Judson Borges in Poland

After the great success of the seminar with Marcos Flexa, we will host another black belt from Carlson Gracie in our gym. Judson will come down straight from the Europeans (he works in the International Federation) to teach one class in Wroclaw and another in Dabrowa Gorniczna.

The seminar in Wroclaw will happen on the Saturday, 7th of February, and Sunday we will go to Dabrowa Gorniczna. Classes will last for 3 hours, and possibly we will have another optional 2 hours explaining the official rules of BJJ according to the IFBJJ. We will soon release more details on prices, times and format of the seminar. Some info on Judson:

Master Judson Borges is a 3rd degree black belt. He received his belt from Carlson Gracie himself, and have competed extensively in the past. He trains since 1974 and won major titles as an athlete and even more as a coach. He worked as director of the Rio de Janeiro BJJ Federation from 97 to 2005. Now he does the same in the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Confederation and in the IBJJF. After many years living and teaching in Rio de Janeiro (the craddle of BJJ) he moved with his family to the north-east region of Brasil, where he coaches 3 schools.

Judson Borges

Helio Moreira in Canada

Our friend Helio Soneca Moreira has been spotted on the Niagara Falls. Actually he went to Canada to teach BJJ in our associated club in St. Catharines, Ontario. Vince Cristelli sent us the pictures and tell us more about the visit on his report.

“Master Helio Soneca made his first visit north of the border to Canada from his Academy in Louisville Kentucky, to the small city of St. Catharines, Ontario, which is a short ten minute drive from Niagara Falls. The seminar was held at Defensive Arts Training Centre, owned and operated by Sensei Gerry DiSanto, one of Master Atalla’s associated clubs.

Soneca provided a no-gi seminar from the guard on the evening of August 15th, shortly after arriving in town. Matter of fact, he went from the airport directly to the club and began the seminar shortly thereafter! The following day he provided a second three hour seminar on gi training from the half-guard. He also brought along a number of gis and training tapes for those who were interested.

Once the training session was completed, Helio had the opportunity to visit the area making a few stops along the Niagara River that separates Canada and the USA, and taking a few pictures at the brink of the Falls. Although sitting on and hopping over the railing makes for a great picture, it is actually against the law! He also had the opportunity to have a look at the Lock System that the ships use to move through Lake Erie to Lake Ontario. We spent about an hour looking around for one of his favourite dishes at a Korean Restaurant and then a Starbucks beverage. A trip through to a sleepy town called Niagara-On-The-Lake was also on the itinerary for the day. The city lies along the southern shore of Lake Ontario.

It was a joy to have him aboard for the seminar. Watching a slick BJJ practitioner pull submissions out of nowhere and the small little things that make a difference in your game is a wonderful thing to watch! A great teacher and one super individual. It was a pleasure to have met him. I hope our paths cross again in the future.”

Vince Cristelli

Steve Haydock gets his black belt

Saturday 6th of October, 2007. It’s three in the afternoon and I leave the train that brought me from London Victoria. Those are familiar grounds to me. I started coming to Caterham in the end of 2003, just a month after arriving in England. At that time he was a very talented blue belt, that won the London Open later in 2004, and already coaching a enthusiastic group of 10 to 15 people with a core group of 5 guys closer to him, plus many kids learning grappling, striking and self defence.

The Applied Fighting Systems joined the Rio Grappling Network and while I lived in London I went there several times, coaching, joining Steve’s classes and training with the crew. After moving out of the country, I keep coming here whenever I am in London, and I can tell from my observations that the group in Surrey is constantly improving its technical quality and the group is growing, with a diversity of people from all ages. The core group now has at least ten people and the classes have sometimes 30 people without counting kids of all ages, keeping the mats full and the atmosphere is bright, everyone motivated to learn and no agressiveness is shown, there is a lot of respect and camaraderie, things I see that are very important no matter what you train or do.

As a leader of this group, Steve has commited himself for a very long time, he has been training and coaching for nine years non stop, putting a lot of time and effort in making this happen.

On a sidenote, this month is the ninth anniversary of me receiving my black belt, and now I awarded my first black belt outside Brasil, after making Steve work through all the students (22) in a progression from white to brown belts. After he was tired, I jumped in his neck

This training was not meant to be a test as I knew already that Steve Haydock was already a black belt, with skills, attributes and knowledge a genuine black belt needs. The idea was to make it a day not to be forgotten, and nothing like a hard workout to remind you how far you have come since the white belt days.

Cheers to everyone present at that day, our guests from Carlson Gracie team, Dave Lucas that came from Switzerland specially to this event and congratulations to Matt Peters, Dave Pawan and Jamil Soroudji that received their purple belts.