Samantha goes to train as well

After Jennifer left Sam’s place, it got the raven haired brunette thinking. Jen was going out to meet a new opponent. She was only a couple of weeks into submission wrestling and already getting tons of experience! Meanwhile, Sam was sitting away at home watching WSW clips, waiting for Jen to come over and share what she’d learned. Samantha was feeling complacent. She was the veteran between the two yet she was the one falling behind.

She decided to reach out to an old contact.

Later that week, Samantha entered a yoga studio in the downtown core. The entrance was an unassuming door between a coffee shop and a bakery. Climbing up to the second floor, Sam found the front door to the actual studio. On the frosted glass pane read “Tina Kwan Yoga Studio”. Not the most innovative name for an establishment, but when your location is as obscure as this, it probably was better to be straightforward about it.

Inside, the space was small. Sam was in the yoga studio as soon as she entered. No front desk or anything, just hardwood floor, bare walls with framed posters for motivation and two windows looking out into the busy downtown street. The room could fit a class size of maybe six at max capacity, but it had all the necessary equipment to do the job. This was Samantha’s friend, Tina’s place. The energetic Asian fitness guru had an apartment upstairs and used this space for her business. While Sam never took a yoga class here, she did come over for a different form of exercise.

“Hey! Long time no see!” Tina called out, coming from the other room, where the storage and washroom was located. She was in a pink and black sports top and matching, form fitting yoga pants. It showed off the fit tone of her pert ass and legs. While not exactly a giant, Tina actually stood a couple of inches taller than Sam. “I was just packing up from the last session!”

“Good to see you too, Tina!” Sam replied, waving and putting her gym bag down. “How’ve you been?”

“Oh good! Things are busy, although that means I’ve missed Judo for the past couple of weeks,” Tina replied. She raised a finger and tilted her head, “Which reminds me!” She quickly stepped into the back room again and came out moments later carrying a rolled up mat. “I got it!”

“Is that?” Sam asked excitedly, already knowing that it was.

“A proper wrestling mat! WSW official merch!” Tina confirmed. “Came in last month! Only, I haven't even gotten a chance to use it yet…”

Sam slouched slightly and pursed her lips in a guilty look. “Sorry… it’s not that I’ve been avoiding you, it’s just that I’ve been in a slump for a while.”

“Here I thought you were keeping a low profile to work on some secret techniques for the tournament!” Tina chuckled.

“Yeah, that was it…” Sam laughed.

“How is Tara Nova?” Tina asked eagerly. “Sneaking around behind me with new wrestlers?”

“Oh…” Sam said, turning red in the cheek. It did feel like she was cheating on Tina now even though they’ve never agreed to be exclusive. “She’s… new. I basically had to train her up, but she keeps getting better and better every time we meet!”

Tina leaned on the rolled up gym mat and craned her neck forward. “Oh? Sounds like you are getting along well enough!” she smiled. “Go on, dish, girl! Is she any good?”

“She’s always improving,” Sam nodded.

“You know what I mean…” Tina prodded, lifting her eyebrow a couple of times.

Samantha paused and felt her cheeks get hotter. “She’s… a very quick learner…” she smiled ruefully.

“Oh, she sounds like she’ll be a fun match then!” Tina replied, rubbing her chin. “You’ll have to introduce us sometime!” Sam’s eyes flashed a defensive glare at Tina. Tina raised her hands, “Well, we’ll meet up eventually, she’s taking part in the rookie tournament too, isn’t she?”

Sam rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah, she says she wants to…”

“What’s the matter? You don’t want her to? Is she that green?” Tina asked.

Sam shook her head. “No, she can hold her own. Well, at least against me,” she shrugged. “I’m just afraid if she sees what else is out there, she might not want to stick around…”

“Like you didn’t?” Tina asked with concern. Sam remained silent, so Tina added, “When you stopped showing up to Judo and started skipping out on our spars, I thought you were done too, Sam, but then I saw you reach out on Discord and was happy to see you still wanted to wrestle!” Tina gave her friend a heartfelt smile. “We’re all new at this. It’s not your fault that I bring my combat sports experience to the table. Sure, others are going to be better than you at the start, but that doesn’t mean you can’t improve as well. You just said your friend is getting better every time you meet. You can do that too! Isn’t that why you’re here?”

Samantha slowly nodded. She wanted to get better so that she could keep up with Jen. As long as she could be at that level, they could keep sparring together. She didn’t want to spill all that to Tina though. As far as she was concerned, it was a budding rivalry.

“I do want to get better, and since you’re the best submission wrestler I know, I wanted to learn from you!” Sam said.

“Aww,” Tina replied, leaning back and covering her chest with one hand. “That’s so sweet, but I’m still a rookie too when it comes to WSW!”

“Yeah, I guess I just don’t know many good wrestlers…” Sam admitted smugly.

“Oh…” Tina replied, shoulders slumped. She grumbled, “Well, I can still kick your ass, so here’s as good a place to start as any…”

Sam smirked.

“So,” Sam went on. “What should we work on? I brought my submission outfit and my Judo Gi…”

“That’s up to you!” Tina replied. “I don’t have another class until the evening, so the afternoon is all ours! We can do some practice and maybe later a spar?” Tina raised her eyebrow hopefully.