On Saturday Sep. 29, my best friend, jiu-jitsu student, and wrestling coach Paul "The Wrecking Ball" Reihner won a championship at Gladiators of the Cage in Butler, PA via triangle choke in the second round. I have been training Paul for four years now and have been in his corner for most of his fights. To be a part of his success, to have a role in his realizing one of his dreams, is a nearly indescribable feeling. It is more rewarding than anything I have accomplished personally. To see the look on his face when that mediocre ring girl strapped his belt around his waist was exhilarating.
And I hated every minute of it.
Cornering Paul is hard for me because I worry, a lot. For the two weeks preceding the fight, I was irritable and distracted. If my mind had a moment to wander, I would think about Paul's fight, about what could go right and what could go wrong, about what we needed to do the day before and the morning of and during weigh-ins and at lunch and at the rules meeting and to warm-up and what we had to do during the walkout and where I would have to sit and what I would have to yell during the fight and what we would do after the fight was over. Fight time is fairly miserable for me.
