Meeting A Lioness

[CaptainL]

Astrid Ostberg had made a mark on LAW for her wrestling skills, wowing crowds nationwide with her strength and stamina and earning the Heavyweight Championship for her efforts. As someone who was raised in a wrestling family and who lived and breathed the sport, she was proud to have reached such heights, and she wore her title with honor. But Astrid didn't just want to leave an impact on professional wrestling for her in-ring talent alone. Wrestling was important to her, and she wanted to give back to it.

She wasn't just in this business for herself. Sure, she was happy to be recognized for all her hard work and dedication, but Astrid knew there would be a time where she and her colleagues had to pass the torch to the next generation of hopefuls. She saw it as her responsibility to inspire and uplift the young rookies who were in the shoes she once found herself in, and who would some day reach her level. As one of LAW's biggest stars, she was already drawing many eyes to the promotion - but she wanted to go the extra mile, and help make their dreams a reality. When LAW's up and coming talent reached out to her, Astrid was happy to help with their training. She had already lent a hand to some of the younger members of the main roster, like Ichika Rei, and she had made occasional visits to the Young Lioness Program's classes to help run drills and teach new recruits.

This time, Astrid would be dealing with this in a more personal setting. She was arranged for a one-on-one training session with one of LAW's Young Lionesses, Joyce Hilda. Astrid had seen potential in the girl, and so had her trainers, who had allowed her to enter the Young Lioness Cup. But in meeting her up close, the Norsewoman would get a better idea of where she stood, where she could improve, and how to bring about the results Joyce wanted - as well as to get a better idea of who she was personally.

Spoiler

A room in the LAW gyms had been booked for their session, and Astrid took her place on the mats. She checked the clock as she did a few stretches, waiting for Joyce to arrive.

[Joyce_Hilda]

Spoiler

It didn't take too long for Joyce arrive, into her wrestling attire: a basic white shirt + blue buruma, with black tennis shoes. She liked to use this as workout uniform, way before she became a wrestler, and decided to keep it as her wrestling attire as she joined the Young Lioness program. Since she was still struggling to come around with a wrestling attire idea, she would keep her favourite workout attire meanwhile.

"Hello, Mrs. Ostberg" Joyce greeted her trainer "I hope I'm not too late. I was doing some warm up by beforehand." I'm excited to start my training with you. I'm needing some advices about some aspects of wrestling: gimmick, entrance songs, signature moves, finisher moves..."

Joyce sounded legitimately excited, but her mind was also wandering pointlessly. Clearly, as an enthusiast, Joyce knew a lot of things about wrestling, but she clearly didn't know what were priorities for a wrestler.

[CaptainL]

As she finished up another set of stretches, Astrid looked up toward the door, where she saw her trainee for the session arrive. She greeted Joyce with a warm and welcoming smile, nodding her head in her direction. "Oh, no, you're right on time - and believe me, warming up is important for a big workout, so you never need to apologize for that! If anything, that just tells me that you're ready!" She chuckled a little to her own remarks before standing a little straighter, placing her hands on her hips and puffing out her generous chest.

She listened to what Joyce described, and she smiled a little wider. It was clear the girl had a lot of enthusiasm, and Astrid was proud to hear it - after all, passion for one's art was often times the first step in achieving success, and right away it was clear that Joyce had that. What gave Astrid some pause, however, was when Joyce described what she was having questions about. The Norsewoman crossed her arms, giving it some contemplation. Certainly, all of what Joyce named was important in establishing onesself as a wrestler worth remembering - but she was missing the most important part.

"Right away," Astrid explained, "I'd like to say that you're geting ahead of yourself. All of those things will come with time - but right now, you're still figuring out where you stand. At that point, you should focus on working out what your strengths are, and developing a style that works for you, yeah? So, let's start at the beginning. What do you feel good at? Or not so good at? We can figure out the fancy stuff from there, but you can't start without the basics."

[Joyce_Hilda]

"Okay, okay, let's start with what I'm good at" Joyce said. "Well, the part I'm best at are submission holds and throwing my opponents around, specially with Irish Whips. I just need to become stronger, because sometimes I struggle a bit before raising people with a certain weight and I struggle to escape some holds. I can also throw some decent blows, although I'm not a boxer or kickboxer. Mainly because I studied Medicine, so I know some tricks about the human body. In fact, I'm right now taking a look at some of the anatomical weakpoints of yours." Joyce said smirking, with a playful tone.

After giggling for some seconds, Joyce continued.

"Now, about my weaknesses: I suck HARD with aerials. You want to make me a laughing stock? Force me to fight a high-flyer or to fight using aerial moves only." Joyce continued. "Also, I have a clinical condition called 'ligament Laxity', so my joints are a bit looser than normal. If my opponents work too much on my joints, I'm afraid they can take my shoulder out of place, for example. And, um... I... um..." Joyce said one last thing, but her voice tone was so low that Astrid couldn't hear.

[CaptainL]

Astrid smiled, nodding her head as Joyce began. She went right to discussing what she was good at and what she wasn't, which, to the champion, was a good sign. She was well aware of what her limits were, and how she could improve. It could take a lot of guts for someone to admit they weren't perfect, but Joyce not only knew that, she was willing to reach out about it, and to pursue correcting those weaknesses. If that was the case, Astrid could already tell that Joyce could look forward to a promising future ahead of her.

"Alright," Astrid said with a smile. "That's a good place to start. So, right away, it sounds like you would best served focusing on your holds when you're in the ring. Throwing people around is fine, but your submission skills are what can help you win a match. The way I see it, the best strategy for you would be to soften up your opponents with throws and slams so that you can go for a submission when they're vulnerable, yeah? And in that case, I think working on your strength would be a good idea, since the stronger you are, the more you'll be able to control the motion of your opponents to set them up how you want." She flexed a bicep to illustrate her point. "If your strategy relies on making your opponents open to a submission, it'll fall apart as soon as you face an opponent too heavy for you to move. So you should build up your strength so that you won't be in that situation."

"Speaking of weak points," Astrid said, "the fact that you can identify you're weak against aerial moves is a good start, but it tells us you might want to train on dealing with high-fliers specifically, so you'll know what to do if you go up against one. If you know you can't win, you need to be prepared for when a situation like that could arise. Of course...I can't exactly help in that respect." She chuckled at her own joke. "But if you have any classmates who focus on aerial moves, it might be worth sparring with them. Working on your strength will help you escape submissions, as will focusing on your striking, so if your opponent goes in to grapple you, you can fight them off before they get a good grip. A good striker can control things from close range, after all."

However, as Joyce added something else, Astrid raised an eyebrow, leaning closer to her. She couldn't quite make out what she said, but she couldn't give advice if she didn't know what to help with. "Ah, I'm sorry? I didn't catch that last part."

[Joyce_Hilda]

"It's nothing, it's nothing at all" Joyce said, blushing a bit. "So, from what exercises do you suggest we to do?" Joyce asked, wanting for some action. "I usually prefer some sparring, but if you feel I need to lift some weight first, I can do that as well. Since you're bigger, stronger and more experienced than me, a thing I feel we should try to do was a sparring match where you would tell me, in real time, mistakes I would make. Just take easy on me, okay?" Joyce asked, not wanting to know what could happen if Astrid attacked her with full strength.

[CaptainL]

Even with Joyce changing the subject, Astrid wasn't one to pry, and she was happy to go on with things. "Well," she said, "some sparring sounds like a good idea. If we're going to do that, we might as well get it out of the way first. That way, I'll have a better idea of where you are now than I would if you had been already tired out from a workout." The Norwegian took a step back, bending low at the knees and getting into a stance as she cracked the joints in her fingers to limber herself up. "Plus, that way, I'll know what it is you can improve on if I see it myself."

With that, Astrid began strafing around Joyce, holding her hands up and leaning in closer to her. "All right, then! Sounds like we have a plan. I'll let you make the first move, but...I must warn you. If I go easy on you, you can't expect your next opponent to do the same..." Her voice turned serious, and her expression turned to a frown. Everyone who'd been around Astrid while she was training cautioned her not to take the easy route, and if she wanted Joyce to reach her true potential, she would take their lessons to heart.

[Joyce_Hilda]

Joyce charged herself at the ropes, then she rebounded herself at Astrid's direction. She would extend her arm and try to nail Astrid with a clothesline. Joyce usually started her matches with a offensive move like this. Her idea, originally, would be throw herself at Astrid with a crossbody, since Astrid was bigger and probably wouldn't get down with just a clothesline. However, with a Crossbody, Astrid would have more room to grab Joyce and reverse her move in a painful way, while the clothesline would give her just the arm. Like a wise man said once: "There are mistakes and mistakes. Sometimes, you can only choose the least worst of them."

[CaptainL]

Astrid bent low at the knees, watching Joyce's advance. Every move she made was being carefully analyzed by the Norwegian, who was assessing what her thought processes were like and how they shaped her actions. Going up against the ropes to draw momentum behind her charge was definitely a good start - when there was such a discrepancy in size between Joyce and her opponent, it was advantageous to get as much force on her side as possible to make sure she stood a chance of moving her. However, even if Joyce had tried to minimize her chances of being countered by using a clothesline, she was still delivering herself toward Astrid when the blonde had been watching her every move - and Astrid, too, could turn her momentum against her.

As Joyce closed in, Astrid reached out with her arms, looking to sling them around the girl's sides. If she could get a good grip, she would proceed to throw herself forward, driving her hip against Joyce's stomach and pulling her up along her body to fling her over her shoulder and to the mat with a hip toss. If Joyce landed, Astrid would turn to face her, dusting off her hands. "Not a bad start," the champion explained. "Just remember that a fresh opponent at the start of the match is going to have the best luck countering you if you go for something like that!"

[Joyce_Hilda]

It ended that Joyce strategy backfired at her in anyway: As soon as Joyce felt Astrid's bulky arms wrapping around her waist, she felt her momentum being broken and she being forced to halt. Also, the feeling of her trainer, an older, stronger, more mature woman capturing her, made Joyce get a slight blush and flinch. This was the moment where Joyce would stop on her tracks and got herself lifted up Astrid's shoulder, being thrown in the mat with a hip toss. Joyce yelped as her back hit hard the mat, and she stared at an upside down Astrid, panting hard to recover her breath.

"O-Okay" Joyce replied to what Astrid said "I got it"