Connor has never come across anyone as strong as Adam before. He even starts suspecting that Adam is using steroids because the strength difference between them is too much.
Lamai is also stunned seeing Adam get out of Connor’s grasp. She couldn’t believe her eyes.
When it comes to grappling, she doesn’t know anyone on a personal level who is better than him, so for him to also not be able to handle Adam’s strength is a massive deal.
"Let’s go again," She says, snapping out of her shocked state.
Adam nods and takes his position once again.
This time, Connor is locked in. Adam might have escaped him the last time, but he is not going to let him do the same again. His pride is on the line. He can’t let some newbie get one over him.
Once both of them take their stances, Lamai gives the go signal, and they engage each other again.
Like before, Adam tries his best to keep Connor away from him, and this time, he does it much better than before.
Last time, Connor did a double fake and caught him off guard, but this time, Adam is much more prepared. He is hyper-focused.
Connor tries to fake Adam multiple times, only for Adam to quickly grab him, counter, and push him away. Connor gets frustrated, realizing that fakes won’t work on Adam. Connor realizes that Adam is extremely hyper-aware of what he is trying to do.
Connor can see it in Adam’s eyes. Those are the eyes of a man who is locked in.
Connor knows that if he wants to engage with Adam and get an advantageous position over him, he needs to let Adam put his hands on him, but that would put him at a disadvantage at the very start because of the difference in their strength.
But Connor is experienced and skilled enough to take such a chance.
He once again moves forward and engages Adam in a grapple, hands slapping each other, trying to establish control over the other.
Connor finally steps in and grabs Adam, and tries to immediately bring him down, but he is immediately met with very strong resistance, as Adam is too strong.
Adam, through sheer strength, manages to get hold of Connor as he tries to trip him. Now that Adam is in control, he immediately takes Connor to the ground; no amount of resistance from Connor is going to stop him from going down.
Adam is just too strong.
But Connor isn’t worried. He expected this to happen as he already knew that Adam could just brute force him and pin him down.
Connor was ready for this, and as soon as his body made contact with the ground, he immediately used his superior skills and knowledge of the game to position his body in such a way that would give him an advantage over time as they struggled on the ground.
Adam gets a little frustrated as he can’t get a better position against Connor, even though he managed to bring him down.
The difference between Lamai and Connor is night and day. Even with his much superior strength, he is struggling to pin down Connor.
Adam struggles as he is clueless on how to approach from the position they are in, after all, he is just a newbie and doesn’t know what to do next. Connor, on the other hand, is a master. He knows what to do.
So, taking advantage of Adam’s lack of knowledge, he twists his body, slipping away from Adam’s grasp and grabs onto Adam’s hand, and rolls him over, bringing Adam to his back.
Now with Adam’s arm trapped between his legs, which are also pinning Adam to the ground, Connor goes for an arm bar.
If Adam doesn’t tap, his arm is going to snap.
Connor grabs Adam’s wrist with both his hands and pulls it back, locking in the armbar. He expects Adam to soon tap, but to his surprise, something incredible happens.
He meets resistance. He wants to lock all the way out, but he can’t.
Surprised, he looks at Adam’s arm as his hand is clenched into a fist, he then looks down at Adam and sees him gritting his teeth, trying to overpower the armbar.
And it starts to work. Adam starts curling his hand. His bicep bulges as they work to pull the rest of Adam’s arm in. Connor’s back starts getting lifted off the ground.
Connor’s eyes widen with shock as he has never experienced anything . Even a heavyweight fighter in this position has no chance of escaping from an arm bar.
But here he is, his whole body about to get biceps curled with just one hand.
Lamai, who is also watching this happen, can’t believe her eyes. ’Just how strong is this guy?’ she questions. She has been fighting for almost her entire life, so she knows how much of a freak you would have to be to curl up someone when they are trying to break your arm with an arm bar.
Connor’s entire body gets lifted up, which allows Adam to roll in and get on top of Connor as he is still holding onto Adam’s hand.
As Adam does this, Connor sees another opening. Adam might have managed to get overpower through the armbar, but the fight is not over.
Using his superior skills and knowledge, Connor twists, throwing Adam out of balance once again, and springs into action, getting behind Adam and clenching onto him from the back.
He immediately wraps his hand around Adam’s neck and legs around Adam’s waist, locking in the rear naked choke.
He knows Adam is extremely strong, so he locks his choking hand into his other hand’s inner elbow, and then uses that hand to put pressure on Adam by the back of his head.
Connor grits his teeth as he feels pain in his forearms from Adam’s fingers digging into his muscles, but he holds on. Any second now, he will have his tap.
After a few seconds, Adam taps. He tried to overpower Connor by pulling his hand away, but Connor had already locked his hands tight. Adam felt he could put in more strength, but feared that his fingers might actually dig into Connor’s hand by doing so.
So Adam just tapped out, as he couldn’t find any other way to get out other than ripping Connor’s flesh off his hand.
Connor immediately lets go of the choke as he feels the tap.
Adam rolls away and gets up, rubbing his neck, as he can still feel the lingering pressure of that choke. No matter how strong he is. He would have passed out. Luckily, this is just training.
But Adam also realizes that if he ever has to fight a skilled grappler in the streets who manages to get his hands around his neck, he could just rip the flesh from their bones with his superior grip strength.
Adam looks at his own hand and wonders just where the limit of this body is.
"That was tough," Adam says,
"Yes, it was," Connor says.
"You are strong, but as you experienced, it won’t always help you when completely outclassed. You still need to learn a lot," Lamai says, and looks at Connor.
She sees him control breathing and sweating. Her eyes can’t help but drift down to his hands and see them shaking, surprising her. His hands are clearly very fatigued from what Adam put him through.
Lamai begins to wonder just what kind of monster Adam will turn out to be in a year or two if he is already making elite-level grapplers like Connor tired from a single spar.
Adam starts going through the spar in his head and wonders what he could have done differently to not end up getting choked out.
"Do you take steroids?" Connor couldn’t help but ask, as he was overwhelmed with what he experienced. Sure, he won, but look at him, trying to calm his beating heart from exhaustion while Adam is just standing there without a single sweat on his body.
"Never," Adam answers. He understood why Connor would ask such a question. He is, after all, extremely strong.
"How do I know you are not lying?" Connor asks.
"We can go and do a test right now if you want," Adam says.
Connor stares at Adam and then nods his head. Even if Adam took steroids, the strength he displayed was still too much. Connor has fought juiced-up fighters before and lost to some of them, but never did any of them make him feel as helpless as Adam did.
Adam is a monster. He believes it now.
"Can you continue?" Lamai asks. Connor nods his head. "Then let’s continue," Lamai says and continues teaching Adam. She tells how Connor managed to get the upper hand on him and how he could have defended.
She guided Adam through it with the help of Connor, showing what he could have done in his situation.
Adam observes everything with great attentiveness, as he doesn’t want to miss anything.
He then locks hands with Connor once again for another spar. He immediately improves on his technique after everything he learned from Lamai’s instruction, surprising Connor once again.
This time their spar lasts even longer, but Connor once again gets the upper hand, putting Adam in another rear-naked choke.
After the spar, Lamai will tell him what went wrong and how he could have done better again.
After that, they engage in another spar, and this time, Adam manages to escape Connor once again.
Frustrating Connor with how quickly Adam is learning.