going to be using my twitter account @shocksjr from now on I think with the exception of using the blog. I won't delete the other one because I've got some cool followers on there however I can't be arsed managing the two accounts. So if you aren't following me on that one - Now is your chance!

Finally, Thanks for taking time out to read the blog, hope you enjoyed it and a big thank you to the guys who are helping my out and sponsoring!

Cheers.

[EN]GAGE WRESTLING CLUB - facebook page (for those who want a wrestle)