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29 Mar
0
1108
"He
grabs his board and paddles back out. He and
the local exchange words...I’m thinking to myself, ‘You
picked the wrong battle.’.."The afternoon sky is showing off. The waves are glassy and
peeling..
22 Mar
0
612
Jacksonville, FL - Mentality Martial Arts "I'll be there in five," says Mikey. "All good, I'll wait for you in the parking lot before heading in. I'll get some B-roll footage until you get here," I r..
15 Mar
0
718
"..there
really are no excuses left when it comes to kettlebells."The functionality and versatility of a kettlebell might make it
the best piece of strength and conditioning equipment you can buy. A ..
07 Mar
0
975
New York City has long been the East Coast hub of Brazilian Jiujitsu. Decorated athletes like Marcelo Garcia, Gordon Ryan, the Miyaos, Gianni Grippo and more have lived, trained, and opera..
01 Mar
0
631
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After stuffing our faces with fresh BBQ pork, we say goodbye to
Val and go our separate ways. Our plan for the rest of the day is to head back
to house, scoop up some of..
22 Feb
0
501
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As soon as we fall asleep, the tranquility of being away from the
ambient city noise of Taiwan is interrupted by the sound of my alarm. With a
sudden jolt of caffeine, I’m ..
15 Feb
0
381
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"I
am super surprised to see eleven year olds throwing knees and elbows and also
taking them in return like champs. This kid is going to be something
special."After learnin..
08 Feb
0
446
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“He said he would be out
front.”“Do you know what he
looks like?” Zoe asks. “I would guess like a
fighter.”Looking for someone in an
airport is like finding a needle i..
01 Feb
0
675
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New Orleans, LouisianaWhenever I get a chance to return to the home I grew up in, I get lost reflecting on things and memories I’ve acquired from my travels: Rastafarian..
25 Jan
0
361
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After a night of eating and chatting with different
nationalities, I slam some coffee and grab a motorcycle taxi. I’m off to Lute
Livre Saigon for their Sunday open mat...
18 Jan
0
322
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“I’ll have a sandwich and
whatever he’s having,” says the man above me in a joking manner.“Please, sit down and
enjoy the day with me,” I reply.It never fails when
travelin..
11 Jan
0
413
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The construction outside my window wakes me up early. Six a.m.
comes fast here. I like this area, but it’s taken a chunk out of my budget when
I know I can sleep cheape..
04 Jan
0
468
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The rain gets heavier and the wind starts to blow harder. A mom
with a family of three on a motorbike creates an A-frame wave in the middle of
the street. I’m lost in t..
28 Dec
0
385
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"This,
is Jiu Jitsu in practice."There is a special time
in the City, where the sun plays peek-a-boo with your eye, as the golden tides
of scooters chaotically navigat..
21 Dec
1
482
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"Alright,
after the picture, we are going to get an hour of rolling in...Again,
the ships start to disappear. I know sets are coming...I was only supposed to
stay fo..
14 Dec
0
447
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Photo by Josh Russell "The fury is strong
is this one. I feel like I’m deep sea fishing, and I just got the marlin up on
the deck of the boat. He’s flopping and popping in ..
07 Dec
0
385
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Friday, 2:30PMThe elevator doors open up to a street already bustling with traffic. I throw my bags in my Uber hoping I won’t get hit in the bicycle lane. I try to cha..
30 Nov
0
325
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Thursday, noonThis time when I walk into the gym, the mat is alive with all different ranks: white to black belt and everything in between. The energy is electric. Before..
23 Nov
0
353
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Thursday, 6:30AMI wake up to what seems to be a garbage truck outside, and then some sounds of shouting. Hey Arnold! was pretty spot-on when describing a New York Cit..
16 Nov
0
367
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Tuesday, 10:45 PM“Not our problem. Call the airline,” said a man with an Indian accent on the other line. My eyes follow the blades on the ceiling fan as they rotate ..
02 Nov
0
365
"We
couldn’t have been five minutes into our acquaintance before Rome and I
realized we were about to take a class directly from the source."Relson Gracie BJJ:Koh Phangan is known to
backpackers for i..
25 Oct
0
305
"The
10TH Planet system is a language unto itself. Riddled with simple names like
“zombie” and “honey-hole,” the system was designed for BJJ in MMA." 10TH Planet Koh Tao:Throwing our bags in with
the ..
19 Oct
0
341
"Andrew’s
class was well-taught and reviewed an inverted leg-lock set-up, amongst sweeps
and guard passes. He impressed us all with his body control and
precision.."Arête BJJ:Located on the fifth
floo..
12 Oct
0
353
"Marshall
was waiting for us, prepared to access bail money if we were 30 minutes
later."“What do you mean you
cross-faced her?”“Chin to shoulder.
Immediately,” Rome replied, never losing step with th..
05 Oct
0
420
Kuba “The Accountant” Kaszuba is a professional MMA fighter and Certified Public Accountant. Originally from Olsztyn, Poland, he now lives in Jacksonville, Florida and trains at Elevate MMA. Kaszuba i..
28 Sep
0
348
Part Two of our interview with Austen Lane, the newest addition to the UFC Heavyweight roster:GrapplerMag: NFL defensive end, professional MMA fighter, radio morning show personality. Meghan and Aust..
20 Sep
0
442
Austen “A-Train” Lane is a true Renaissance Man. He played five years in the NFL before retiring and transitioning to MMA. He also co-hosts a morning radio show here in Jacksonville, FL. Lane is ..
06 Sep
0
378
Trey “The Truth” Waters is preparing for the biggest opportunity of his fighting career. Slated as the co-main event on Dana White’s Contender Series: Season 6, Week 7, Waters gives us his thoughts on..
31 Aug
0
538
Kuba “The Accountant” Kaszuba is a professional MMA fighter and Certified Public Accountant. Originally from Olsztyn, Poland, he now lives in Jacksonville, Florida and trains at Elevate MMA. Kaszuba i..
24 Aug
0
426
"Make sure to wear a
clearly obvious Jiu Jitsu T-shirt everywhere you wander. This will surely
attract other BJJ practitioners’ interest in you."We all experience times of restlessness, when life begi..
17 Aug
0
372
"..If
class times are too long the student will learn less. Short class times with
few tasks to learn and plenty of sparring retain students longer!"I have spent a number of years building a youth Jiu..
10 Aug
0
834
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"Pick who you roll with. Spar with the people who make you better, not the people who want to win. There is a difference."To the Middle-aged jiu
jitsuman:If you're over ..
03 Aug
0
406
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"Fierce winds shook
the street signs and whipped the power lines around like a game of double-dutch
jump rope...Admittedly, I was excited and thankful to be standing there ..
27 Jul
0
452
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"My
only fear was that one of Taiwan’s famous Level-5 earthquakes would shake the
building down and leave us trapped in the gym forever."Some time went by, and we
began ..
20 Jul
0
661
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"At the start of
class, where you may expect to see an organized line up or any concrete
regiment, there stood only shirtless men in the tightest of spats striking
funny..
13 Jul
0
670
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My husband pushes his
smart phone in my face while we wait for our flight departing Osaka. The vivid
glow on my tired eyes is enough to blur out the screen.“See? There! ..
06 Jul
0
405
“Every morning in our
lives, we have a choice to make. You have the choice to stay in bed and say
‘Forget it, I’m not going to work out today.’ Or ‘Forget it, I’m not going to
work hard today.’ That’s..
29 Jun
0
414
“Sign here and here”. The UPS delivery man
throws the clipboard under his shoulder and strolls back to his brown wagon. I
can hear the band Cake playing on the radio through his open door. He’s going ..
22 Jun
0
399
“Aw
geez Rick, that’s a weird way to pass someone’s guard.”“It’s
really weird. It’s about to get a whole lot weirder, Morty.”I spent the majority of my time at blue belt perfecting my
triangle game. I..
15 Jun
0
858
"When
I look back at my time as a blue belt, I hate my blue belt self. I don’t like
to use the word hate, but I had Blue
Belt Fever."Everything is different now. I feel like I’ve just powered up or
ev..
08 Jun
0
699
"White
Belt Fury can be experienced when an individual has yet to learn the art of
self-control (flow) and trains at a high rate. Usually very aggressive, even
unintentionally."“Find a partner!” I sca..
01 Jun
0
523
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"Should
a gym – Brazilian based or not – still follow the unwritten law of the
mat?"“When I went to prison
and came out, it was like another stripe being added to my sho..
18 May
0
565
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The pandemic of 2020/2021 brought with it the necessity for sacrifice, patience and courage. With no false humility, becoming a trusted operator in the United States mil..
18 May
0
583
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Part 4There are moments in the night that hold long, belonging to no one but the individual experiencing it as no words can explain the feeling. Standing in the tunnel w..
11 May
0
587
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Part 3I flew back up to New York and quickly remembered, amateur or not, sparring is a far cry from a live cage fight. The night schedule made it impossible to find an o..
10 May
0
567
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Part 2I got to Brandon’s house with a palpable buzz. We set up the call in his office and got a hold of Rome. I told the guys about the opportunity, along with my intent..
04 May
1
897
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The year 2020 was rough on everyone. Personally I was dealing with a few losses that seemed insurmountable and admittedly I was fighting an internal battle tha..
22 Apr
0
825
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Our follow-up interview with UFC welterweight Preston Parsons as he prepares for his upcoming fight in Las Vegas on April 23rd.Grapplermag: Walk me through the process of ..
15 Apr
0
1620
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Preston Parsons is an MMA icon in northeast Florida,
co-owner of Elevate MMA in Jacksonville Beach, and he isn’t even thirty years
old yet. He made his UFC deb..
02 Feb
0
2327
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Your temple is a place where nothing else matters. You go to this
place to escape; stress isn’t allowed here. No matter what, you’re not allowed
to bring whatever is bot..
26 Jan
0
661
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The practice of Jiu jitsu relies on us coming together to train.
All the other benefits that stem from the practice of Jiu jitsu come from this
implied idea of community..
19 Jan
0
443
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I warm up quickly and
trot to the back of the mat where I find some space to start my rolls. Open mat
rolls to me are always chill compared to rolling during a class. Th..
12 Jan
0
424
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Rolling with everyone is super fun. The first thing I notice is
how everyone flowed from one position to the next. I transition into an
omoplata on one purple belt, and ..
05 Jan
0
550
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After a busy day at work, I was on my way home, using one hand to
read a book and the other to hold on to the handrail of the train. I decided to
purchase a travel card ..
29 Dec
0
439
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So you
want to grapple? And the gyms near the town you live in aren’t half bad. You
start to improve. Then you hear about this gym...in a faraway country…What
then? How ..
22 Dec
0
588
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So you want to grapple? And the gyms near the town you live in
aren’t half bad. You start to improve. Then you hear about this gym...in a
faraway country…What then? How ..
15 Dec
0
495
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The idea of a journey is often used as a metaphor for the process
of progress in the martial arts. In fact, the Chinese character, “dao” (道), meaning “way”, is part
of t..
08 Dec
0
397
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Drop In: Okinawa, Pt.3I have to survive 4 days
in Japan with only 16000 Yen ($162 USD). I can do this. Day 3 Again, I’m up early and out to enjoy the day before heading ..
01 Dec
0
409
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I have
to survive 4 days in Japan with only 16000 Yen ($162 USD). I can do this. Day 2I wake up in my cubby-hole the following morning, climb down and
get ready to start..
24 Nov
0
542
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I have to survive 4 days in Japan with only 16000 Yen ($162 USD).
I can do this. One of
my best friends whom I consider a brother got me into backpacking 10 years ago.
A..
17 Nov
0
467
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Last night, I had a dream. I was walking up to the deli line at
the grocery store, when I noticed that five people in line were wearing
bathrobes. Then, I noticed I was ..
08 Sep
0
599
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You can hear it...even on top of the frenetic music and yelling
crowd, you can still hear it. Those nearly bare knuckles hitting his face is
something I will never forge..
05 Sep
0
818
"[The
guy] turns around and starts trying to advance towards the cop, so I was like,
‘Alright, fuck this’...Standing shoulder-locked him, put him on the ground, got
the knee in his back, his arm pinne..
25 Aug
0
477
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If a tsunami or an erupting volcano or an alien invasion suddenly
forced me to evacuate the Dave Cave and I could take only one book with me, it
would be Mastering Jujit..
28 Jul
0
554
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Photo via Instagram -
mowglininjaI’m
teaming up with my friend Lee Campbell, whom I met on Ninja to implement Ninja
Warrior and BJJ programs into schools across N.S.W. a..
27 Jul
0
647
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Photo via Instagram -
mowglininja"The
competitive nature of Ninja Warrior is very different to BJJ in that we aren’t
really competing against each other like in a roll. ..
21 Jul
0
687
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"Combat
Sambo is more akin to MMA..The sport is seen as brutal, because they allow
headbutts and groin strikes in addition to elbows and knees."Sambo originated in the S..
07 Jul
0
743
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“This is communist, and
it’s illegal.” That’s what they said to
me at the Osan Air Force base in South Korea when I presented my Taiwanese ID.
It was all uphill after th..
30 Jun
0
488
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"It
is no easy feat to throw another person cleanly to their back with precision
and control. The judo player must leverage the opponent’s momentum and timing
with prope..
23 Jun
0
566
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"This
aspect of the sport changes the style and speed of the matches dramatically.
Without the gi to control and restrict the opponent, the tempo of movement is
often in..
16 Jun
0
516
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"Another large
aspect of catch wrestling is “the ride”. The ability to advance position and
hold the opponent there is an important part of the art."The history of catch..
09 Jun
0
423
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"It is always a
great idea to rent a van with some friends and travel around doing something
you all enjoy while filming the process. If you can do it, then do it."
At..
02 Jun
0
475
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"It is no secret
that Taiwan BJJ is our biggest rival at Danimal BJJ, but for my part, I have
always enjoyed the competition between us. A large part of this of course i..
26 May
0
609
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"The first stop on the trip was Bonsai Jiu Jitsu in Taoyuan. It
has a unique set-up with red padding and mats everywhere, giving it the feeling
of a champagne room in a ..
12 May
0
483
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Shave the layers of fancy gis, sublimated rash guards, tattoos
and acai berries from Jiu jitsu and what we have left is a martial art which is
all about submitting your ..
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