Jiu Jiu wrote another post regarding the other side of the gender issue when it comes to women in jiu jitsu. It’s an interesting read, I read through her list of advantages. While I agree some of them are indeed advantages, some of them I feel are actually disadvantages, more specifically a smaller pool of competitors in tournaments.
Anyway, I would recommend it: check it out!
Our guys fought hard, a couple came away with medals, a couple got banged up and one got head butted in the nose. :-/ But, among our competitors was Maggie’s dad, mike: go Mike!
The only brown belt females that fought were in the masters and registration closed before I could attempt to be the youngest master’s division competitor at the tournament. I don’t know: I just didn’t see the tournament coordinators bending the rules for an adult to fight masters AND after the tournament’s registration had closed- but I did have a chance to chat with Jen Flannery and we talked about coordinating registration for future tournaments. I imagine this will turn into something like a phone tree, but, you know…not.
Other than that, I just checked the tournament results and the top teams were Alliance at 309 points, Renzo Gracie at 212 and Gracie Barra at 109. For anyone who’s interested in that sort of thing.
Oh, and can someone solve this for me? There is a brown belt Gracie Barra guy who has fantastic hair. I see him at tournaments all the time, and it just never seems the appropriate venue to compliment a dude’s hair. Anyone have any idea?
UPDATE: mystery solved. It’s AJ Agazarm. Apparently he’s making all the right moves on the Jiu jitsu mat, and wherever he buys his styling products. Trust me, as someone with long curly hair, it’s not easy to find the right hair stuff.
Ok, I think I’m done talking about hair.
Also, while we’re at it, the hippy-Jesus guy who is always at the west coast Jiu jitsu tournaments, if anyone knows his name as well. I feel like I should know that guy’s actual name, and stop referring to him as “Hippy Jesus”.
Filed under tournaments
Hey guys, so my teammate told me that someone recognized me in the real world as the Skirt on the Mat while I was out in California.
If you guys see me, please by all means say hi! I’ll certainly be happy to meet you. If it makes you feel any better, Rick from Middle Age BJJ at Pans last year walked up to where we were sitting and just said out loud to our group, “So, who’s Skirt on the Mat?”
That’s me!
I may be surprised, definitely happy to meet you. It’s one of the great things about jiu jitsu: meeting new people who share the same interest in jiu jitsu.
On that note, I should probably put an actual, non-Katie face photo up….Yeesh…
Filed under bjj
The more I read around the internet about where people train, the more spoiled I feel when it comes to our facilities. I just read Jiu-Jiu’s locker room shower situation- they have one unisex communal changing area and one shower. Actually, I have heard of similar situations in the area around our academy.
Again, I feel a little spoiled when saying this, but we have separate men and women’s locker rooms: each locker room has two bathroom stalls, two shower stalls and two sinks. Separate hot water sources too, I’m pretty sure: there have definitely been a few occasions when the boys had to deal with cold showers while the girls were totally unaware of any issue.
It wasn’t quite always this way: we were temporarily displaced when the building was being remodeled, but men and women always had separate changing areas made with stacked lockers.
I’m sorry to hear this is a situation in some gyms. I understand sometimes owners/instructors make sacrifices when it comes to real estate: a space with the perfect square footage and the right location can make someone overlook the bathroom facilities, but I have to admit, if I was just starting jiu jitsu and someone told me that I had to change in a communal area, I probably would have quit, or brushed up on my locker room ninja changing skills from highschool gym class. Most likely the latter, contorting myself like I was in a straight jacket, with my arms inside a t-shirt when attempting to change from a regular bra to a sports bra.
For ladies who put up with all of this and still train, you absolutely have my respect. For guys who have women in their academy in this situation, I agree with Jiu Jiu- please understand that it can be a stressful situation for a girl, especially for one that is starting out in the sport. I’m not saying you should let this theoretical white belt girl walk all over you and take an hour shower, but understand that’s an uncomfortable situation for most women, and sometimes it takes women a little longer to get themselves sorted before leaving the locker room. I don’t even know what I would do about a single shower. I would most likely either go home and shower or only use the gym shower in extreme emergencies.
On a side note, congratulations on Meghan getting her blue belt! Hooray!
On a geek-tastic side note, I haven’t watched the season premiere of the new Game of Thrones, but I did take advantage of their site Join the Realm and made a Coat of Arms for the blog.
…Oh yeah.
Filed under bjj
Hey guys, still running around trying to get back into the swing of things- I should have my Pans highlights/summary up in a day or so, promise.
I wanted to share this moment from class last night though: I was sparring with one of our white belt girls, and had caught her in a bow and arrow choke. She tapped, turned around with a big smile on her face and exclaimed, “I missed you!”
It was a little odd, but definitely endearing and I couldn’t help but laugh.
Have a great day everyone!
Filed under Uncategorized
It’s been a little over a week, so sorry for that: I wanted to get permission from the photographer, Maggie, before putting them up.
It was a good seminar and good to see Saulo here on the East Coast: we learned some different things, cleaned up a few techniques, and overall had a good time. Here are some photos!
Filed under bjj
Jiu Jitsu black belt Val Worthington wrote a pretty interesting article about helping men better understand the perspective of a woman starting out in the sport. While it may appear to be a large word count, it’s actually a pretty quick and easy read that I hope more guys read and take into consideration the next time a new woman starts their jiu jitsu program.
Georgette posted a video from GracieMag of the brown belt absolute finals match between Keenan Cornelius and Gianni Grippo at the Boston Open. Both are really good jiu jitsu players, so it’s a little long, but pretty interesting most of the time.
Filed under bjj
Right up there with patience, timing I feel is one of the hardest things to teach in jiu jitsu. You can show someone techniques, how to turn, how to grab here, place the foot there, so on and so forth, but it’s timing that pulls the whole thing together and changes a series of what seem to be movements with no rhyme or reason into something effective and in some cases, quite beautiful.
The hard part in teaching timing isn’t so much the explaining part, even though that is a little challenging: it’s getting the student to fully understand the concept of timing in the situation the technique would be best applied. We don’t want to train people to respond in only one way to particular moves, but there are some common reactions, based on past experience and pure body mechanics. It’s those reactions, those opportunities we address and take advantage of, with our own positions we find effective from past experience and body mechanics.
It’s difficult, but immensely satisfying when someone finally gets the timing down. It may look a little different than how we do it, or how we do it, but the technique and timing are down, and the person may have adapted the technique for their game, which is pretty cool to watch.
So while timing may not be everything, it’s a pretty large part of jiu jitsu.
Filed under bjj
I know everyone has probably put in their two cents at this point, but when I first read the heading to Keith Owen’s post, “Can Women Really Handle Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?” my first reaction was to recall a scene from the movie 300, which I have (painfully) recreated for you with a free gif generator, so sorry for the poor quality:
“Clearly you don’t know our women…”
Granted this guy doesn’t make his living writing, he makes it teaching jiu jitsu. Also granted there is an expectation that as an instructor he should have a little more open mind and less sexist attitude when it comes to recruiting women students into his academy.
Maybe it’s just me, but in his post the instructor creates an “us versus them” mentality, which may also reflect in his teaching at his academy. In an attempt to not scare women away, he in fact is creating a segregated culture by putting women to the side where they won’t be”harmed” or “made uncomfortable” by rolling. By putting women to the side you create a double standard; a perfectly healthy man is pressured to train, where the “delicate flower”of a woman is not pressured to try her new skills out on the mat.
Aye, but there’s the rub: to try something new, jiu jitsu or not, is about getting out of your comfort zone and being challenged. And while we know the joys of overcoming those challenges in the art, they can be immensely frustrating and practically a deal breaker for ANY beginner. It takes time and patience to get a new student through that first obstacle, regardless of gender. I’m sure if this is he notices a lot of women walking out the door, there’s a good chance a lot of white belts in general are walking out the door, frustrated with the experience: it’s just women are the smaller group and so their absence is more noticeable. While you will find a few exceptions to the rule, your white belts aren’t quite “in love” with jiu jitsu up to the first 60 to 90 days-you have to share that passion, that enthusiasm with them. Challenge them, but also make sure someone isn’t smashing the living daylights out of them the first week in.
I do find the mention of the married men a bit out of line though. I could be totally wrong, but to mention it as an issue means there’s a good chance someone is making it an issue on the mat which would make any female uncomfortable no matter how much they love training.
I never thought I had to be Captain Obvious, but women don’t think about sex when they are training with male partners. We are there to learn and improve, not to “get our grind on”. Just….ew. And if the wives of these guys are complaining about women training with men, encourage them to try a few classes to see what the whole thing is really all about. Who knows? Maybe you’ll have a few women sign up that way.
My point is treat everyone in your academy with respect, encourage that respect among one another, have relatively little to no double standards (guys in our academy are not allowed to wear a shirt under their gi, but women are allowed- that sort of thing) and most importantly share your passion for the sport with your students. That is how you will get women to stay: by focusing on the sport and everything you love in it, and not a woman’s perceived “delicate sensitivities”.
I’m linking to Julia’s post on the subject, mainly because she was the one that brought the whole thing to my attention, and also I don’t want to give this guy any more publicity than he already has gotten in response to the article. If you are going to read it, read Julia’s analysis first, and like her post so she gets the readership traffic boost.
Filed under bjj, Training, women's bjj
A 20 something jiu jitsu brown belt student at Maxercise in Philadelphia, PA who likes to write. Obviously.
