Jiu-Jitsu is a Martial Arts with unlimited possibilities and can be overwhelming at the beginning. Like everything you start learning it will get better with time but in BJJ every time you start understanding a techniques it open another universe of opportunities so is important when you get started to have a clear path and focus in the correct hierarchy of techniques, I mean you need to learn some techniques before others.

Most people focus on submissions first but don’t know how to control the positions or how to even get there to begin with, this can lead to a lot of frustration and a lot of times people end up quitting before getting to the good part of BJJ, also not having a hierarchy of techniques and no focus will make your learning curve much longer.

Here are some things you can focus to get started:

Basic Solo Drills: This are the movements you typically do at the beginning of classes to warm up like: hip escapes, bridges, technical bridges, front and back rolls, break-falls. Learning how to move your body will help you get familiar with BJJ movements and understand how to perform technique better.
Defense: When you start training you will find yourself been mounted, side mounted, having people taking your back or getting submitted from someones guard and if you don’t know how to defend (been safe in this positions) and escape from there to improve your position, you will spend a lot of energy trying to force your way out and getting exhausted, tapped and not being able to train for long period of time.

(NOTE: I recommend if you are new to Jiu-Jitsu that you spend the first 2 to 4 months focusing in the fundamentals classes and learning all the basics. At my school beginners have to get to at least the second stripe on their white belt to be invited to a more advance class where they roll more, this is super important so you can enjoy Jiu Jitsu longer, trust me don’t rush it and be patient, the good part is coming but you have to prepare your body and mind for the long journey.)

Escaping Basic Positions: So in order to start constructing your game you first need to get comfortable been in bad spots, meaning that you are able to not get tap in this spots and then been able to escape and recover your guard or come on the top to a better position. I recommend you learn and master 2 or 3 escapes from each of this basic positions:

– Front Mount: Can be UPA escape, elbow escape, hipe escape.

– Back Mount: Under-hook escape, over-hook escape.

– Side Control: Replacing guard, going to turtle , and back door escape.

– Headlock: This is common in self defense situation but it will also happen in training and there is 2 or 3 fundamentals escapes you should know.

– Half Guard: Depending on your body type you will use half guard as your main guard and attack position but in general a good guard passer will look to force half guard also know as half pass, to smash and pass your guard so you should learn to replace your full guard from here and also going to the back.

With this you have a lot to work to get started, I say it before but is important to repeat, make sure to leave your ego outside the academy.

Everyone is trying to learn and getting tap is not personal, you are trying to do the same to your training partners. Build good relationships with them so you both can trust each other and enjoy more the process.

In the next lessons I will show you the techniques I was talking about to escape this positions of control that your partner will try to get to be able to submit you.

They were two very difficult years due to the pandemic, in which Jiu-Jitsu in Europe practically stopped.

In Ireland, gyms reopened without restrictions in February, and Jiu-Jitsu came back in full force. Based in Dublin for about seven years, our GMI Henrique Saraiva tells how he overcame his mishaps:

“We were totally closed for a year”, says the black belt, son of master Orlando Saraiva. “Ireland was one of the countries with the greatest restrictions in the world, and the Jiu-Jitsu community felt this downtime a lot. But, amazingly, we came back even stronger and our children’s team won the two official events held in the country this year, the Emerald Cup and the Irish Kids Cup. The adults on our team also managed to finish second overall in the Emerald Cup.”

The professor had a chat with GRACIEMAG.com about the team’s other challenges:

GRACIEMAG: After a year with the gym closed, you saw 90% of the students go back to training. How do you think you achieved this almost massive return?

HENRIQUE SARAIVA: We kept in touch with the students throughout this period, and I think they all missed Jiu-Jitsu very much, eager to get back to doing an irresistible physical activity like ours. In addition to the people who returned, we had a great demand from people for physical activities to get back in shape, and Jiu-Jitsu was widely chosen, after all it is a passionate sport.

What was the biggest lesson of the long interruption?

After this one year of lockdown, I think the biggest lesson is to live today, and not miss more training for nonsense. After all, we never know what life has in store for us tomorrow.

How have the kids been at your school?

flying. The Irish Kids Cup was the first major children’s event in the country, and we were able to show that our leadership in children’s events here remains the same. I was happy with the result and most importantly: the children and parents were pleased to see their children in competition again, with all the fraternizing atmosphere that marked the event.

What did you take the opportunity to change and implement in the academy in this stopped year?

I studied hard our teaching methodology. And I also opened a new school, www.bjjlucan.com. We’re in a new area of Dublin that didn’t have BJJ yet and growth is fast. We started last month with children’s classes and soon we will have more athletes to represent the team in competitions. Oh, and I graduated my first Irish black belt, Connor Dillon, as well as other worthy students.

How the sport has been doing in the country?

Growing up a lot. We’re going to have the first Irishman in the ADCC this year, lightweight Sam McNally, and the IBJJF events are getting big here, I’m sure we’ll still have a black belt world champion. About our team, the team also only grows, so much so that Professor Evandro Japan came to reinforce classes. He’s my first black belt, graduated in 2007, and he’s a two-time European Jiu-Jitsu champion.

Guthierry Barbosa in action. Photo: Ane Nunes/AJP

Professor Pedro Lott lives and teaches Jiu-Jitsu in Canada, where he has been able to follow the evolution of Carlson Gracie team in competitions. The team recently had good performances in IBJJF events as well as superfights. In three Copa Podio’s editions, for exemple, Guthierry Barbosa’s star shone bright.

On the Jiu-Jitsu Con stage and at the Worlds Masters, held by the IBJJF in the same week of November, Pedro Lott had four students winning gold, and six more with silver medals. A respectable result for the team, which turned its attention toward competition in 2021.

“The result was very good; the team is evolving a great deal”, Lott stated. “The athletes are progressively more aware of the rules, the training is well structured, and the result could not have been different. I am very happy with the result, team Carlson Gracie place third overall at the Master Worlds — we’re a real threat again! It’s some very serious work that has been done by Master Carlson Gracie Jr; he’s getting the team together again. It’s a very hard tournament, and we did great. Out of the champions, I want to point to my student Ahmad Kabalan, who was the master-3 champion black-belt at the feather division. He was a Pan champion in the brown belt as well, so I could make him a black-belt, after five matches, including a win over Ranieri (Mike) in the finals.”

In the adult black-belt competitions, the young Guthierry Barbosa has been leading a new crop of talent. He now owns three Copa Podio trophies, including a win in the lightweight GP and two in middleweight GPs held in 2020 and 2021.

“Guthierry certainly is our team’s standout in the black belt. He’s coming off some excellent campaigns in Copa Podio. We also have other strong names like Matheus Nascimento, Celson Ricardo, Alexandre Molinaro, Pedro Dias, Juan Lopes, plus the new generation. There’s also Pedro Dias, a silver medalist for two years straight in the IBJJF Pan in the black belt. Team Carlson Gracie is coming in really strong this season,” Lott said.

For 2022 season, Pedro wants his team focused on the main IBJJF competitions, especially the Master Worlds.

To arrived in great shape at the IBJJF World Championships, which ended in the second week of December, Tainan Dalpra, Mayssa Bastos and Matheus Gabriel were even more professional during their preparations by hiring Nathalia Chantre, a specialist in sports nutrition for Jiu-Jitsu athletes.

Tainan won gold at middleweight in his first year as a black belt, after beating Isaque Bahiense. Mayssa, for example, was champion for the second time at rooster. Matheus, who had won the Worlds at featherweight, closed ranks with with a teammate at lightweight.

What made the difference in the performance of these three elite athletes of the new generation of the sport? Well, Nathalia will explain below.

“The biggest differentiator about Tainan that I see is the tireless search for improvement and professionalism. With this in mind, the only missing piece was precisely nutrition. The first simple and efficient adjustment we made was hydration. Tainan, for example, used to train practically every day dehydrated, since his water intake was approximately 1.5L. Another very important adjustment was the quantity and quality of meals. The current middleweight world champion ate just two meals a day. It was just lunch and dinner with a carbohydrate source and a protein source. The amount of caloric intake was far below his energy demands, making it difficult to recover. In the first week, Tainan evolved a lot and we managed to increase the water intake from 1.5L to 4L. We also included an electrolyte replenisher after morning competition drills. From two meals, we went to five meals, even when cutting weight. This contributed a lot to his recovery after the training sessions. He improved immunity, started getting truly restful sleep and minimized the chances of injury! Consequently, he had a performance boost! Simply, that 1% that was needed to finish the year at the top”, emphasizes Nathalia.

A certified nutritionist by the International Sports Sciences Association, in the United States, Chantre also reveals the strategy she concocted for Mayssa to have the best “career weight cut”. The rooster champion had three matches, all of which ended with a choke from behind.

“Although I’ve been working with Mayssa Bastos for almost two years now, this was the first time we did the weight cut for rooster in the IBJJF. As she said, this was the best weight cut she made for this event. It was really clear on the mat that she had a lot of energy in the first fight after weigh-in through the final, the next day. The biggest difference for this cut was the beginning time of nutritional periodization, Mayssa’s dedication to follow 100% of what was proposed and understand that an athlete should not cut carbohydrates from their diet! She used some supplements with an ergogenic effect such as creatine, for example. We took care of immunity, which was a frequent complaint from Mayssa, and I paid some attention in the pre-competition phase. It is at this stage that the athlete can have a drop in performance due to the intensity of training. When Mayssa entered this pre-competitive phase, she was practically at weight—that is, I didn’t need to reduce the caloric intake, which is not common when athletes do it on their own. In addition, I added foods and supplements that enhance recovery, such as curcumin, concentrated grape juice and tart cherry”, reveals the nutritionist.

With Matheus Gabriel, an athlete with whom Nathalia has worked for two years, she tells what were the main strategies and changes in the champion’s eating plan.

“At the Worlds Matheus was very good at his weight. He trained with high muscle glycogen stores, which not only boosted his training performance, but also helped his recovery. One of the carbs we used in pre-workout meals was tapioca, which he likes a lot, and fruit. He had a diet planned for his training schedule and we also used an electrolyte replenisher, after intense training sessions, supplements with ergogenic effect such as creatine and beta alanine, both of which improve sports performance. To help Matheus have restful sleep, we use foods rich in tryptophan for dinner, chamomile tea before bed with drops of propolis and also CBD of the ATH brand, which does not have THC and magnesium”, says Nathalia.

Matheus Gabriel with Nathalia Chantre.

Photos: Personal Archive

Denilson Pimenta, 41, is a big winner on the IBJJF’s competitive scene. An owner of six world titles, as well as gold medals in the gi and no-gi versions of the Pan, this black-belt from GFTeam wants to return to the roster of big superfight-heavy events like BJJ Stars and BJJ Bet, which are known for providing visibility to athletes older than 30.

Now living in Naples, Florida, he trains twice a twice a day planning to be summoned to fight Bruno Frazatto, Rafael Mendes or Mario Reis in a superfight event. Those are three fights that, in his eyes, make a lot of sense.

“I’d like to fight them again,” Denilson said. “It’s more to compare my mental side from before to now; the way I think has changed a lot. I’m a more experienced guy, more professional in regards to training and nutrition. If any event calls me up, I’ll be ready. I love fighting, and respect all my opponents.”

Out of the titles he won this season, the No-Gi Pan was etched in Denilson’s memory due to the final against Isaac Greeley of American Top Team. The light division’s gold was on the line.

“Man, this championship really left a mark on me,” said Denilson. “Isaac is a really tough old man; I had to come back from behind against him. He scored an advantage right at the start of the fight… I almost finished him twice, got two advantages and won. It was a war. It left a mark!”

Denilson also shared his thoughts on masters’ competitions in general, saying the number of competitors in the age group has been growing more than among adults. “The master category loves to compete; there’s no vanity, because the goal is to have fun, to test your BJJ,” he added. “In the adults’, on the other hand, in my point of view, it’s just like football. Back in the day, it was about winning competitions to make money. Now the athlete makes money to fight in competitions. Everything has changed; Jiu-Jitsu has become more professional. So people can stop competing at any moment. In the masters’ there’s no such thing. There will always be war!”

Photo: IBJJF/Facebook

Kaio César is starting to reap the fruits of the discipline employed in the course of his journey in Jiu-Jitsu, which began when he was just 13, when he got an invitation from a friend while playing football.

Today, at 29, Kaio is one of the big black-belt names on the IBJJF’s master 1 competitive circuit. He is a 2021 American Nationals no-gi champion.

“I live to train and compete,” he said in a recent interview. “In Brazil, for example, I used to teach class. I notice that there is no difference between training in Brazil and here – it’s really just the language. Here, they often say that if you speak the language of Jiu-Jitsu, everybody’s going to understand you. But you’d better learn to speak English too!”

A representative of Gracie Barra, Kaio has an intense routine to keep up with the biggest BJJ events. By the end of this season, he wants to fight for the gold at the Pan and the World Championship, in and out of the gi. He currently sits atop the IBJJF’s master 1 rankings for no-gi light feather athletes.

“I train four times a week, and within those days, I try to organize the technical side, the specific training and lots of free training, which, in my view, is important,” he said.

Kaio went on to say that these days the master 1 age group is very hard-fought, and added: “Back in the day, even after the age of 30, most athletes would still fight in the adults’ group. But nowadays, I see that it’s pretty evenly split. The athletes from the adult category, when they reach master age, realize there’s plenty of tough fights and opponents in all categories. So it’s worthwhile to fight in the right division and do good matches regardless.”

The black-belt of seven years wrapped up the interview by sharing the greatest lesson he learned in his 17 years of jiu-jitsu: “Have discipline! Never give up on your goals, and be perseverant. Discipline has never failed to produce good fruits.”

Photo: Divulgation

At a meeting held at the Brazilian Embassy in Ireland, professor Henrique Saraiva, counselor César Leite, and ambassador Marcelo Biato signed a partnership to support projects involving Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in the European country.

Saraiva, a Jiu-Jitsu teacher based in the capital Dublin for six years, is one of the most active promoters of the sport in Ireland, through his academy, his social projects in schools, and sports competitions he holds.

At the Embassy meeting, the theme was the development of Jiu-Jitsu in Ireland and the rest of the planet in recent years. With the number of teachers that Brazil has exported to the world, the increase in the number of gyms, practitioners, and championships, the martial art has been an important diffuser of Brazilian culture.

The Brazilian community in Ireland today is estimated at 70,000 Brazilians and the Embassy has supported projects that consistently contribute to building solid bridges between Brazilian and Irish cultures. Jiu-Jitsu, like the rest of the world, has established itself as an excellent integration tool in the Brazilian community.

As the son of Orlando Saraiva, a red belt who started in the sport thanks to a social project, Professor Henrique is well aware of the importance of everyone’s support for the sport to put down its roots:

“Everything still seems like a dream, and it’s at the very beginning, but we are working hard to make it come true”, comments Henrique Saraiva.

Henrique e Darragh after the graduation. Photo: Reproduction

Jiu-Jitsu ace in Ireland, the country’s representative in several elite tournaments, Darragh O’Conaill has plenty of reasons to celebrate. Under the tutelage of Brazilian Henrique Saraiva, the Irishman received the second degree at his black belt, cementing his reputation as one of the main competitors in the land of Conor McGregor.

GRACIEMAG today recalls one of the most important duels in O’Conaill’s career, the middleweight final at the IBJJF 2018 No-Gi European Championship. Check out the pressure of the master with adult intensity in the video below. Oss!

Raphael Barbosa is a Jiu-Jitsu Black Belt. Photo: Personal archive

Raphael Barbosa is among the most renowned teachers in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. This 39-year-old has over 25 years of experience across classes, seminars and competition. A black-belt since 2007, when he was promoted by his teacher Luís Cláudio, Raphael teaches Jiu-Jitsu at the gym from Ultimate Fight Champion, known as UFC Gym, which has over 400 students just in the gi classes.

The owner of a unique methodology, full of steps for preparing a good student on their journey to the black belt, Raphael in a recent interview explained that his teaching belongs to a Gracie lineage, due to his teacher’s education under the legendary Rickson. Additionally, his students have been achieving better and better results on and even off the mat, given that he also uses the sport as a tool for personal growth.

“Jiu-Jitsu is a unique sport; it provides many things beyond maneuvers and moves,” Raphael said. “On the mat, you learn to be a better person, a more patient person. You become more confident, believe in yourself more, and that is reflected in your life. It’s perceptible to notice that in the white-belts, because they come in with no confidence and with fear, but as time passes, they become confident, they believe more in their own effort. I really like Jiu-Jitsu because of that. No matter how much knowledge you have, the sport is always going to teach you something more. It’s one of the strongest tools for personal growth in the world.”

Below we organized a list of five concepts shared by Raphael. He views these as important for a student’s evolution, regardless of their belt color.

1 Not skipping the process: “The practitioner needs to respect the process! We know that Jiu-Jitsu is a very complex sport and demands lots of motor coordination, and explores all of the student’s physical functions. Because of this complexity of movements, especially when it’s time to put it into practice, many students get frustrated, and there’s always that question: ‘Professor, when will I be able to do all these moves automatically?’ I see that this is a constant occurrence in beginners’ classes. Within this concept, here at UFC Gym, I place beginners’ classes separate from the others, where I teach them the entirety of the ABCs. They perform drills thousands of times, and, until they reach the second degree, I don’t even let them spar on their own. First they will learn how the whole process of a well-done technique works.”

2 Studying Jiu-Jitsu: “It’s necessary to study how Jiu-Jitsu was created, to know the story of the Gracie family. Understand how the promotion system works, the scoring — how everything surrounding the sport works. In order to know what you are doing, to know the basics to get a better understanding. A white-belt needs to know these things so as not to get lost.”

3 Practicing self-defense: “Jiu-Jitsu was created for this, for the smaller person to be able to defend themselves against the bigger one. So never ditch self-defense — we never know when we’ll need to use it. The white-belt usually ends up trying to learn advanced Jiu-Jitsu online, instead of learning what they really need, and ends up hindering the evolution process.”

4 Practicing takedowns: “Jiu-Jitsu starts standing, and lots of gyms neglect this! I see lots of sparring done only on the ground, and sometimes on the knees. The takedown side of things is essential for the student to learn. Practice Jiu-Jitsu as a progression!”

5 Listening to the body: “Respecting your body’s limit is essential! Sometimes, a white-belt, in that endeavor to evolve or prove something to themselves, to the teacher and to training partners, ends up not tapping to and armbar, not tapping to a choke… Then they end up blacking out or getting arms popped, causing an injury. This can’t happen — it’s foolish! If the student really loves Jiu-Jitsu, they will want to practice it for the rest of their life, but by acting that way they will only be shortening the journey. Think about it!”

DJ MArcelinho da Lua trabalha da guarda contra o professor Luiz Dias, da GAS Jiu-JItsu. Foto: Reprodução

Feras das pick-ups, DJ Marcelinho da Lua celebrou seu retorno aos estúdios, para a gravação o novo CD “Insolente”, com a volta aos tatames, muito bem acompanhado pelo nosso GMI Luiz Dias, da GAS Jiu-Jitsu.

Para o artista, o clima de companheirismo da GAS Jiu-Jitsu, além das semelhanças com o professor Luiz, que além de faixa-preta é surfista e artista plástico, facilitaram a comunicação e o retorno aos treinos. Luiz Dias fez coro com o aluno, e ressaltou a possibilidade de manter um paralelo entre a vida produtiva fora e dentro dos tatames.

Confira o treininho e as declarações de ambos os craques no vídeo abaixo!

Equipe G.A.S Jiu-Jitsu
Rua Cardoso Junior, 16, Laranjeiras
# (21) 2558-1088
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