Characters I Have Met.......

Back in June, I had the experience of a lifetime. My wife, Kelly, sent me to a professional Cage Fighting Training Camp, at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas. (Check them out at: http://xtremecouture.tv/)

I detailed this experience here on my blog. See my posts from June 14th, "Countdown to Training Camp," June 23rd, "Back from Camp and a Little Bit Sore," June 24th, "Back From Camp Part 2," and June 26th, Back From Camp Part 3."

While at this camp, I was able to receive instruction and work out with several World Class Athletes, including Former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion of the World, Forrest Griffin. My training partner was a 38 year old guy name Matthew. Mathew was almost as tall as me, and probably 20 pounds lighter. He had a lot more experience and was gracious in showing me some of the finer points of MMA. He had told me that he was a published author, and was now working on a book about MMA. I asked him the name of his book, and he told me it was "American Shaolin." He was very humble and said it was moderately successful. I figured he was probably over stating his success and didn't think much more about it.

Fast forward to August 23rd. I'm looking at the Xtreme Couture Blog, longing to return, when I notice a story, and a link to the Las Vegas Sun newspaper. It turns out that not only was my training partner pretty famous, he actually continued on to train at Xtreme Coture after camp, to continue researching his next book. He also went on to have his first fight which he won.

(Check out the article at: http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2009/aug/23/coutures-son-victorious-best-selling-author/)

This got me to thinking, "hey I should read this guys book." Well I just finished it and it was great. It is the story of Matthew Polly, dropping out of an Ivy League College to chase a dream of becoming a Shaolin Kung Fu guy, like David Caradine in the old "Kung Fu" television show. He went to China, not even knowing where the Shaolin Temple was located. He found it, and actually lived with the monks for 2 years while training in Kung Fu. The book chronicles his journey as he challenges his beliefs on life and begins to learn who he is. During this incredible journey, Mathew actually fights in a National Chinese Kick-Boxing tournament, and actually takes second place.

The book is fascinating, even for those not into the martial arts. This book can stand alone as a travel book, or even a philosophy book. Matthew was being extremely humble when he described the book as moderately successful. He has won numerous awards, made the talk-show rounds, promoting the book, and his book has been optioned to become a major motion picture.

On an interesting side note, one of the guys I work with immigrated from China. One day on our morning walk, I told him that I was reading a book called American Shaolin. He got very concerned and replied "There are no American Shaolin." I told him there was. He was my training partner at Xtreme Couture. I went on to briefly tell him about Matthew's story. He said, "Oh yea, I remember him now. He was very famous in China. He was on television often. He speaks Chinese very well."

The book based upon his MMA adventure is tentatively titled "Full Contact Writer." It is scheduled for release around March of 2010. The book will chronicle his journey to learn Mixed Martial Arts, including his journeys to Brazil, Russia, and of course Las Vegas. I'm expecting at least one chapter on the big, tough guy who was his training partner for Fight Camp at Xtreme Couture!

Consulting the Blood Doc - Part 1

When I returned home from the MMA Training Camp at Xtreme Coutrure, I was sore and tired. I thought it was the result of intense workouts, the heat of Las Vegas, and the depressing thought of going back to work. Time moved on. I started back up with my workouts. I remained tired and just kind of accepted that as part of getting older. Than the worst possible thing happened. No it wasn't the loss of my job, it wasn't my wife Kelly kicking me to the curb, and it wasn't some bad medical diagnosis. It was worse.

For the last couple of years, my daughter Tammy and I have been playing racquetball, about once a week. It's always been fun and a great workout. Fun, because my daughter is very athletic (she runs triathlons) and even more fun because I've never lost. The game is always a great workout because the game forces you to basically run intervals for an hour. Then it happened. The game was no longer fun. Tammy beat me. Not once, but twice. She beat me two games out of two games. OK, it was still fun, but extremely humbling, and being my daughter, of course she just had to rub it in. I had to listen about how old I was getting, and how my glory days were over. To top it all off, Tammy hit me with the ball and I had a huge welt on my back! This was not good.

While I was mulling this over, I was surfing the web. I read a story about some guy called "The Blood Doc." The story talked about how this guy worked with many pro fighters and other pro athletes. The article went on about how this guy works with these pro athletes in helping them to dial in their nutrition. It also talked about how he analyzed their blood tests and sculpted their nutrition to improve their blood tests and their overall athletic performance. I guess he is kind of a behind the scenes superstar in the UFC. Now here is the catcher, the article talked about how he was able to tune your body, through nutrition, to the point where your athletic performance was not reflective of your age. This was starting to sound good. Then it dawned on me. Hey, I know this guy. I met him at Training Camp, and he had invited me to call him or e-mail him with any questions.

When you have gastric by-pass surgery, your body changes quite a bit. You no longer have a normal digestive track. Your body does not absorb things the same as it once did. As a result, people who have the surgery are forced to take supplemental vitamins and minerals for the rest of their lives. About 6 months after surgery, post-op patients are subjected to a complete series of blood tests. The tests are repeated at the 1 year mark, then again annually for the rest of your life. These tests check all kinds of stuff, and depending on the results, you adjust your supplements. Kind of a pain, but a very small price to pay to get your life back. I had my blood work done in March. Things were all in a great range, but I thought why not send them to the Blood Doc?

I converted about 5 pages of blood work into a pdf document. I then sent them, along with an e-mail to the Blood Doc. I re-introduced myself and told him my concerns, and I gave him a list of the current supplements that I currently take. I really didn't expect a response, and was really surprised when I received an e-mail saying "Give me a call and we can talk about it."

Here is my current list of supplements:

• Fish Oil 1200 mg capsules - I take 5 in the morning and 5 in the evening.
• Calcium Citrate 500 mg tabs - I take 2 in the morning and 2 in the evening.
• Super B Complex - I take 2 in the morning and 2 in the evening.
• Vitamin B12 100 mcg sub-lingual - I take 1 in morning and 1 in the evening.
• Flinstones plus Iron - I take 2 in the morning and 2 in the evening.
• Glutamine - I take 5 in the morning and 10 after my workout in the afternoon.
  

As soon as I got that e-mail response, I jumped on it. I called the Blood Doc. I ended up talking to the guy for about an hour and a half. In the next installment, I'll tell you what he told me, and what steps I'm taking now. Stay Tuned! :-)

Meeting The Blood Doc

We all have secret dreams. You know, those little feelings that you are almost afraid to think about. Everybody has them. When you are obese, many of these dreams are about loosing weight, about having better mobility or just being more active. I know when I was obese, those were my dreams. After my surgery, I began working with Aaron as my Personal Trainer.


Aaron's dream was to become a professional cage fighter. He was training hard at a local academy, eating right, and working out. He had even some amateur fights and was teaching some MMA classes. Aaron was progressing well. He was also working on becoming a certified Personal Trainer, and I was his first fitness client.

Aaron worked me hard. He taught me many things about nutrition, and about getting back into shape. I packed on muscle, and increased my cardio. While all this was happening, Aaron became a fully certified Personal Trainer. He took a great job in Palo Alto at the Equinox Fitness Club. That was great for Aaron, but at the same time, it was kind of sad for me. I was extremely happy for Aaron, I mean he deserved this more than anyone, but I was worried about me. Could I still get in shape? Could I still loose and maintain a healthy weight and lifestyle?

The answer was a resounding YES. I was able to leverage the tools that Aaron had taught me, and as I continued to loose weight and build muscle, I had a new dream.

My dream was to be a cage fighter. Don't laugh. This was my secret inner thought. My dream was to get a pro, semi-pro, or even an amateur fight before I turned 50. I knew that I wasn't going to be on TV, headlining at the Mandalay Bay Hotel, or even at The Hard Rock, but I figured there was something out there for me. There are lots of smaller organizations, and lots of Indian Casino's hosting fights.

I increased my workouts. I pushed my strength training and my cardio. I read everything on cage fighting and studied the shows on TV. Then I received a great birthday present. For my upcoming 50th birthday, my wife, Kelly, sent me to a 3 day, professional cage fighter training camp in Las Vegas. The camp was at Extreme Couture and featured some of the best instructors in the world. (See my posts on this blog from June 14th, June 23rd, June 24th, and June 26th).

While I was checking in to the Camp, the receptionist said I should "talk to John over there, about nutrition and the new XCAP line, oh and by the way, here is a sample of one of the new products"

I went over and introduced myself to "John." I explained that I used to weigh over 400 pounds and that because of my surgery, my absorption rate is much different than most people. He totally understood and said that I really need to watch my vitamin and mineral intake. He then explained a little about the product, O2 Plus+. The product is a "Methyl Donor" and is used for increasing endurance. He then gave me a business card, and told me to call or e-mail him with any questions. I didn't think much about it. I tried the sample and went on to the workout. Little did I realize, that guy was the "Blood Doc." (That's him in the picture)

In my next installment, I'll talk about my consultation with the Blood Doc. Stay Tuned! :-)

Back From Camp and a Little Bit Sore

Well I did it! I survived Training Camp! I'm back and just a little bit sore, but what a blast. OK, maybe a little more than just a little bit sore. Here is a quick run-down of Thursday and Friday, with stories about Saturday and Sunday to come ....


Thursday - I jumped in the Corvette and took off. I got to Vegas in about 8 hours and the car ran great. It loves to run at 80! I checked in to the Golden Nugget and took a nap. I woke up and went down to play cards at the El Cortez. It is kind of a dumpy hotel but they usually have $3, single hand blackjack. They have changed a bit. They had remodeled and made all of the tables smoke free. That was cool, but now they have double deck blackjack. Well I played for a couple of hours and dropped $50.


Friday Morning - Up early and off to camp. Friday morning wasn't part of the official camp, however, Campers were allowed to attend any other classes while they were there, so I went to a Muay Thai class. Muay Thai is a style of fighting that originated in Thailand. The basic premise is your body consists of 8 weapons. Your legs, your knees, your hands and your elbows. Muay Thai uses all these to disable your opponent.

The trainer was a pro-fighter named Joey Varner. I'd actually taken a class with him a couple of years ago. He claims he remembers me, but he was probably just being nice. He has fought in the IFO and is one of the very nicest people you will ever meet. This was a great class. We worked on conditioning, and lots of striking.

To warm up, he has us jump rope for 5 minutes, then do 20 push ups. Then he has us go back to the jump rope for another 5 minutes, then 20 push ups, and 20 sit ups. Then back on the jump rope for 5 minutes. We finished with 20 push ups, 20 sit ups, and 20 squat jumps. Man I was starting to get tired before we even got to the good stuff.

We spent the rest of the hour working on striking drills. We worked on mostly punches and side kicks, while working on the heavy bags. We finished with ..... more conditioning! Since we weren't even tired yet, we ran lots of sprints. By the end of class, by shins were black and blue and I had bruises all over my feet. I was ready for a nap, so I headed back to the Hotel. The official Camp starts at 7:00 pm.

Friday Evening - After a nap, a soak in the hot-tub and a few runs down the water-slide, it was time to head off. When I got to camp, it was apparent I was going to be the oldest Camper. The next oldest guy was 45. He was a professional Squash player from Ontario. His wife had given the Camp to him for his 45th birthday. There were people from New Zeland, Scotland, Canada and from all over the Country. Some were already pro fighters, some were amateur fighters looking to build their skill set to go pro, and there were a couple of guys like me with a little bit of training who just wanted to learn more. The average age was probably 25 with the youngest of 16. This evening, the focus was on Jiu-Jitsu.


Jiu-Jitsu is an important part of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). When the fight goes to the ground, wrestling and Jiu-Jitsu come into play. Jiu-Jitsu is a fighting style that relies on leverage and the applying of joint-locks and choke-holds to defeat your opponent. Going into camp, I had very little Jiu-Jitsu, having only learned a few things while training with Aaron. The coaches for this evening were Head Extreme Couture Jiu-Jitsu Coach Neil Melanson and Former UFC Light-Heavyweight Champion of the World, Forrest Griffin. Neil is the man who trains Randy Couture, Forrest and all the other pro fighters at Xtreme Couture and Forrest is well, Forrest. You couldn't ask for two nicer people or better teachers. The picture above is of Forrest and I.

We started by pairing up with someone about our same sizes. I paired up with a 38 year old guy named Mathew something. Mathew was almost as tall as me, probably 20 pounds lighter, but with a lot more experience. Mathew and I stayed partners for the entire camp. He was really an interesting guy. He was a writer. His first published book was about the Showlin Monks of China. He is currently working on a book about MMA, and already has a publishing deal set up. He has been traveling around studying different types of fighting. He has been to Rio to study Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Russia to study a fighting style called Sambo, and now he was at camp to train with some pros. He was already well known to the Camp Instructors.

We spent the next 2 hours working on a choke hold called a triangle, and how to escape the triangle when you are on the wrong end of one. The triangle involves the squishing of the arteries in your opponents neck with your thighs and calf muscles. When applied correctly, the hold cuts off oxygen to the brain, causing your opponent to black out. We took turns applying the move, starting at a very slow speed and moving up faster and faster until we could do it at full speed. The guy getting choked would tap out before loosing consciousness. I actually got to work one on one with both Neil and Forrest. It was really cool. I didn't think I could bend like that but it turns out I was actually pretty good at it. After this session, I was pretty sore so it was back to the Hotel for a quick water slide and a soak in the hot tub.

If you have never been to the Golden Nugget, you have to at least check out the pool. They spent $32 million to create the pool and water slide. The slide actually goes through the middle of a shark tank. You can see sharks swimming by as you go through the tube. It is really cool. You can check it out at: http://www.goldennugget.com/amenities/pool.asp

I'll try to post tomorrow or the next day to tell about Saturday and Sunday.