North vs. South Qualifier

As the title suggests, we had the Qualifier tournament for the North vs South crew battles that are coming up next month. Top 5 spots get to rep Northern Colorado. 10 people showed up (woooo).

I ended up having to face my friend's Baiken first round, and he 2-0'ed me. Rather than get SUPER pissed and indignant with him, I congratulated him, went off, and THEN reacted poorly. Still, I didn't just bitch to him all during our match. Small personal victories are still victories.

I really really really need to stop fixating on my damn 632146hs special as a get-out-of-jail-free card, especially since I can't get the motion down when it matters most. I think the block is entirely mental, but because of it, I end up focusing on doing it and nothing but it until I not only execute the motion properly, but hit with it, too.

Huge problem for a lot of players, and I'm fully aware of it. When we miss a motion, we keep doing it until we hit it. It's like we have to reassert our technical dominance in our own minds or something. Really lame, and really stupid.

Props to Jamaal for beating me again, though, and MiniMatt for thinking during our matches. Can't count how many times I was airgrabbed because I jumped predictably. Shoulda been a heat knuckle, but seeing the air-grab was actually more intimidating, and made me keep going in the air in an attempt to grab him back.

All in all, I need to stop playing on tilt, and pay attention to my outlook. I didn't give up during my matches, so at least there's that.

After the tournament, we hit up McDonald's and talked about upcoming tournaments, things all of the fresh blood players need to work on, and random stories from the past. We went back and played GG for a couple more hours, and I managed to take a good chunk of matches from Don and Eric, though I guess it does bear mention that whenever I actually took them outta the rotation, they weren't using their mains. I messed up an IK set-up against Don's ABA, but then just decided to run up and try it anyway. He didn't know Zappa's IK was an unblockable, and I have some pretty nasty ideas for stupid things I can do involving the dog in IK mode now. :D!

Sorry this update is so late. It's been done for about 3 days, I just didn't have time to post it. I'm challenging DarkPanzer this weekend, so I'm really getting excited for it.