"The only BJJ team out there dedicated 100% to just do cool stuff" |
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BJJ Globetrotters Newsletter // March 2014 |
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| Dear Globetrotters!
As always, it's been a hectic month at Team BJJ Globetrotters. The summer camp is closing in and other interesting projects later in the year is on the drawing board. I've recently been doing a lot of work on our website as well as putting together some video from the camp in El Salvador.
I hope you'll enjoy the newsletter and as always, if you have any questions or suggestions
See you on the mats,
-Christian |
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| What you'll find in this month's newsletter
New Globetrotters shorts are now in (limited) stock
Newsletter exclusive preview of the Beach Camp video
Instructional of the month: Passing lockdown and half guard
Meet Ellis Younger: The Young Gun Globetrotter
Join the BJJ Summer Camp in Copenhagen on June 16th!
The first BJJ Globetrotters Beach Camp is in the books
The story of Team Brazilian Jiu JItsu Globetrotters
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| | New Globetrotters shorts are now in (limited) stock |
| There is a bit of profit in the Globetrotters empire from selling patches and stuff, and I have no ambition to take it out and use for boring stuff like taxes and groceries. So I basically decided just to use the money to keep doing cool stuff, like making new products or realising crazy ideas about events, camps, parties, travels etc.
Together with the rash guards, I had a single pair of these BJJ Globetrotters shorts designed and produced in the summer, just to try them out. I didn't really have any plans to make more of them, but people kept commenting on my worn down pair and finally it convinced me.
I now have a box of 50 shorts here and I'll pay your shipping costs to anywhere in the world (they're pretty light).
The early reviews are in and people are saying stuff like "these are the coolest shorts in the world" and "OMG, I've already made out with five girls in a week just because of these shorts". So there you have it. They're pretty awesome.
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| | | | | | Newsletter exclusive preview of the Beach Camp video
This is hot off the press, literally just uploaded it. Soon you can tell your friends "I watched this way before it became cool and went viral"! |
| | | Instructional of the month: Passing lockdown and half guard
For every newsletter, we'll post a short instructional video on any topic decided by the members of our Facebook group. To make you feel special, these videos are unlisted on YouTube, meaning that no one else can find them without the link. Yes, that's right. It's all for you.
There was an overwhelming interest for half guard this month, so I picked a pass I use and teach all the time. Hope you like it and if you have any suggestions for the next month's video, just let us know! |
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Meet Ellis Younger: The Young Gun Globetrotter |
| | Ellis Younger is a representative of the younger generation of Globetrotters. Only 18 years old, blue belt Ellis is also one of the busiest competitors on the scene. Last year alone, he competed in 13 competitions and had his first amateur MMA fight in the featherweight division, which he won by way of triangle choke in the first round (BJJ represent!). This year he's planning on doing a similar amount of competitions and is heading to Rome for the Nogi Europeans, which will be held on the 4th and 5th of April.
After watching the UFC, and being mesmerized by the grappling aspect, he signed up to a local gym and never looked back. He currently trains without a permanent instructor, but instead does drills with some friends at his matted out garage and trains with a local brown belt twice a week. Ellis embodies the globetrotter spirit by showing that it's possible to achieve great results, even if you don't have access to a regular gym, as long as you're willing to seek out instruction where you can find it.
Ellis was at last years Summer Camp in Copenhagen. Here's what he had to say about that experience:
"Last years Summer Camp was amazing. I would recommend it to anybody! The camp brought on my jiu jitsu a ton and I met loads of great people from different countries. It led to so many great opportunities."
He'll be making a return at this years Summer Camp as well, which will take place on the 16th of June.
Ellis wants to thank his sponsors If U Care Share, Natural Nutrients and Roll Supreme.
We wish Ellis all the best on his BJJ journey and look forward to seeing him on the mats in June.
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| | Join the BJJ Summer Camp in Copenhagen on June 16th! |
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| | | This years Summer Camp is fast approaching - it will be held in Copenhagen on the 16th-21st of June. For those who want to do some BJJ Globetrotting it's a great way to get in touch with other like-minded Globetrotters.
Last year there were over a 100 participants training for six days under the supervision of some of the worlds best instructors: The extremely photogenic Clark Gracie, Gianni Grippo, Oli Geddes and more. The camp ended with a bang as the 10 year anniversary of CSA was celebrated with a party at a venue that included a full sized MMA cage with several MMA fights taking place.
This year will be no different, with an international line-up of top instructors, with Roger Gracie blackbelt, Oli Geddes already confirmed to make a return. Last year he showed some great variations on the half guard, a nasty kimura and his trademark loop choke. In addition to Oli, other confirmed instructors are Swedish champ Robson Barbosa, Christian Graugart, Daniel Bertina and others. More instructors will be announced soon, so stay tuned!
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| | Last years participants were unanimously pleased with the experience:
"If you like BJJ and we know you do; The CSA Summer Camp is a must! It offers good vibes, a great atmosphere, superb techniques and fantastic athletes. And, eehhm, the beer in Denmark is very cheap!" - Simen "The Norwegian Oil King" Raudstein
"The camp was awe inspiring, as a jiu Jitsu rookie, attending a camp with several notabilities, you can get a bit apprehensive. But being at the Summer camp, made one feel right at home, even among extremely talented, enthusiastic BJJ people. I would warmly recommend the camp for everybody , who wants to train jiu Jitsu, have a good time, and make new friends". -Christian Liberg
More info can be found on the Globetrotters website. If you have any questions regarding the upcoming Summer Camp you can shoot a mail to the good people at CSA at post@csa.dk |
| | | | | The first BJJ Globetrotters Beach Camp is in the books |
| | Palm trees, surfing and all day BJJ - this probably sounds like paradise to many BJJ practitioners. Well, last month, a few lucky souls got to live the dream at the Globetrotters Beach Camp at Casa Kickapoo in El Salvador. The camp might best be described as an episode of Survivor, only with more BJJ, better food and nicer people. So nothing like an episode of Survivor, really. Instead participants were treated to a 7 day event of daily BJJ, surfing, wakeboarding, kayaking and relaxing by the pool. |
| | | British based Ed Appelby was one of the participants, and his story is quite a remarkable one. Last November, Ed was on the verge of giving up on BJJ altogether due to compounding factors, such as work, injuries and personal issues. After the El Salvador experience, Ed says he's reinvigorated, both in his jiu jitsu as well as his personal life.
"I've realised these little vacations are the perfect thing for me. It wasn't about the training, it was more the whole experience. Meeting new people, seeing new places, finding myself [...] This, along with new lifelong friends, experiences, and opportunities, is the greatest thing I have taken away from my trip."
He's planning another BJJ trip to Scandinavia, this time to visit with his friend Johan, whom he met during the Beach Camp, and invited him to come train with him in Sweden. Ed says the Globetrotter lifestyle, of travelling, meeting new people and shunning the politics of BJJ are what attract him to the Globetrotter team.
"The lack of politics Christian and his club has, has been hugely important to me as I have trained at very strict clubs (not naming names) and it has caused all manners of problems for some people [...] Christian has no time to get involved with the politics and that's the best way! People relax more and absorb the art and ENJOY it most of all!" |
| | | | Jodie Bear, another Globetrotter who attended the camp, did a quick write up (with pics!) about the El Salvador experience on her blogpage, which can be seen here. We'll be covering Jodie and her many achievements in more detail in next months edition; but until then, Jodie is doing an awesome 24-hour grappling charity event in April. You can read more about the Grapple-A-Thon and ways to support the cause here. |
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| | | The story of Team Brazilian Jiu JItsu Globetrotters
I posted this on our website last week, but thought I'd include it in the newsletter as well, for those of you who didn't read it yet :-) |
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| I always disliked politics in Jiu Jitsu and pretty much managed to steer clear of most it myself, but throughout the years, I’ve heard and experienced my fair share of bullshit. Students who are told they are not allowed to train with whom they want. People who has gone traveling and gotten a friendly reminder from their instructor, that they can only visit academies on their trip within their affiliation. Bad mouthing of former students and friends, who has chosen to change academy, sometimes even online in public. Being encouraged to keep a distance towards those not training with you. Push an “us vs. them” mindset, even to the children of which the people are role models for. The list goes on, and I am sure you know, what I am talking about.
In 2010, I got the obvious idea of doing a round-the-world trip to train Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in as many places as possible. It was a long and intense experience that took me to 56 academies around the globe in 140 days. It resulted in a blog full of photos and I even wrote a book about it, when I got home.
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| | | Strange things happened to me on that trip. Moving around so quickly, jumping from place to place at a frantic pace, going from one extreme to another, I somehow caught a rare glimpse of the whole world from above as one, connected, border-less place. A strong feeling deep inside of me of everyone being one. Like all the people I had met on the trip were the same person. |
| "I was free. Completely free. My mind was vibrant, alert and it was like all my experiences and memories had come together as one. The feeling of my whole world being in a single city at home, had been replaced with a feeling of the opposite. The entire globe and everything in it, was my world. It was a playground; there was nothing I couldn’t do. I felt the presence of everyone I had met along the way. Every friendship, every personality, every interaction. They all melted together into a unity, a combined feeling of being one with everyone." - The Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Globetrotter |
| The stories about Jiu Jitsu politics I heard from people, haunted my mind for long, after I returned home. The feeling I had gotten from visiting all these academies of the world, finding friendships in each and every one of them, made them painful to listen to. One day, whilst riding my bicycle home from training, an idea popped up in my head. With my new-found position in the top of the make-believe, fantasy hierarchy of grownups that we call the belt system in BJJ, I realised that I was in a position to do things differently. I could create a team against teams. An alternative Jiu Jitsu affiliation, that poked the traditional notion of our tribalised culture and would advocate against the typical Brazilian business model of making sure your customers are scared enough to keep eating in your restaurant out of “respect”. There is no “us vs. them”, it’s an illusion, a stone age mechanism, hardwired into our brains to keep us safe by staying with and fighting for our own desert tribe. Anything else would’ve meant certain death 2.5 million years ago. The typical Jiu Jitsu business model builds on—and takes advantage of—this and channels it into a culture of “expected loyalty”, which is great for short term money-making, but very bad for long term karma. At the end of the day, we’re all just adults, who likes to grapple and no other adult should tell us, who we can and can not play with. A new team could too easily fall into the trap of becoming just another closed group of followers, before anyone would’ve noticed, though. It had to be build on a foundation of actively encouraging people to stay open and politics-free. So I wrote down a set of defined values, which are forever unchangeable. You can call it a mission statement, maybe a constitution; most important is, that it can not be touched or altered in any way, at any time. If I ever make changes to these values, please abandon the team immediately and tell everyone I suck. - We don’t pay each other any affiliation fees
- We wear any patches we like on our gis
- We are free to represent any (or no) team in competition
- We encourage training with anyone regardless of affiliation
- We are willing to promote anyone who deserves it—members or not
- We arrange camps, seminars and visit each other for training and fun
- We believe everyone is equal both on and off the mats
- We strive to enjoy life, people and the world through Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
I posted about this on my blog, encouraging anyone who wanted to “sign up” to send me an email. In my mind, the whole thing was still merely a provocative experiment, but the interest was overwhelming and I got more than a hundred emails the first week. Apparently, I wasn’t alone with my dream of an alternative to the highly political teams that were at war with each other. Before I knew it, the ball had really started rolling and suddenly, people from all over the world started traveling, gathering at training camps and visiting each others academies. |
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| Choosing to be part of this team, is not about “following” me, joining my “lineage” or giving me the (awkward imo.) title of “professor”. Every single person, regardless of their belt rank, should be treated as an equal member of the team and that includes myself. We all follow and inspire each other, from beginner white belts to seasoned black belts.
BJJ Globetrotters is growing by the day and my personal mission with it is clear. For myself and everyone else involved, I am determined to try and create as many friendships and memorable experiences as possible. True, honest friendships and positive memories are amongst the very few things really worth collecting in life. Jiu Jitsu is a fantastic tool for designing your experience here on Planet Earth to be a good one, and with this constantly expanding community of like-minded people, we have in our hands a powerful vehicle to do great things together.
Any person you meet could potentially change your life forever. You could die tomorrow; why limit yourself in any way, including who you choose to be friends (read: train) with and allow to influence your existence?
I am sincerely looking forward to meet you.
-Christian |
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