<story><title>Ravens Offensive Lineman Publishes Math Paper</title><url>http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/03/20/394340722/john-urschel-ravens-offensive-lineman-publishes-math-paper</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>geoka9</author><text>What about getting punched?</text></item><item><author>Swizec</author><text>To be fair, I think that&amp;#x27;s true for any competitive sport. Even many forms of non-competitive sport. Personally I enjoy sparring in english boxing.&lt;p&gt;There&amp;#x27;s something very relaxing about punching people in the face.</text></item><item><author>jgmmo</author><text>Good for him.&lt;p&gt;I hear what&amp;#x27;s he&amp;#x27;s saying about the physical contact, and the feeling of dominating the player in front of you. My high school football coach use to say, on the football field you could measure yourself. You could see how tough you are, how strong you are, and if you have the mental toughness required to win. It&amp;#x27;s you versus the guy across from you.. There&amp;#x27;s not many chances in this world to test yourself like that. I think that&amp;#x27;s some of what he means when he says he&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;addicted&amp;#x27; to the physical contact of football. I certainly miss that aspect.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>beagle3</author><text>The timeline for me is clearly separated to &amp;quot;before the first punch to the nose&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;since that moment&amp;quot; -- and this description is similar to just about any other person practicing martial arts that I&amp;#x27;ve talked to.&lt;p&gt;The first time you get your nose punched while boxing, you have no idea what hit you, or where you are, or where the floor is. It is very disorienting, and usually quite alarming. But that experience somehow reconfigures your brain, and all the times after that are &amp;quot;just&amp;quot; irritating or painful.&lt;p&gt;And I also remember, that following that day, a lot of things in life became much less intimidating and much more tractable. For me, it was a small, but memorable, &amp;quot;life changing experience&amp;quot;</text></comment>
<story><title>Ravens Offensive Lineman Publishes Math Paper</title><url>http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/03/20/394340722/john-urschel-ravens-offensive-lineman-publishes-math-paper</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>geoka9</author><text>What about getting punched?</text></item><item><author>Swizec</author><text>To be fair, I think that&amp;#x27;s true for any competitive sport. Even many forms of non-competitive sport. Personally I enjoy sparring in english boxing.&lt;p&gt;There&amp;#x27;s something very relaxing about punching people in the face.</text></item><item><author>jgmmo</author><text>Good for him.&lt;p&gt;I hear what&amp;#x27;s he&amp;#x27;s saying about the physical contact, and the feeling of dominating the player in front of you. My high school football coach use to say, on the football field you could measure yourself. You could see how tough you are, how strong you are, and if you have the mental toughness required to win. It&amp;#x27;s you versus the guy across from you.. There&amp;#x27;s not many chances in this world to test yourself like that. I think that&amp;#x27;s some of what he means when he says he&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;addicted&amp;#x27; to the physical contact of football. I certainly miss that aspect.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Swizec</author><text>Gloves work &lt;i&gt;surprisingly&lt;/i&gt; well. It took me four years of regularly (1x&amp;#x2F;week) sparring dudes 20kg+ heavier than me (40+ lbs) to get my first injury. And even that was just a small cut above the eye.</text></comment>