Tuesday 30th March

I took a step outside of the comfort zone on Tuesday gone. We made a trip to Rivervalley in Swords to train with the ITA guys and see how they do things.

When we arrived, there was a larger crowd than I expected. It turned out to be a special session for their junior national team, so there was students there from across the country.

The training was super, although it got very intense very quickly probably at a pace I wasn't used to which caused me to retire for ten mins to get some air and some lucozade. Once I was settled into the pace of things I enjoyed the pad work. Stephen Cooley is a very knowledgeable guy and I picked up lots of different bits, he spoke about not using the side facing position at all for sparring, this made sense when I picked his brain after the class. I like his coaching style and everyone enjoyed the session.

I developed a little twinge in the right sartorius muscle, nothing major but I need to just watch it and not aggravate it.

We'll pop out to Rivervalley again next week, there's lots to be learned out there!