So instead of spending 24/7 hacking on arm linux I have decided to improve my health a bit and take up some martial arts. Being in Leith I had the obvious choice of Rick Youngs Blackbelt Academy which has awesome reviews from everyone and is only 10 mins walk away (at a slow walk).

I was originally recommended Rick Youngs by a friend I was talking with about medieval broadsword, he suggested I try Escrimma/Kali. Anyway I went along and watched a Muay Thai and a Kali lesson and loved what I saw so joined the next day.

Muay Thai I have now been doing for 3 months with pretty much every week attending 2-3 lessons (as many as I can). I am loving the kick boxing and my technique has definitely been improving.

Kali/Jeet Kwun Do is Saturday morning so unfortunately I have had trouble making it along regularly as everything else seems to happen on Saturdays as well.

This week I have also started to study BJJ at Rick’s. I had already done a bit of Judo as a kid and been doing some Ju Jitsu on Fridays so it isn’t completely alien. First lesson was two passes of the guard and two sweep to mount/side control from guard. Will definitely be a good addition to my striking from Muay Thai/JKD lessons.

I have been doing Ju Jitsu at another school mainly because I was looking for something to do Friday nights and it was the only lesson that was available. But Ju Jitsu also spends a lot of time working on core strength exercises so its very good as an addition to the other arts I study which are more focussed on technique. Certainly for punching power and grappling I need to improve my core strength.

Medieval sword fighting I have been studying for about a year now. Due to wrist problems I have been specialising in Rapier and will be studying the DiGrassi techniques when I get time to read the documents properly. I have been keeping my hand in at broadsword and done a little sword + dagger stuff. Kali has also been good for my technique. The Kali footwork is very applicable to the rapier and the double stick techniques blend well with sword and knife.