My Night @ Gracie Philadelphia

What it look like folk? I wanted to put this up last night after leaving the jiu jitsu spot but between eating, talking to Butterbear, and losing my battle with exhaustion, here I am Friday morning. Its the first day of spring, though right now its 6:18am and spring won't officially start for about another 90 minutes. Its brisk as shit here in Philly, with a damn wet snow falling out of the sky. Lol Mother Nature is a mad scientist. But life goes on. And so do the Chronicles....shall we?

So I went to the Brazillian Jiu Jitsu spot to watch a class last night. Even though I wasn't participating I was a little nervous. Mostly because of the uncertainty of the situation. What if I went in there and there was some straight UFC ready mofos in there? I knew I was going to watch a beginners class, but still. Class started @ 7pm, I arrived @ 6:45(I live by the motto, "if you're on time, you're late"). I walked in and saw the pic you see above. Basically the entire school is the training mat with a makeshift walkway around half of it. The walkway leads to the back. I didn't go back there but I assume that the changing room, bathroom, and instructors office is back there. There was no real place for obvservers to watch(hint hint) just window sills on either side of the door. I sat next to a man on one. Almost immediatly a young man approached and asked if I was there to watch a class. I said yes and shook his hand. He told me that he would go get the instructor then disappeared into the back.

I sat and watched a group of middle aged white men stretching on the blue mat. The man next to me informed me that his son had missed his earlier class so was going to train with the adults tonight. His son was currently the only person on the mat younger than 30. As time went on more middle aged white men filed in and exchanged greetings. Then the closer it got to 7 the younger the people got that were coming in. This put me at a bit of ease for some reason. Then a young black guy walked in with a young hispanic guy, and I was at home. LOL. At about five after 7, an assistant instructor casually strolled out and ran through some light stretches with the students. Nothing formal at all as he joked around with another assistant while running through the workouts. The workouts weren't the typical sit up push up affair. It was a bunch of bizarre looking stretches and spastic movements. At this time the instructor strolled over to me. His name was Joe. A short middle aged white man. Very unassuming. He introduced himself and asked if I had ever taken jiu jitsu. I told him no. He replied "that's good". He told me he would be over to me periodically during the class to answer any questions I may have.

At this point he walked to the middle of the mat and began showing a technique he wanted the class to practice. So they paired off into couples and went at it. The class atmosphere was very relaxed and informal. With joe floating around watching everything and his assistants doing the same. The assistants being extremely hands on and jumping in and actually getting in and SHOWING the people what needs to be done. Every 15 minutes or so, joe would demonstrate a new technique then send the class to practice it. When he came back I had questions.

I asked about class and rank progression. He told me that like the Gracies that taught him HE decides when one is ready to advance. No tests, no tournaments. He told me that he focuses more on the self defense aspect than the competition. He said he teaches the art to where you can use it against any person in any situation, as the Gracies intended. Going on to say, that there are things illegal in UFC that a thug on the street doesn't care about. Made sense to me. It was at this point that I realized I would be signing up for this class. Something I noticed as I watched the men practicing techniques is that, oddly enough this martial art is more closely related to boxing. Which is wild because there are no strikes. But just the mindset. The second you relax, you can get seriously hurt. That can be said for all forms of fighting I suppose but having seen boxing matches, and various martial arts tournaments. THIS most closely resembles the level of alertness a boxer shows. The funny thing is, a lot of the moves are performed while not looking at your opponent. I noticed joe informing students to turn their heads away, and feel where the guys hands are. One of the guys in front of me even closed his eyes. Now this is extremely close quarters, in fact the guys where in most cases on top of one another. So this isn't some Bruce Lee vibe....lol

At 8:15 I shook hands with Joe and told him I would be in touch. As I pushed on the door, that was now dripping with condensation I escaped the oppresive heat of Gracie Philadelphia onto the cool air of Frankford ave. With a kid like smile on my face. The only thing standing between me and these classes is the $200 new member fee. Lord knows when I'm gonna have that...but fuck it, I will get it. I can't wait family.

I'm out