Tag Archives: purple belt

What Would Gandalf Do: Masters Division vs Adult Division

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In judo and bjj, being 30+ years old means you have the option to compete with other 30+ year olds in a separate “Masters” division. This year, I have joined the ranks of this group. My first instinct is that of Groucho Marx of not wanting to belong to any club that would have me as a member.

Early on, in my 3+ years of jiu jitsu, I was forced to acknowledge a simple reality:

I will never be as good as the current black belt BJJ world champion in my weight class.

I know this might seem like an obvious fact to just about anyone who knows anything about jiu jitsu. In fact, it’s pretty embarrassing just to write those words. But I’m human, I’m a dreamer, I have an ego, and I had to ask myself on a few occasions: how good can I get? The answer to that was painful, humbling, but ultimately liberating. I have found simple happiness in the day-to-day learning, hard work, improvement, and a systematic dedication to understanding the art and the sport of jiu jitsu.

Anyway, I’m off to DC for a presentation tomorrow, after several days and nights of programming, reading, scribbling in a notebook, and then more programming. My life is not that of a full-time competitor. For me, my work (research) is the main challenge and the main source of enjoyment in my life. Despite the occasional lack of smile, I’m sincerely a happy dude.

gandalf-you-shall-not-passSo for major tournaments (e.g. Pans) I’m faced with a choice: masters division or adult division. I know many people from white belt to black belt that go back and forth. The reality is that winning Pans in any age division is tough, but of course there is a reason why black belt masters matches are 6 minutes while black belt adult matches are 10 minutes. The guys that win the adult division don’t just bring technique, they bring an incredible level of physical preparedness (cardio, agility, flexibility, aggression). The 30+ guys have a bit more “old man strength”, wisdom, and experience (theoretically). Still, I believe that “wisdom” (the opposite of “recklessness”) is more of a negative than a positive. Ultimately, competition requires stupid confidence and focused aggression. If your brain is allowed to ask philosophical questions around the time of competition, you’re probably going to lose.

Also the masters divisions are usually smaller. At the 2013 Pans (see 2013 Pans competitor list) the purple belt middleweight division had 37 guys for adult and 25 guys for masters.

In some sense, thinking about age is the very thing that ages you. If you don’t give a shit, then you don’t age. I’ll leave with this quote from Satchel Paige (baseball player from over 50 years ago):

“How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you was?”

My Purple Belt Good Fight Experience

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lex-fridman-gold-purple-belt

Update: here are the videos of my matches with commentary.

I competed at The Good Fight ”Tournament of Brotherly Love”. I wrote exactly one year ago a post about how I’m happy to see the evolution of this tournament. It’s really has come a long way. It runs on time, runs well, attracts some great competitors, refs, organizers. It’s expensive (around $80), but it’s worth it. It’s still not on the level of IBJJF in terms of the number of competitors for purple, brown, and black belt divisions. My division (purple belt middleweight) had 8 guys. Some IBJJF tournaments will have less, but the bigger ones will have 30+ purple belts. Still, it’s growing, and the important thing is they keep providing a good experience

I definitely had fun competing. I won gold in my division with three tough matches (with two submissions). I ended up not doing the absolute division. The 2 hour wait killed me this time. I went to bed at 4:30am last night due to a paper deadline, so while the lack of sleep didn’t affect me during the actual matches, it did contribute to me crashing afterwards. I have to figure out a system for myself of something like taking a nap between divisions to get refreshed for the open. It’s tough every time to weather that 2-8 hour wait (depending on the tournament) between the weight division and the absolute division.

tim-hart-coachingI was reminded today how much I like being a purple belt. Everyone I went against threw a different technical game at me. There was no aimless aggression. Especially my first and third matches were against the type of guys who compete and win A LOT. They were relaxed, focused, and had a clear gameplan. I’m sure they are the ones who would rise to the medal stand in any purple belt division whether it be 8 people or 80 people. I had to come back from behind in both matches, and could have easily lost both. I love matches like that because it gives me stuff to work on, and still I get to enjoy the good simple feeling that comes from winning a match. I’m sure I’ll face both these guys again, maybe at the IBJJF New York Open next month, and I look forward to the challenge. In fact, one of the cool things about competing is going against the same people as they go up the ranks and evolve their game. In a way, we evolve together, responding to flaws that the other reveals.

I met a lot of old and recent friends, which is really the best part of these tournaments. It’s like a battlefield reunion. I caught the above in-action shot of Tim Hart coaching. He was intense and very precise about his on-the-mat instruction. Great stuff as always.

Thanks to everyone who teaches me, kicks my ass, and pushes me at Balance. Special thanks to Aldo and Marco for coaching. Marco was a man of a few words, but they were the right ones. Aldo is actually a brilliant coach. Before today, I thought of him as a competitor and knowledgeable jiu jitsu guy, but I didn’t realize that he was also the Sun Tzu of jiu jitsu coaching. The memory I’ll take away from this tournament is Aldo saying “You did good. Made me proud”. That made me feel like a Game of Thrones character returning from battle.

aldo-lex-fernando-tony

Black Belts Compete for Free: Considering a Tiered System of Tournament Fees

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I have always (perhaps naively) thought it strange that black belts have to pay the same registration fee for a tournament that a white belt does. Some tournaments proudly announce at times that black belts get to compete for free, but that’s a rarity. This post ponders the idea of charging different registration fees to different people, inspired by the 3,500 pages of the U.S. tax code. I say that half-jokingly, but the criticism of a tiered system is the same as that of a tax code: once you start trying to charge people a “fair amount”, everyone starts complaining that their rate is not fair.

First, I would very loosely classify tournaments into four tiers:

  1. Super Big (divisions of 100+): Grand Slam IBJJF tournaments (Worlds, Europeans, Pans, Brasileros).
  2. Big (divisions of 30+): Some of the bigger IBJJF Open tournaments, Abu Dhabi Pro Trials, No Gi Pans, No Gi Worlds.
  3. Medium (divisions of 10+): Grapplers Quest, NAGA, US Grappling, some of the smaller IBJJF open tournaments.
  4. Small (divisions of 4+): Local tournaments designed to attract anyone willing to travel 1-2 hours to the tournaments site.

The division size estimates are based on the blue belt middleweight division, since that is where most of my recent competition experience is from. It is usually the biggest division of the tournament but there are many white, blue, and purple belt divisions that are of similar size.

I think that for (1) super big and (2) big tournaments, the pricing structure is not getting in the way. You can complain about it not being fair, but purple, brown, and black belts are still showing up. In fact, I believe that the registration fee is not even a major factor in their decision, since hotel and transportation cost far more.

The problem of price starts rearing its ugly head in the small to medium size tournament (#3 and #4 above). It’s common to see divisions of two, one, or zero purple belts in the adult middleweight division here. And often the only brown and black belts are the ones refereeing or running the tournament. Though I have doubts, I wonder if decreasing the price for the higher ranks will encourage them to jump in. Here’s an idea:

  • Purple belts get 25% off
  • Brown belts get 50% off
  • Black belts are 100% free.

Another good idea (thanks to Mike) is to give a refund to the first place in every division. I think that most people go into a tournament believing they can win 1st place, which would make this refund a powerful incentive.

Or in another crazy idea, perhaps you can get $10 for every submission win. Nothing makes a tournament more exciting and move faster along than a quick submission win.

I think these financial incentives are irrational from the perspective of the competitor, given that you really still have to pay for transportation, food, etc. But the incentives might work via the fact that they are there at all in the same way that a “BIG SALE: 50% off” sign works at a clothing store.

Then again, I wonder if, for a local tournament, attracting more competitors suffers from a steep law of diminishing returns. Sometimes it feels like they are content with the number they have. With more competitors come more problems and DELAYS. By the way, IBJJF has done a good job at getting a handle on this, moving to multiple-day events when necessary.

This post was motivated by the fact that I was going to compete at a local tournament tomorrow. However, there’s only one person in my gi and no-gi divisions. Hard to justify $100 and a day of transportation and waiting for that, when I can get a good training session for free in just one hour.

Sometimes I feel like there’s a cruel law in the universe that the closer a tournament is to Philadelphia, the exponentially fewer competitors it will have.

Purple Belt Promotion

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I was promoted to purple belt on Saturday. A lot of the people I looked up to (and still do) in my almost 3 years of training jiu jitsu were purple belts at the time. Brown and black belts often seemed like generals brilliantly commanding the unfolding battle from the back of the field (see Josh Vogel’s video take on this). Purple belts, on the other hand, seemed more like platoon leaders, right in the heat of combat with the blue and white belts. And that’s what I aspire to be in my new role as purple belt: talk less, drill more, train hard, and compete, compete, compete.

Purple belt means different things to different people. For me, I want this belt to see a lot of tough tournament matches, win or lose, I know I will come out on the other end a better person, with a deeper understanding of myself and a greater ability to put the highs and lows of life into perspective.

The actual promotion day was a memorable learning experience. There were 20+ black belts there. I got to train with several of them. The matches lasted anywhere from 3 to 20 minutes, they all felt like playing speed chess with the regulars at Washing Square park, like in the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer. Each black belt had a unique style and exhibited a mastery of the art. I know that sounds cheesy, but it’s true. These guys are artists. It was especially cool to roll with Tim Hart. I heard so many tales about his epic technical expertise and power, that I was starting to believe that he didn’t actually exist and the few times that I met him were just an illusion ;-) Here’s a picture of me miserably failing to be able to do anything in his open/spider guard:

One of the things I’m proud of myself for doing is pulling guard on everyone I trained with at the promotion. I’m definitely a top player, and it’s where I feel more “at home”, but I find that when I play a relaxed technical guard against high-level training partners, they play a more relaxed technical game as well. The result is, no matter what happens, I learn more from the experience. Here’s me in a crappy butterfly guard with Frank Ambrifi, who is another man of legend who I heard so much about but have not met before:

Congratulations to everyone who was promoted, including nine new black belts. Josh Vogel and Drew Vogel were two of the nine. I consider them good friends and inspiring leaders on and off the mat. Here’s a picture of the Vogel brothers and the Migliarese brothers with my favorite gang sign: the thumbs up.

Whenever I look at pictures of the universe, I’m filled with awe at the billions of billions of stars that are out there. I feel the same way when I look at the following team picture. It’s just as awe-inspiring to think of how many hundreds of thousands of hours of jiu jitsu wisdom is in this picture alone:

I have to give a special thanks to Josh (pictured right). He has taught me a lot on the mat, but more importantly he has been a role model in philosophy and lifestyle in jiu jitsu training and competition. We roomed together for the 2012 Worlds in a cheap motel that smelled like hookers and smoke, cutting weight and trying desperately not to think about food.

By the way, thanks to Eric Zippe, Angela Vogel, Jennifer Francisco, and Sean Gilliard for the excellent pictures they took during the event. Eric is a excellent professional photographer as many people in the grappling world know.

Ranks in BJJ: Ideas on What To Focus on at Every Belt

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My name is on the promotion list to purple belt this October 20th. Much like the Spartans, in order to receive this honor, I will now be dropped off half-naked in the middle of the woods and told not to return without the fur hide of a grizzly bear. That’s pretty standard purple belt test I believe, so I don’t think it should be too hard. I’m confident in my open guard.

On an unrelated note, how awesome is Jimi Hendrix:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MYIc6s5ACY

Where the hell is the brain-gnawing musical genius of his ilk these days?

Anyway, back to the jits talk. I’ve read and heard a lot of ideas about what an individual should work on as he/she progresses through the ranks. Conan Schafer wrote a great post on this topic. He also has some great links in his post including this one from Roy Harris. My own gripe with the ideas described in these posts is that they are highly subjective. I believe that a jiu jitsu practitioner progresses through the ranks by overcoming challenges, obstacles, demons, etc. That could range from being overweight, to having a crappy open guard, to being afraid of truly going 100% in competition. Whatever it is, jiu jitsu is about discovering your flaws, and overcoming them.

I have many clearly identified problems at any one time that I acknowledge and work on fixing through drilling and purposeful training. That said, it’s fun to describe the progression through the ranks by mentioning one main focus for each rank. Here are the obstacles I have overcome (to some degree) and seek to overcome as I move to purple, brown, and black (by never quitting). This is a plan for me (from my current shallow perspective) and probably not for others. But you should make a plan like this for yourself and adjust it often as you learn more about yourself and what your coaches and teachers expect from you.

  • White belt: Open guard. I had to start learning to play off my back and not stall.
  • Blue belt: Guard passing. I had to start learning to play on top against good guards and not stall.
  • Purple belt: Competition. This is the rank where I want to “go to war”. I want to break through the fear, the stress, the ego, the excuses of competition. I want to step on the mat and truly have fun.
  • Brown belt: Submissions. Footlocks. Escapes. Sharpen everything.
  • Black belt: Philosophy.

I’m not exactly happy with the above list, but I’ll leave it be. It’s missing a bunch, like the fact that I’ve been working on escapes from day 1, and will be obsessed with guard passing until my joints are strong enough to hold my body up. But these posts are just for fun… so please read it as such.

Thanks to everyone who trains with me, coaches me, and supports me in competition. I try to be a good friend and good training/drilling partner every day.

“I Knew You Had to Slow Down”

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Watched the Andre Galvao episode of Rolled Up where he mentions that strength training and conditioning is important to prepare for the difference in intensity between hard training and competition. I think no matter how hard you train, competition is another level.

I’ve been thinking about that, considering that I rarely run up against the cardio wall in training, and if I do it’s because I’ve had 2-3 hard matches in a row. I very rarely go so hard that a single 6 minute match in training pushes me to the edge where that quit voice comes out and needs to be silenced. And yet in competition that happens quite often.

That brings me to something I heard Alec Baulding say in an interview about his 2010 Worlds purple belt open finals loss (shown below) that it was the toughest match yet. The quote that caught me was that he was surprised that the guy “didn’t get tired or give up” given his high-paced aggressive passing game.

I heard that and thought that I want to be the guy (in this case, Sebastian Brosche) who pushes the pace. The title of this post is something a great blue belt (Andrew) told me a while back after a good roll. I mentioned how impressed I was at his aggressive guard recovery. I kept almost passing, and he kept re-guarding with a lot of energy every time. He said that he was able to do that because he knew I would have to slow down and get tired eventually (which I did). That’s just it, beyond all the technique, drilling, intelligent jiu jitsu / judo, I have to start getting hard interval training sessions in so that with my aggression (in competition) I can convince the other person that I will never slow down, and they might as well quit.

This is a great match to watch. I first saw Alec Baulding compete at Abu Dhabi Pro Trials (on the same mat as me) against Abmar Barbosa: