2012 Recap

This one was harder for me to write than the recaps for our first two years.  This is not because 2012 was a bad year.  It was our best so far.   The reason, I think, is that I’m so focused on looking ahead.  In my mind are all the plans for Renzo Gracie Pittsburgh Academy’s new space in The Strip.  Along with the building we have new instructors and new programs being initiated.  It has been three years since we opened the first class during the 2010 snowstorm.  Although going forward is our focus let’s take a couple of minutes to look at what we have built focusing on last year.  2012 should give us confidence that we have a strong foundation that will keep getting better this year.  

One of the things that really stand out in my memory and shows in my jiu-jitsu game is that Daniel Gracie visited us and stayed with us several times in 2012.    He shared his years of knowledge and competitive experience for two weeks teaching classes in March.  He visited two more times and did three special seminars for us.  The nogi guard-passing seminar was amazing for the advanced guys.  We learned twelve battle-tested techniques and some strategies for making them work.   Marcio "Macarrao" Stambowsky, the highest belt-ranking instructor teaching in the Northeast, did a great seminar for us as well.  He focused on wristlocks as a strategy to stop guard passing and attack. He also showed us a great “Gymnastica Natural” based warm-up.  He showed us some self defense based techniques as well.  Right at the end of 2012, Garry Tonon (voted one of the worlds best brown belts at any weight) did a seminar for us.  Garry showed us new cutting edge techniques all to benefit the Red Cross’s Charity for Hurricane Sandy relief.  I also did a charity seminar this year in San Jose, Costa Rica benefiting disadvantaged children in the country that gave me so much in the way of great jiu-jitsu training. 

Some of our competitive highlights include, in chronological order:

• Lance Thompson 2^nd place purple belt adult in IBJJF NY Open.  This is a great tournament finish! Purple belt is so tough.  No one from other schools in the area can claim a finish in purple belt at such a top-level event.
• Mike Wilkins got his second pro MMA win this summer.
• Jonas Rubiano and Dino Juklo both got there first amateur MMA wins.
• Mike Flor won his divisions at the Kumite Klassic
• RJ Sache and Bob Demmler got blue belt wins at Steel City's martial arts tournament
• Dean Lewis won IBJJF Pan Nogi!  This is a top tier tournament.  Dean showed that he is the best blue belt around.  Look for him in some tournaments coming soon.  Mike Flor also won his weight at the Pans in the masters division.
• Logan Stout won the absolute at Pitt's grappling tournament.

That’s a nice list!  For those of you who enjoy competing, let’s get out and compete more this year.  No one remembers the ones you lose.  They only teach you how to be better.  The more we compete, the more we learn.  We have a great team to support us including the other teachers in the Renzo Gracie Association in NYC, Brazil and other places.  We have great training partners to keep us getting better. 

We also had many promotions to blue belt this year as well as two youth members earning their orange belts.  Check out our academy facebook page to see photos of all of our belt promotions.

We had some fun social events.  Everyone who stayed until the end of the summer barbecue remember Douggie P’s antics.  Anthony, thank you for hosting us, and the keg, after the barbecue to watch the Strikeforce fights where Roger Gracie dominated Jardine. Bowling night was fun also.  We established that I’m the worst bowler of the academy.  The end of the year party was really fun.  We had over 50 people there this year, up from about 30 in 2011.  The location was more fun also.  We had lots of other informal get-togethers to watch fights and jiu-jitsu tournaments.  It is so important that we enjoy doing things as a group outside of the Academy.  As people get more and more fragmented, isolated and specialized it becomes more important to have something universal to share.  Jiu-jitsu is that thing for many of our members and for me.  Our membership almost doubled from the year before. 

 Let’s get ready for even more growth and good things this year.

-Warren

Renzo Gracie Pittsburgh 2010 Recap

The new year is here! Looking back on our first year I am surprised at how well it has gone. First of all we have grown in membership from zero to the point where some of our classes are full! From my experience with other academies once the the membership numbers that we have now are reached academies only grow exponentially. This means new workout partners, new friends, and a solid business base. The later should allow us to do more fun extra events such as our trip to NYC and the main Renzo Gracie Academy last July. We had a few other members who where not along for the July trip, individually take advantage of the training at the main school. At Renzo Gracie NYC world champions including two current ufc champions (Edgar and St. Pierre), two of the best jiu jitsu competitors of all times (Roger Gracie and Braulio Estima) as well as many other world level competitors train regularly. While in NYC we had some belt promotions. Logan Stout, Noah Nieman, and Mike Wilkins where awarded blue belts. All of them had at least a year of training in jiu jitsu before starting at RGA Pittsburgh academy, lots of talent, and where long overdue promotions (sandbaggers!!!). Lance Thompson was awarded his purple after only about two and a half years of training including his first year and a half at Steel City (another BJJ academy located South of RGA Pittsburgh). I had the great honor of getting my Black Belt from Renzo Gracie himself with many other of my teachers, friends, and mentors including Shawn Williams, John Danaher, Daniel Gracie, and the Brothers Rolles, Igor, and Gregor Gracie there supporting me. Rolles, it has been a lot of living passing since Cuiaba, Brazil, for me (probably for both of us) but Jiu jitsu has been a constant. Thank you Renzo and thank you to my students and training partners including past and present in Brazil, Costa Rica, California, State College, and now Pittsburgh for helping me past this milestone. We had two other belt promotions including Anthony Previte (officially the second person to join RGA Pittsburgh). Anthony was my first belt promotion. Earlier Daniel Gracie awarded talented Lucas Burdette his Blue Belt as well.

We had two seminars last year. The first was with Gregor Gracie. Gregor is a young competitor and I think embodies the "Battle of Life" quote we have on the wall of the academy. He is "in the arena". Gregor won his last mma fight against a seasoned opponent. At the seminar he showed us some great stuff and trained with everyone. For our official opening we had Daniel Gracie in August. His personality as well as his obvious passion for teaching inspired me and other members to a greater level of appreciation for jiu jitsu. We look forward to having both of these guys again in 2011. Thank you to members of other academies who attended and gave us the chance to train with you during the seminars. Special thanks to Dan Hyman, Rory, and Gary Smith for coming all the way from California for our opening and for Daniel's seminar. You guys showed some great stuff as well. Also, hopefully Kristel makes another cake for us sometime. The logo cake as nice and tasty too.

Some of our members competed in jiu jitsu, wrestling, and mixed martial arts. As with most competitions it was not always winning but the experiences enriched our learning process on many levels. We did have some good success. Scott Rendos who, has since relocated to Florida, had two amature MMA wins while training at our academy. I was able to win my amature MMA debute at Yankee lake, up a wt to 185lbs against a tough opponent who was slated to fight for that organization's tile fight. I also won the WKA amature/novice mma tournament at 170lbs in Virgina posting 3 wins including one by submission in the quarterfinals. Mike Wilkins fought to defend his "Cage of Chaos" title at 155lbs. He fought the fight of the night against a skilled and tough opponent. He was on the wrong end of maybe the worst decisions I have seen in my years of watching MMA. That said both he and his opponent Josh Baker fought great fights.

To sum up the year I will say that we have a great base including technique, business, and, most of all because of the quality of dedicated members that we have attracted, in order to have a great 2011! Check the class schedule at www.renzograciepittsburgh.com Join our facebook page Renzo Gracie Pittsburgh. Look for more blogs coming soon. See you at the academy.

-Warren