Martial Arts

Hey! First thing I want to say is I’’ll be 24 years old in May, not athletic at all (I was swimming until about 12), but not overweight either (~5”10, ~154 pounds). In the last 10 years all I did was smoke weed, destroy my health and sit around doing utter nothing.

Last year in August decided I will turn this around at all cost, so I cut off drugs, started eating healthier, and finding something to make a man out of me.

So last week I joined an MMA gym, went to my first ever wrestling class, and it went exactly as I expected. I liked that I know literally nothing and I want to get better, I only had one problem which is as follows:

I walked in, told the guy/instructor (who is not the guy who usually teaches the class, but I think he prepares for a fight, not unusual) this is my first time doing anything related to a martial art, and he just told me to hop in and do what everybody else, so I did just that.

Of course I was already dripping in sweat during the warmup, than paired up with a guy similar in size to me, and did (tried doing) what the instructor said. Didn’t even know how to do “pummeling” right but I tried. Than we did a couple drills standing, then next to a wall, then it was freestyle wrestling. I sucked ass ofc, got thrown around a lot by my neck mostly because everytime I went for a leg, my head was low, and I didn’t even know how to position my stance or anything really. During the class I received absolutely zero attention from the instructor guy, and I noticed the guy I was in pair with was a little bit annoyed from my questions and being faltering. During he asked me what did I do, kickbox? Which I said nothing, ever, and he was like “oh, I get it now… Got a lot of bruises too on my arms and chest but no biggie.

So my question is: is it common to just throw someone new without any basic knowledge on wrestling to the deep water? I know new guys come and go in this place (or probably every ma gym), so maybe they will pay more attention if they see that I’m persistent on learning?

In my area there’s no wrestling class for adults, close to none MMA specific gyms, this is the only one where alot of guys go the amateur fights, one pro fighter, and a few really good wrestlers. So it’s not an option to just go somewhere else. I’m just not sure yet if I will make any progress by just going there to do some freestyle wrestling and watching tons of youtube videos on fundamentals to try be better next class. I mean there’s no other option so I will do it anyway. I’m just a little scared that it won’t work out magically this way. But I guess it’s a good thing that I didn’t get discouraged, rather motivated.

Let me know what you think please, any suggestions appreciated!