The Shintaro Higashi Show - Traincation

Episode Date: July 22, 2024

In this episode of the Shintaro Higashi Show, Shintaro dives into the rising trend of "traincations"—vacations centered around intensive martial arts training. He discusses various traincation opportunities, from BJJ cruises to specialized camps like Camp Vertex, offering insights into the benefits and experiences of combining travel with dedicated martial arts practice. Shintaro also shares his musings about the potential for creating a unique traincation experience in New York City, highlighting the logistics, local attractions, and the immersive training possibilities. Whether you're a martial arts enthusiast or just curious about this innovative concept, this episode is packed with valuable insights. (00:00:00) Introduction (00:00:35) The Concept of Traincations (00:10:45) Potential Traincation in New York City (00:13:18) Shintaro’s Dream Staycation Join our Discord server and start chatting with us and other grapplers by supporting us on Patreon: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/shintaro_higashi_show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Any amount helps! 10% off Judotv.com with promo code: SHINTARO Buy one get one free www.clnwash.com with promo code: SHINTARO2024

Hello everyone, welcome back to the Shintaro Higashi Show with Peter Yu. Today's going to be another solo episode. Me and Peter have not been coordinating. Mostly because of me, I cancelled out of a bunch of times. Some personal stuff came up. Small beef, you know, but you know, it's fine. In life you're going to have problems and you got to kind of take them head on. You got to adjust and adapt and make yourself better.

Re-evolve, you know. And sometimes you're just going to butt heads when, you know, things happen, et cetera, et cetera. Everything is fine. All right. So today on the episode, we're going to talk about train-cations. This is a thing. This is a new theme that a lot of people are doing. There's a BJJ cruise.

Fuji did it. A cruise where you go out on the ocean for 15 days with a bunch of champions food included sleeping accommodations included it stops in the bahamas this and that uh i know camp vertex is happening in uh texas travis stevens is running that you learn judo jujitsu and gun shooting gun skills And then you eat barbecue every single day. So, like, I know a guy that went to that. One of my friends was like, hey, did you hear about this thing that Travis is doing? And I was like, Travis, what is it that you're doing?

He was like, oh, it's this camp thing that I'm doing. It's going to be great. You know, it's going to be awesome. We're going to eat meat and shoot guns and do Jiu-Jitsu. I'm like, you know, should I send my friend to that? He's like, yeah, send him. And I was like, yo, you should do it i'm you know i spoke to travis and he said it's gonna be awesome and it's gonna be these things and he went so this is the thing this is the theme now and uh yes there's like big physical location things like the cruise that i mentioned and the camp vertex in

texas where they're on like a 100 acre compound. Don't quote me on the acreage. I just made that part up. But it's a big compound supposedly. And there's also trancations at local dojos. For instance, we had a guy, Ali. He came to New York for a three day trip and did five private lessons with me.

He did one private lesson for an hour and then two hour session two hour session and the evening he did the class so he had like three double session days where it was like you know and it was awesome you know and i got to like talk to this guy we had a lot of interaction i got to like learn about his martial arts style he does like a korean jiu-jitsu type martial art called tukang and he's kind of uh the master head guy in that and then he wanted to kind of refine his throwing takedowns and then systemize a lot of stuff for his martial art and wanted to see some of these drills that he saw me doing on youtube so i was able to kind of teach it to him uh in a very concentrated period of time.

So he had a very, very information-dense three days. And he did the night classes like two hours long. And then he had two hours in the morning. So he was doing four-hour, three, four-hour days, three days a week. So it's like six, seven hours of judo with me. You know, I'm not going hard judo, of course. And then he did work out hard at night. But it's a very, very concentrated thing. And, you know, I not going hard you know of course and then he did work out hard at night uh but it's

a very very concentrated thing and you know i did this before right i one time i went to uh a gym you know i mean it was a training camp so it's not really a traincation you know i mean i think you've got to distinguish like training camp and traincation is a little bit different training camp is like right national team is going to canada and montreal to shido con nicholas gill and those guys the entire national team from canada is there entire national team from the u.s is there a couple of japanese guys they're peppered in there and now all of a sudden doing two sessions a day and this is two weeks long for the goal of competing at the world championships in a few weeks so that's a training camp that's not what i'm talking about here i'm talking about

a traincation where you seek out a groove and say hey i'm gonna go to your gym every day can you do a morning class with me a private lesson and can i do an evening class with you and then you schedule midweek midweek can't do it on a weekend senseisis are busy. They're doing seminars. They're competing. They're teaching. You know, they're at a competition coaching. You know, and you don't want to burn a 40-something-year-old sensei's weekend with their child. I take my kid to the pool. You know, if you want to do a trancation Friday, Saturday, Sunday, I'm going to be like, no.

I'm going to take you to the pool. Right? Like, today I'm taking her to the pool. You know what I mean? So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesdays, work week for us, work week for a majority of people. Taking those days off, coming to the local spot. It doesn't have to be me. And dedicating those three days.

Midweek, classes are running. So you can do the classes right do the classes throw in a private lesson and have some local cuisine if you're coming to new york city unbelievable food here seriously the best food in the world i mean according to michelin guy is france tokyo those are the top two but new york city man you got the diversity pizza's great here i always joke with my italian friends like pizza in new york is better than in italy like we invented pizza but like uh no seriously like it's a thing now and i see more and more people reaching out to me about this trancation and i'm not trying to like shamelessly promote my trancation package there is no

trancation package right it's no trancation package, right? It's usually, hey, I want to do a private lesson with you. Great. These are, this is my availability. Hey, can I schedule two or three in a row in this span? Will you be there Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays on this date range? And then kind of putting it together. And it really got me thinking, man, like, I would love to have done that.

You know, so it's like now I'm thinking like, all right, I got to do that. Who do I want to train with? You know, maybe there's like, I mean, I would go to Japan, if anything. You know what I mean? I go to Japan. It would be content related because that's what i do right this is like content creation in the grappling space uh but i really wouldn't mind like going out and working out with like justin flores or something like that and you know keep training jujitsu with keenan so you get

jujitsu you know judo obviously nogi judo because justin's kind of at the forefront of that and so like i would love to do that you know what i mean yeah so traincation it's kind of a new hot thing and i did have an idea for myself as a product and you guys are all sort of the first line people who kind of hear my idea because you guys listen to the podcast and give me great feedback on the comments it's a great source of me getting feedback from the community to see what you guys are interested in so i'm gonna give it to you guys first it's like not really in the works yet but i have an airbnb in the mountains it's on a five acre lot it's gorgeous overlooking the shawangunk ridge right which is like actually it's millbrook ridge but it it's like the Shawangunk Mountains, like Mohawk Preserve is up there. It's like a destination for rock climbers globally. So much rock climbing up there,

so much nature, hiking, bikes, local cuisine, and like farm-to-table food. And it's just a really, really like rich in a nature kind of way, you know, getaway from New York City people because it's only two hours away from New York City, it's actually an hour and 45, right, so people drive up there, leaf peeping season is huge, I have a big Airbnb there, it's like a four-bedroom property house, it's big, you know,

really wide, it has a dojo in the basement, I don know if you guys seen my uh instagram reels or stories where i'm like oh look at me building a dojo in the basement of my airbnb i'm thinking about doing a traincation there we have the rooms upstairs there's four bedroom upstairs right we could put eight to ten dudes in there and we'll pick out an off-season day, right? Like winter. Well, like midweek when the thing is not generally booked because there's an opportunity cost to it, right? So Friday, Saturday, Sunday in a July. On any given weekend, the nightly rate is very high. And it's usually already booked.

It's booked with the gills, right? But the Tuesday, the Thursday, the Monday to Wednesday, you know, mid-October, like those days are going to be empty because families aren't going on vacations. So I was going to kind of try to pick some of those days and get a group of guys to do judo downstairs or private lessons downstairs in like a pod, right? So it'll be like this rich thing. And then all of a sudden we'll give you breakfast.

You go for a hike. You hang out. And then at at night there's jiu-jitsu schools in the region and i was gonna talk to those guys and i actually walked in once and i was like hey what's up i introduced myself like oh yeah hey i know you all the stuff so i might kind of like talk to those guys and you know take part in their nighttime training so now all all of a sudden, you get the mountains, you have the hot tub, you have the whole feel. Maybe you can go rock climbing, you know, do some privates. And then you also get to work out at night, like do a hard jujitsu session at the jujitsu school down the street.

So, you know, that's something that I kind of have an idea about. And that's something that I would love to take part in if that was available to me. You know? So, traincation. Yeah, I don't know how else would I explain it. But, you know, I've done a lot of these when I was younger, too. It wasn't really a traincation, though. For instance, I went to Jason Morris' for like three days. It was like a thursday friday saturday or something you know what i mean

i did that and then you know jimmy pedro's i lived up there for a year but like i'll go and miss it every now and then you know mostly for like training camps though so it's not really a trainingcation uh but yeah dipping into a dojo for an extended stay three to five day range where you're kind of booking an airbnb or a hotel nearby and your whole purpose of that trip is to kind of see the neighborhood but also to get a lot of training in so it's the best of both worlds you know a lot of guys kind of go on vacation and bring their gi and dip into a training uh but this is more like the reverse ratio you know the ratio usually is like 90 sightseeing 10 grappling this is the reverse it's gonna be like 80 grappling you know with the guy that you want to train with. And then 20% sightseeing.

So if you're coming to New York City, it's like, oh, you know, I came in on Monday. I worked out with Chantaro. I'm going to go see the Empire State Building, go to Central Park, have a little New York pizza, which is better than pizza in Italy. And then I'm going to come back for the class at night. And we do a little judo. And because we did a session, you're prepped for that night class. And I'm teaching stuff that's going to help you because I already know what you're doing.

And then you go to bed and then Tuesday morning, we do the same thing, right? We get in the morning, how was your training last night? We're hanging out, we're training and then do a little bit of a private lesson and then all of a sudden, it's like, what are you going to do today? It's like, I think you should go see a Broadway show. Right?

It's like, have you seen Hamilton? Have you seen Book of Mormon? You know, yes, no, maybe. Like, ah, I suggested. Do you like musicals? No. Okay. All right, fine.

Scratch that. You know? Maybe you walk the Brooklyn Bridge. Very different now. Right? All the vendors on the Brooklyn Bridge got kicked off recently. In the last six months, they're like, get out. And then they enforce this thing which is

crazy because it used to be like this cesspool of vendors and like they have this like rotating selfie taking you know thing that has that jay-z song new york and it's like non-stop with this bridge but they made it a lot better so you go see that and you come back for training at night and then i'll give you a couple of restaurant suggestions. What are your price tiers that you're looking for? Do you want to go low-end, mid-range, or high-end? What kind of cuisine do you look for? We have guys from the dojo who are restauranteurs.

We do. And we also have guys who write in the food section of the New York Times at the dojo. We have one guy. He's amazing. He doesn't do Judo. He does Jiu-Jitsu, Aikido, and the other martial arts. You can talk to that guy and give you a suggestion.

Now, that is a trinication. Because to me, when I go on vacation, it's nice. The first day is kind of nice. Like, ah, yeah, it's relaxing. And I'm already sitting on the side like, ah, I'm a little bit bored. I want to grapple. I want to work out. I want to be doing something.

You know what I mean? And now that I don't drink, it's like a thing where it's like I can't imagine myself going on a seven-day vacation and just hanging out. You know what I mean? Drinking mimosas on the beach or something. Like, I just can't imagine myself doing that anymore, you know? most is on the beach or something like i just can't imagine myself doing that anymore you know before i will go away and do what i usually do in new york which is kind of just drink and get blitzed and be belligerent sometimes but like i now that i don't drink it's like what am i gonna do sightsee for seven days straight i think i need to do a staycation myself

maybe not like in the judo realm because I'm you know pretty good judo already and you get to to I got a GT guy JT Torres here Marcus Johnson did like Brian Glick teaching me jiu-jitsu it wouldn't be a jiu-jitsu staycation traincation maybe wrestling but this is the thing about wrestling it's like there's not a lot of hobbyist gyms that are high level there is not almost you know what i mean so maybe a wrestling youtuber who is out there that's a wrestling youtuber that i could kind of hang out and do a trancation with? That's my next thing, I think. We'll make content. We'll wrestle.

I learned a new skill. I hope they're in a cool city. Probably not because I'm from New York and we're very arrogant about that. Everywhere outside of New York City sucks for New Yorkers. It really does. about that everywhere outside of new york city sucks for new yorkers it really does um i'm really exposing the unlikable new yorker side of me right now you know it's like jimmy pager old guys are in boston like boston jesus boston oh my god the worst right that's how we are in new york um but yeah that could be a traincation thing that I do next. And if you're interested in doing a traincation in New York, you let me know.

Again, this whole episode became a shameless plug for myself. I'm very sorry, Peter. I hope you guys are able to derive some kind of value out of this episode. And that's why Peter is here. He's my co-host slash partner. Because I'm just sitting here talking about myself, and promoting my stuff, and it's probably coming off very abrasive to most people,

we'll see if anyone's even listening at this point, but yeah, thanks to you guys, the podcast is doing phenomenal, thank you very much to our sponsors, Jason, Levon, and Joe. Greatly appreciate your unwavering support.

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