Gracie Combatives - What the hell?

[dave9019]

all you johnny come lately MMA types dissing DVD learning (or distance learning). why are you mad? you sound like snobs. "oh my little Bjj secret is out". learning from DVD is possible. Evan Tanner "taught himself submission and grappling techniques using instructional videos created by the famous Gracie family. He continued to fight in local shows and tournaments in Texas and Iowa before travelling across the world to Japan to compete in the Pancrase organization. Tanner won five fights overseas and competed in the USWF once more before being asked to join the UFC".

Not everyone can do it, but it can be done. I have studied martial arts for 30 years now. I have been involved in MMA for 10 of those years long before it was "hip, cool and the in thing". I stepped into a Bjj gym five years ago and took a free class. talk about all the ego and attitude. You johnny come latelys need to be more humble. I rolled with a purple belt and he got so angry that he couldn't submit me. He then tried to smack me in the face. I rolled with a black belt and the same thing. I watch and watch and watch. I have always been good at mimic and adapting it and making it my own. all I did was spend 10 minutes watching these guys and just copied it.
I have friends who study Bjj at gyms. They have had their arms broken, ankles broken, wrists broken, etc. this is not toughness this is stupidity. Again, the johnny come lately MMA types.
The gracie combatives are solid and well done. They offer a sequential order to learning and offer the possibility to test for rank. Not everyone will be able to pass the test, not everyone will stick with it. But, it's there as an option. So instead of bad mouthing and being arrogant. instead of showing your inverted snobbery focus on yourself and not what others are doing. Remember, talking big in competition is very different than talking big on the street. Alex Gong learned that lesson the hard way. You have to rest sometime tough guy. These dvd's give people a chance who may not have the money or opportunity to train at a decent gym.

 

[5050buttflopper**]

^ Thank you!

people need to stop whining about gracie combatitives, u get what u pay for, they arent stealing anyones money. And if your not just some retard and actually pay attn to the video, u might learn something.

remember bjj started as 2 belts, white (or gray i think for students) and blue (instructor).

All this blue, purple, brown crap was for carlos gracie to make money when he started ibjjf. To make all u people giving up your money for training feel rewarded. As long as they are teaching bjj in the way they advertise then who cares about the bells and whistles that actually have no substance when it comes to learning techniques. Belts are marketing so why complain that rorion markets with belts and not complain that evry other instructor does the same thing, except for some no gi schools that dont grade at all.

 

[YellowFury]

all you johnny come lately MMA types dissing DVD learning (or distance learning). why are you mad? you sound like snobs. "oh my little Bjj secret is out". learning from DVD is possible. Evan Tanner "taught himself submission and grappling techniques using instructional videos created by the famous Gracie family. He continued to fight in local shows and tournaments in Texas and Iowa before travelling across the world to Japan to compete in the Pancrase organization. Tanner won five fights overseas and competed in the USWF once more before being asked to join the UFC".

Not everyone can do it, but it can be done. I have studied martial arts for 30 years now. I have been involved in MMA for 10 of those years long before it was "hip, cool and the in thing". I stepped into a Bjj gym five years ago and took a free class. talk about all the ego and attitude. You johnny come latelys need to be more humble. I rolled with a purple belt and he got so angry that he couldn't submit me. He then tried to smack me in the face. I rolled with a black belt and the same thing. I watch and watch and watch. I have always been good at mimic and adapting it and making it my own. all I did was spend 10 minutes watching these guys and just copied it.
I have friends who study Bjj at gyms. They have had their arms broken, ankles broken, wrists broken, etc. this is not toughness this is stupidity. Again, the johnny come lately MMA types.
The gracie combatives are solid and well done. They offer a sequential order to learning and offer the possibility to test for rank. Not everyone will be able to pass the test, not everyone will stick with it. But, it's there as an option. So instead of bad mouthing and being arrogant. instead of showing your inverted snobbery focus on yourself and not what others are doing. Remember, talking big in competition is very different than talking big on the street. Alex Gong learned that lesson the hard way. You have to rest sometime tough guy. These dvd's give people a chance who may not have the money or opportunity to train at a decent gym.

that's a bit inappropriate, isn't it?

 

[lechien]

that's a bit inappropriate, isn't it?

Hum, he just created a new account to ressurect a 10 month old thread. WTF!

 

[codemonkey76]

all you johnny come lately MMA types dissing DVD learning (or distance learning). why are you mad? you sound like snobs. "oh my little Bjj secret is out". learning from DVD is possible. Evan Tanner "taught himself submission and grappling techniques using instructional videos created by the famous Gracie family. He continued to fight in local shows and tournaments in Texas and Iowa before travelling across the world to Japan to compete in the Pancrase organization. Tanner won five fights overseas and competed in the USWF once more before being asked to join the UFC".

Not everyone can do it, but it can be done. I have studied martial arts for 30 years now. I have been involved in MMA for 10 of those years long before it was "hip, cool and the in thing". I stepped into a Bjj gym five years ago and took a free class. talk about all the ego and attitude. You johnny come latelys need to be more humble. I rolled with a purple belt and he got so angry that he couldn't submit me. He then tried to smack me in the face. I rolled with a black belt and the same thing. I watch and watch and watch. I have always been good at mimic and adapting it and making it my own. all I did was spend 10 minutes watching these guys and just copied it.
I have friends who study Bjj at gyms. They have had their arms broken, ankles broken, wrists broken, etc. this is not toughness this is stupidity. Again, the johnny come lately MMA types.
The gracie combatives are solid and well done. They offer a sequential order to learning and offer the possibility to test for rank. Not everyone will be able to pass the test, not everyone will stick with it. But, it's there as an option. So instead of bad mouthing and being arrogant. instead of showing your inverted snobbery focus on yourself and not what others are doing. Remember, talking big in competition is very different than talking big on the street. Alex Gong learned that lesson the hard way. You have to rest sometime tough guy. These dvd's give people a chance who may not have the money or opportunity to train at a decent gym.

11'ers gonna 11

 

[5050buttflopper**]

^LMFAO

ugh the thread necromancer made me his victim, i really gotta read the dates on these things

 

[Jimmy Cerra]

all you johnny come lately MMA types dissing DVD learning (or distance learning). why are you mad? you sound like snobs. "oh my little Bjj secret is out". learning from DVD is possible. Evan Tanner "taught himself submission and grappling techniques using instructional videos created by the famous Gracie family. He continued to fight in local shows and tournaments in Texas and Iowa before travelling across the world to Japan to compete in the Pancrase organization. Tanner won five fights overseas and competed in the USWF once more before being asked to join the UFC".

Not everyone can do it, but it can be done. I have studied martial arts for 30 years now. I have been involved in MMA for 10 of those years long before it was "hip, cool and the in thing". I stepped into a Bjj gym five years ago and took a free class. talk about all the ego and attitude. You johnny come latelys need to be more humble. I rolled with a purple belt and he got so angry that he couldn't submit me. He then tried to smack me in the face. I rolled with a black belt and the same thing. I watch and watch and watch. I have always been good at mimic and adapting it and making it my own. all I did was spend 10 minutes watching these guys and just copied it.
I have friends who study Bjj at gyms. They have had their arms broken, ankles broken, wrists broken, etc. this is not toughness this is stupidity. Again, the johnny come lately MMA types.
The gracie combatives are solid and well done. They offer a sequential order to learning and offer the possibility to test for rank. Not everyone will be able to pass the test, not everyone will stick with it. But, it's there as an option. So instead of bad mouthing and being arrogant. instead of showing your inverted snobbery focus on yourself and not what others are doing. Remember, talking big in competition is very different than talking big on the street. Alex Gong learned that lesson the hard way. You have to rest sometime tough guy. These dvd's give people a chance who may not have the money or opportunity to train at a decent gym.

It's not the technique, it's the tele-belts & video testing. It's the NDA. Don't call people arrogant for disagreeing. Video can be faked. It's a very poor way to evaluate people. And their video requirements can't test character. A black belt tried to smack you in the face for not being able to submit you? Wow, I'd like to know the context. Unfortunately, it wouldn't surprise me now-a-days since the character-requirement of ranks has been becoming more and more lax.

Here's what I believe. Maybe this is arrogant, you tell me. Promotion isn't just a "certificate of achievement" for a student. The belt doesn't give you skill, after all. Every legit blue belt was already a blue belt before they were promoted. In effect, it's a gift for what you already have. It means you represent the instructor. If you don't have good character, does that mean you represent him well? How can you be certain you are being represented fairly by a person you never met?

I also believe, after the minimum standards, each student teaches their instructor how to promote them. Your rank not only signifies skill, but how close you are at achieving your own goals for that rank. A blue belt who wants to win the worlds won't get promoted until they do (or until their goals change). A blue belt who doesn't care about improving will never get promoted until their attitude changes for the better no matter how much innate skill. This aspect is also missing from online belts.

Remember, the main purpose of jiu-jitsu comes from our judo heritage. That purpose, according to Kano, is to "inculcate in the mind of man a spirit of respect for the principle of maximum efficiency and of mutual welfare and benefit". It is hard to do that with a technical test with a person you barely know. It is extremely hard if you only know a person via video from the internet.

 

[beachgrappler]

Oh, and everyone who passes gets a blue belt at the end of the course:

are you shitting me, i'd like to see anyone attempt to defend that nonsense. 22 lessons!

 

[MonkeyNuts!]

sigh.

Don't know how many times we have to repeat it. Using dvds as a supplement is perfectly fine. The GC dvd content is fine, production quality is good. If someone truly doesn't have access to BJJ, then DVDs are better than nothing.

That is not the problem.

I have studied martial arts for 30 years now.

Do you not remember all the mail-in-vhs correspondence rank bullshit of the 70s and 80s? just open a copy of an old black belt magazine.

They offer a sequential order to learning and offer the possibility to test for rank. Not everyone will be able to pass the test, not everyone will stick with it. But, it's there as an option. So instead of bad mouthing and being arrogant. instead of showing your inverted snobbery focus on yourself and not what others are doing.

BJJ is one of the few systems out there that doesn't widely abuse its ranking system and where its practitioners are actively involved in policing legitimacy of belts. You may not give a shit and be perfectly fine with seeing BJJ go down the path of karate and kung fu, but alot of us love BJJ and do not want it to become like the majority of TMAs.

 

[Dougiek]

11'ers gonna 11

so so so so so appropriate that he comes into play tapped......

 

[rnaviaux]

And their video requirements can't test character.

How exactly does one test someones character? What is the standard by which this is judged?

 

[Vitamin C]

How exactly does one test someones character? What is the standard by which this is judged?

Training with someone in person usually makes it pretty easy to tell if they are a giant doucher or a pretty cool guy who doesn't afraid of anything.

 

[rnaviaux]

Training with someone in person usually makes it pretty easy to tell if they are a giant doucher or a pretty cool guy who doesn't afraid of anything.

Raises the same question. How do you define "giant doucher"? What makes a "pretty cool guy"?

Do you mean "isn't" and not "doesn't"? If so are you saying that a person who isn't afraid of anything is someone with "character"? Might that not make them a bit foolish by some standards?

Also what is this mystical method of learning a person character when rolling with them? Do you somehow absorb by osmosis whether the individual in question is honest in his dealings with others?

I submit that rolling with someone is no guarantee of learning a person character.

 

[MonkeyNuts!]

Also what is this mystical method of learning a person character when rolling with them? Do you somehow absorb by osmosis whether the individual in question is honest in his dealings with others?

I submit that rolling with someone is no guarantee of learning a person character.

I agree that simply rolling with someone doesn't tell you anything.

But talking to someone, finding out their goals, watching them persevere thru hard training to get there, observing their attitudes, etc. can be all done thru a teacher-student bond, one that takes first hand exposure and time.

Cannot be done thru short video long distance basis.

 

[bagelgod]

Raises the same question. How do you define "giant doucher"? What makes a "pretty cool guy"?

Do you mean "isn't" and not "doesn't"? If so are you saying that a person who isn't afraid of anything is someone with "character"? Might that not make them a bit foolish by some standards?

Also what is this mystical method of learning a person character when rolling with them? Do you somehow absorb by osmosis whether the individual in question is honest in his dealings with others?

I submit

Verbal tap, rnaviaux loses.

Stupid, idiotic jokes aside, I'd be ok with online belt testing if there was a tournament win record minimum requirement.

 

[Jiujitsurican]

to pass from white to blue belt their you have to do each Combatives class 3 times, then you would have to do a reflex development class twice once that is completed you pay $100 to take your test. If you pass the test you can then transfer to the master cycle. You would have to wait until the next belt promotion which is either in june or december. Then you get your belt and a certificate and your name posted on the list of gracie certified belt holders.
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[rnaviaux]

Verbal tap, rnaviaux loses.

Stupid, idiotic jokes aside, I'd be ok with online belt testing if there was a tournament win record minimum requirement.

"Verbal Tap" -Not sure what your point is here in as I don't think my questions have been answered.

I like how Judo has set up their promotion requirements in regards to tournaments. Seems like a good way to go as it covers a lot of different situations.

But this minimum "win" record seems a little odd. So now every student needs to enter and win a set number of tournaments to advance in rank. I guess if that is the stated rule up front then I don't think that's a problem. Some students would simply never compete and never advance in rank. Those would be some bad assed white belts! I have seen this occur before and its more amusing than anything else as the other students really know how good so and so is.

Of course if a person does want to advance in rank he needs to enter a tournament. I'm assuming we would want to include a specific tournament as in a gi tournament.

This could get expensive pretty quickly depending on how far said student had to go. Ten years or so I went to the US open in Santa Cruz. (I didn't win. I was a brand new blue belt and only trained a couple hours a week. Sure was fun though.) After that trip the wife put the kabosh on spending that kind of money. I think all told it was around three hundred dollars and I was scrimping on every dollar.

Now blue belt is a fairly competitive division. If a hundred competitors enter the same bracket your going to have a 99% rate of individuals not getting one of those "wins" he or she needs to advance in rank.

But this brings up another point. How many people are you going to say needs to be in that division before the win counts. What should their records look like so your win is legitimate? What if there is only one other guy in your bracket and he is brand new at that belt level? Should your win really count towards you "minimum" requirement?

As I am sure you can see there are lots of issues with putting standards like this in place. (Not that I really have a problem with it as if I was still a white belt it wouldn't change my current skill set in the least.) But I'm sure if we ran the numbers we would find out that a majority of students in a club would never rank up. From what I can tell a majority of students don't even compete.

I think my non-existence competitive career is probably over as I simply can't risk further injuries to my back. I train with those that I trust. I don't trust someone else in a competition to make it his priority to not cause serious injury to my body. I know Pedro Sauer doesn't care if someone competes or not. In one class he gave a list of reasons to not compete. I never heard him say it was important to do so or that one should. But then he came from Helios lineage and we all know how Helio felt about today's competition scene.

Of course there is the issue of the Gracie Combatives test which is a different beast from others tests that I have observed. Or non-tests which no one observed But I'll leave that for others to debate as I simply don't have the time.

I agree that simply rolling with someone doesn't tell you anything.

But talking to someone, finding out their goals, watching them persevere thru hard training to get there, observing their attitudes, etc. can be all done thru a teacher-student bond, one that takes first hand exposure and time.

Cannot be done thru short video long distance basis.

Again a standard hasn't been defined here about how we determine if a person has character or not.

I've watched a lot of bjj classes. At what point is the instructor supposed to talk to someone and find out their goals? Is this part of the regularly scheduled class? Is this an extra-curricular activity. Its been 14 years and I have never heard an instructor ask me what my goals are. Frankly its none of his business as I'm just there to learn jiu-jitsu. Thats my goal.

And speaking of goals what if my goal is to do something that disagrees with the instructor? Does this mean I then don't have character in his eyes?

One can certainly see a student persevere. But that's really a no-brainer. If the guy keeps showing up then he passes that character test.

Observing their attitudes? About what? Jiu-jitsu, getting beat, winning, etc. Sure you can see some things fairly easily but really a majority of most students lives will not be observable unless you decided to follow them around 24/7.

What if the student thinks the instructors character is in question? Then what?!? Maybe there is an aspect of his instructors life that the student thinks needs improving. Does this mean the student is right and the instructor is wrong. Or does the instructors "character" trump the student's?

I don't see a way that this can be resolved but then I don't think it should be an issue. I don't go to jiu-jitsu for character building or some such tripe. I go to learn jiu-jitsu. Period.

 

[bagelgod]

"Verbal Tap" -Not sure what your point is here in as I don't think my questions have been answered.

It's a dumb thing I do that isn't funny. Whenever anyone says "I submit" in any context ever, I act as if they've tapped out. I keep it up in the hopes that one day, someone will feel enough pity to laugh.

But this minimum "win" record seems a little odd. So now every student needs to enter and win a set number of tournaments to advance in rank.

I want to clarify that this is for Gracie Garage dudes only. Call me an asshole or whatever, but if you have two dudes in their garage practicing headlock escapes and sparring with each other, I don't think you should get to blue belt without beating a few white belts who you don't know first. We've all seen week 1 whitebelts roll with each other, and it is atrocious. No knocks against them, they don't know any better (I'm not trying to be an asshole, but I guess I am so it comes out that way).

I didn't intend "winning the entire tournament", but rather matches. This is really thought of with the Online correspondance courses in mind. The competitor obviously already has a camera with which he sends in his techniques to be graded; he could tape a few matches, couldn't he?

Personally I think it would groove with most of the self defense stuff as well; a lot of early white belts do all sorts of head locks and general no-no moves. Once that person gets their online blue belt, they'll really hit a wall though. The blue belt pool is just rough. It is my diabolical plan that at this point, if there is a gym in distance, they will seek it out to make greater gains faster out of frustration.

Now blue belt is a fairly competitive division. If a hundred competitors enter the same bracket your going to have a 99% rate of individuals not getting one of those "wins" he or she needs to advance in rank.

I think this is solved by the match reporting method personally. It sucks if you get paired up with the champion in the first match, though. Can't deny that.

But this brings up another point. How many people are you going to say needs to be in that division before the win counts.

This is another reason why I'd value matches over tournament wins. I know I've gone to a few Bob & Tom's Feed Store Grappling Tournaments where I won 1st for just showing up, and that's not cool.

What if there is only one other guy in your bracket and he is brand new at that belt level? Should your win really count towards you "minimum" requirement?

If we pretend that there is some kind of minimum set standard for each belt, that yes, it should. Obviously there's a difference between new blues and old blues, but that should come out in the wash depending on the minimum requirement.

From what I can tell a majority of students don't even compete.

I know; I rarely compete myself. This is really only for online promotions. I find it ridiculous that someone can go up to brownbelt via online training without having another similar rank or higher kick their ass.

And I'm really ok with people learning via video or online or whatever who don't want to test, or are doing it for self defense, or just fun. But if you want to get ranked, I think it's a different story.

As for the character stuff, meh. I've seen turds at all belt ranks, so I don't buy it.

It comes down to what the hell makes up a BJJ colored belt. I can't give you an exact answer. But I can tell you they should be able to kick the asses of people their same weight, who are also technically worse than they, a few times before scrambling up the belt ladder.

 

[rnaviaux]

bagel god - Crap! I missed the pun. Made me chuckle though. Thanks for clarifying.

I see your points and they do make sense.

I don't have an issue with the Blue Belt test. In fact I think it is far more stringent than anything else that I have seen or am aware of.

However, having said that, I am very curious how they are going to handle the blue to purple transition. I've been working through the 1st stripe techniques on the Gracie University site and there is a huge amount of information to learn and practice. Much of which I have never seen before in 14 years of group classes (off and on to be sure).

I don't think I could pass the blue belt test as of yet to their standards. The purple belt test will be a monster if they expect you to demonstrate all techniques and combination of techniques one learned since blue. And that doesn't even cover their various types of "rolling". From dealing with punches to a skilled and strong "bad guy."

(The blue belt test has one demonstrate every technique learned as well as using all of them in a realistic self-defense scenario. Not a lets roll with a sport jiu-jitsu guy but lets apply techs against a guy trying to knock our block off. A much more realistic scenario than a typical rolling session.

Still Purple belt is a question mark in my mind and am interested to see what they come up with.

I asked Pedro Sauer a couple months back if he could determine someones skill level by simply watching them move or did he have to roll with them. He said that now he could tell simply by watching them and it didn't take long at all to see where they were at in their progression.

I also find that watching a student of mine roll gives me a far greater idea of what they are doing than rolling with them. The exterior point of view shows me so much more. I'm sure this goes against many a cherished belief but that's my experience after a couple of years of teaching.

As for the character stuff, meh. I've seen turds at all belt ranks, so I don't buy it.

Exactly - I think I can count on one hand the number of times I've asked about some aspect of a students personal life in the last two years. And that was after class was over and was merely polite conversation and had NOTHING to do with determining anyone's character. Things like "How are your kids, blah, blah, blah."

I only care about one thing. That my student can survive an altercation on the street. Thats my goal in teaching this art. The rest of it is fun and all but not at the top of my list of importances.

 

[lechien]

How exactly does one test someones character? What is the standard by which this is judged?

I have known people that did not get promoted because they did not have the correct character for the belt.