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I've noticed that most of the higher ranking guys at our academy compete, or have done so in the past. Personally, I was never interested in competing. But having noticed this phenomenon, I wonder if there is a correlation between competing and attaining a higher rank. Is it possible to hold a high rank without ever having competed?
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SF Bay Area
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Re: Is it necessary to compete?
Mon, March 12, 2007 - 9:18 PMThat's a pretty good question, but tough to answer, since I basically have only trained at Gracie Barra schools. I have heard second hand at how a few other schools are run though. That being said, it seems to me that it depends on what "lineage" your school is from, the Professor and the number of students.
When I first started, we had one school. Since then, our Professor started a second. That means he's at our school Tues, Thurs, and Fri, and at the other one on Mon, Weds, and Sat. So looking at it from his shoes, that gives a lot of people to keep track of. Moreover, there are people I know, who train at our school mainly on the days he isn't there. At our school, we follow the format that if you can hold your own with the belt level above you, its usually about time to move up. But, even for me its hard to tell who those people are. At our school there is no requirement to go to tournaments. But, I can tell you that even for me, its much much easier to tell what level the other students are at if they compete - even those from the other school that I don't train with. I see the same core group of guys at the tournaments. If they are winning a lot at their belt level, I can tell that they should move up soon. So, for me, its much easier for me to tell you where the students are at that compete from our other school, than it is for a lot of the students that I train with at my school.
Another thing is that at our school, it seems that the students that compete stick around long enough to advance also. I can see how training for 5-7 years would get a little repetitive and boring if there wasn't something to shoot for once in a while. There is a joke that runs around our school that if you give out a purple belt, that's the last you'll see of that student. But now that you asked the question - I actually ran through all the purple belts that have been given out over the years and if my memory is correct, all the students that compete or have, are still in the system. There are only two people that I can think of that has a purple belt and I do not know if they have competed or not. The others all have.
I have heard of one school that one of our Black Belts knows of that won't advance anyone unless they win a tournament or consecutively place really high at several tournaments. Which, if you think about it, if you win a big tournament as a white belt, you're basically not a white belt anymore.
I'm actually curious as to how the students at one of the other Gracie Barra schools are promoted, since the class format is different. It is taught by Nelson Monteiro, who taught my teacher, Marcelo Pereira. In our school the class format is warm-up, train a few moves, then sparrring for 1/2 hour. At Nelson's school, I hear its a light warm-up and training moves /drilling for an hour - then sparring follows as a different class and is completely optional. I hear that quite a few don't participate in sparring on a regular basis, so there must be some other form of consideration for moving up.
It must be different at other schools, since I go to a lot of big tournaments in LA and I only see a few people competing from schools like Royce Gracie etc., yet their schools are far larger than ours. They could send in an army if they wanted too. So the emphasis on competing is lower.
So, now that I wrote a book, all I can say is, it likely depends on the teacher, but at our school, I do know, its much easier to tell if a person is a brown belt if they beat all of the purple belts at a tournament, than by watching them roll with the same people day in and day out, and also I now noticed that people that never compete usually leave in the blue belt/purple belt stage.
Out of curiosity, why do you not want to compete? My reasons for wanting to compete as much as I can have nothing to do with rank (in fact I think about rank very little, but I guess it would be nice to move up to brown one day). They are 1) when I compete, one match seems to make my awareness of my weaknesses a lot better, 2) it seems I improve more during a tournament than training for a month, 3) I get to test my skills against others outside of my school, so I can actually see where I stand, 4) its a different world - in terms of self-defense aspects of BJJ - you can't ever really simulate the "fighting adrenaline" in a regular class, no matter what you do. 5) I learn a ton from my losses - since I'm older, and not ever going to compete in the UFC, I'm really into just learning BJJ and eventually will take up Muay Thai. I'd rather than lose all my matches and learn a bunch than crush a bunch of people and learn less. 6) I just think its fun.
btw, since this has to be about the quietest tribe I've ever seen... you can get a lot of responses at this other discussion board: www.jiujitsuforums.com There are a lot of really enthusiastic students on there.
Where do you train? Is it busy there? If its a huge school, it just may be that its easier for the Professor to remember the competitors.
Happy Training. -
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Re: Is it necessary to compete?
Wed, March 21, 2007 - 8:29 PMThanks for the reply. Your reasons for competing make sense. In fact, I might have to rethink my aversion to competions. Basically, I'm just not a competative person, and have been more interested in the self-defense aspect of BJJ, rather than the sport aspect. Being completely new to BJJ, and coming from an Aikido background, it feels odd to hear so much talk of competitions. But I can see your points about how competions help you improve... especially if you've trained with the same people year after year, I can see how people would be up for a new challenge. In your experience, those people who do compete- how often do they do it? To answer your question, I train at a Ralph Gracie school in the SF Bay Area. He has several schools in the area and has assigned a black belt main instructor to each one. Don't know about the other schools, but ours can get pretty packed in the evenings. -
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Re: Is it necessary to compete?
Thu, March 22, 2007 - 1:06 AMHi again,
In response to what you have to say, I'd say that in a way, I'm not all that competitive anymore either - in terms of wanting to "win" competitions. Like I mentioned, there are plenty of other reasons to compete. I realize that likely a lot of the guys (and I mean guys) who likely compete at your school have the win win win attitude, which you can voice your opinion on wanting to try competing.. ie. you just want to see what it's like.
As far as sport vs. self-defense... here's one to chew on, of course, a lot of it is my opinion... but mixed in with a lot of my own experience and other friends who used to fight a lot or have been attacked.... Likely the best training for fighting/surviving on the street, is fighting/survinging on the street. Of course, these days its dangerous. One of the bay area's best standup guys from Fairtex was shot not too long ago. If its not something like that, something unorthodox can happen. So what are you left with.. training in different forms. To me, it just makes sense that the best way to learn to hit someone is to learn how to do it with them hitting back. The best way to learn how to get out from underneath someone is to have someone on top of you doing their best to keep you there and put you out somehow. So... even though many will argue (especially online!) that standup "sports" like boxing/kickboxing/muay thai are for the ring, and wrestling/judo/jiu jitsu/sambo etc are for the mat. In training one gets closer to the actual feel of what its like. Now when you compete, everything is turned up quite a few notches:
1) you go against someone you've never seen before
2) they will be surrounded by they're teammates that you've never seen before
3) you will be in an unfamiliar setting
4) once the ref says shake hands... there's pressure to stay in it (technically you can walk out)
5) the other person is gonna come at you full speed with the intention of dominating you.
This all means that it takes you one step closer to the street fight/attack, that what you get in your class. You'll learn things about how much being in shape is important, what it feels like when someones coming at you, and where your general skills are at and where your adrenaline/stupidity levels are at. After I read the above list, it seems a little intimidating... but so will a real life encounter, which you'd want to deal with as effectively as possible.
Lets just say, if you pull of a choke in competition - you'll likely be better at it when the time comes. And while a lot will argue that these competition sports aren't deadly, I can assure you that there are a lot of guys in jail for beating people to a pulp and strangulation, and I haven't heard of any that are in for "pushing their palm into a guys nose and jamming it into their brain" or something along those lines and something that I don't actually no of that has even been practiced semi-live to the point its been done right 50-100 times.
For a while when I was younger, I lived in Wyoming - they fight a lot out there, and they used to let 2 guys go at it until it was done. I asked one of my friends the other day, who kept it up until about a year or so ago. We were wrestling teemmates. His streetfight record is 41-0, and its usually the same, throw the guy down and smack him. The reason he wins, is that he practiced holding a guy down for years. Me, I'm not really the fighting type, and what I've wrote is kinda creeping me out, but, I have been attacked, I've had to defend other people, and I'm just glad I had the composure that I've gained from competing and being in those positions. My first wrestling match, I couldn't even see what's happening. Just recently at a more underground music event, this guy would not leave this woman alone. Other folks were too squemish to do anything about it, so I told this monster to take a hike and my adrenaline level was in check, same as it was the last time I had to step in to keep a guy from being smacked by a beer mug.
So, I guess what I've now written a second book about is that if you do go to a tournament, its going to simulate fighting a little bit, but in a safe way, and in a way you don't get in class. Example, I jumped into a huge no-gi tournament a while back - even though I don't train it - and in one match where I tied the guy who won, we had to go for the first point scored in over time. I tried to force a throw, and it didn't work, which it shouldn't have. You just can't really throw someone for *real*, unless they are coming at you and its there. I've known this since high school, but I just had to have the reminder. I also relearned that going into it in 3/4 shape isn't the best idea, but also that being in 3/4 BJJ shape is enough to let you go at it for 8 mins, which is quite a while if you are out of shape.
To answer how often people compete - we have a couple of groups. Non-competitors of course. Then the people who do only our yearly "in-school" (which is about 5 different GB schools in the area). Then the folks that will kind of just try for the big tournaments, ie. the Pan Ams and Nationals in LA thru the IBJJF (which are run thru GB) and maybe one or two of the other tournaments - like the Gracie Worlds from the Helio side. They usually worry about getting hurt or worn out etc, from going to other tournaments, but I think the more the better if you want to really compete. Then there are the guys who jump into anything. We have a bunch of nutballs that go to anything they can and also jump into no-gi, judo, pankration/pancrase tournaments and MMA. Some don't really train for it, but do it anyway.
So I guess, once a year, 3 to 4 times a year, and then every 2 - 3 weeks.
I can see why there is a lot of talk about competing, since you are at Ralph Gracie's school - he was taught by the same guy that our teachers were. He's even in the famous picture... www.graciebarra.com/blackbelts.htm one of our teachers is to the left and back from C G Jr.
I actually trained at the school kinda near Stanford. I have to go to Berkeley and Stanford a lot to do experiments. I've been trying to get my friend Dave, who I stay with sometimes in the city, to go to one of the ones in SF. I said I'd go with him.
Maybe I'll see you and I'll show you a secret move from San Diego.
Geez - you can really tell I don't feel like working. I just wrote a novel.. but you can tell how much I like BJJ! I actually thought of deleting half of this, since its a little embarrasing, but you should see my responses to some dorky science questions.
Peace, happy training.
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