Day One:
12-1:30pm (1hr 30min)
I met up with my mentor this afternoon at 12pm at the FTCC gym in Daly City. We got started as soon as he finished teaching his Jiu Jitsu class.
The first thing he taught me was how to wrap my hands with hand wraps properly. This process wasn't difficult; it was probably the easiest thing I had to do. After wrapping my hands, we warmed up with jump ropes for 3-4 minutes. Sad today, jump roping was the most difficult task I had to do all day. I was having a hard time picking up the rhythm. The first thing we did after our jump rope warm up was footwork. I learned the proper stance in Muay Thai and how my feet are supposed to move when in motion or just in one place. Along with the footwork, my mentor taught me the arm movements, which are jabs, cross jabs, and hooks.
We took a 40 seconds break after every work we did. My mentor went on and taught me some combinations - jabs, cross jabs, hooks, along with kicking. With kicking, I learned that you always want to be on the balls of your feet so it's easier to pivot when doing side kicks. For the knee kicks, you have to make sure that whichever knee you're using to kick, your feet must be pointed and you want to use the pointed part of your knee. Again, you want to stay on the balls of your feet for knee kicks.
After learning the stance, foot work, and jabs, we went on and used the boxing gloves and punching bags to practice what I had just learned. Then, he had me practice as if I'm fighting and had me use everything I learned. Of course there are some things that I had trouble with, such as using the right arm to punch and keeping my feet far from each other.
The next session, we will be learning the same lesson but switching everything up to the left side of my body (arms and legs).
