Reyson Gracie seminar, RGA, London

Master Reyson Gracie (top) demonstrating transition from side to north south

Something a bit weird happened to me today. I felt a bit dizzy and a bit out of it at the Reyson Gracie seminar today. It could have been the blistering heat in the Roger Gracie dojo (glass roof + sun = greenhouse effect), or it could have been the mind blowingly awesome fact that stood before me, are three generations of BJJ history makers right before my very eyes - Reyson Gracie, Mauricio Gomez and Roger Gracie.

Reyson is the 3rd son of BJJ founder Carlos Gracie. A 9th degree black belt. He is one of the very few in the world who wears a red belt owing to his very senior status. And, at 67 years young, is as sprightly and lively as a man a third his age.
The seminar was a mixture of BJJ self defence street techniques and side control sport technques. To be fair, there was nothing I had not seen before from previous seminars or lessons. But what I really enjoyed about the session was listening to a BJJ legend talk about his swashbuckling early days on the streets of Rio, getting into street fights and honing his jiu jitsu skills. What I also found interesting was that whilst us gringos dream of (and many actually end up doing) paying homage to their art by visiting and training in Brazil, Master Gracie was paying homage to his lineage by visiting and discovering his Scottish ancestors in Scotland (Dumfries I believe was where the family grave is).

After the seminar we all got a chance to roll. Which I was desperate to do after a poor week of missed training sessions. I rolled fairly well against a 90 Kg blue belt and a recently promoted purple belt. But got completely screwed by a newbie white belt. Pah! That's the 'joy' of BJJ, you're only as good as your last roll. Still, apart from cardio issues, I'm happy with my technical level, with a week to go before the British Open.
Oh, it was also real nice to bump into the writer of this blog. Matthew's been living and training BJJ in Japan for the past 4 years and has many interesting stories to tell.

Kimono news
I think I may have finally found the perfect gi for me. Having retired a couple of my old warhorses that became too small, I was in the market for a new gi and took my chance on the Vulkan Pro Light. My first order of A1 was just too small, but the A2 fits perrrrrrfect. And it is sooooo light. A real joy.

It's funny but when I had an A2 Koral (supposedly an almost exact same make as a Vulkan), the Koral was just too big and baggy so I sold it. But the Vulkan A2 is much slimmer and shorter. Such is the mystical world of BJJ uniform sizing. Every brand is different and even within brands, sizing can vary quite a bit. The race is now on to patch it up in time for the Open.