THE NEW FIGHT CLUB
JIU-JITSU’S WHO’S WHO
Five high-rollers with formidable yet largely unacknowledged grappling skills
Ed O’neill The Modern Family paterfamilias considers his black belt awarded by Rorion Grace in 2007 his greatest achievement in life – apart from his kids, of course.
Ashton Kutcher A purple belt under Rigan Machado, who teaches no-sparring jiu-jitsu to risk-averse celebs. But given that the actor was also a college wrestler, we won’t mess.
Guy Ritchie Directed by Roger and Renzo Gracie, the black-belt film-maker started out with the Stath and reportedly gets mats out on set, so he can roll before the cameras do.
Vince Vaughn At 46, the funnyman swapped Average Joe’s Gym for the Gracie Academy (home to Ryron and Rener) in Torrance, California. Two years on, he’s a blue belt.
Anthony Bourdain The late gastronaut won the blue-belt masters middleweight division at the 2016 IBJJF Open in New York, where he trained at the Renzo Gracie Academy.
Rorion cannily put forward not himself or his brother Rickson, who resembled a bald Marlon Brando on steroids, but his smaller sibling Royce, dressed in white to look innocent. Rorion knew that Royce’s victory against bigger men would highlight Brazilian jiu-jitsu’s supremacy.
Today, MMA fighters consider Brazilian jiu-jitsu to be indispensable. “For me, it’s everything,” says Mackenzie Dern, a former world champion with a Phelpsian haul of golds. Dern made the switch to MMA when she was 21, after being encouraged to do so by the people at her academy with whom she regularly rolled. She joined the UFC in 2016, and her record stands at seven fights, seven wins. Striking isn’t easy, she hastens to add, but you only have so many punches and kicks to master: after that, it’s simply about refining your technique. “But jiu-jitsu is chess,” continues Dern, echoing Dave. “You make one move, and there are about 10 different options after that.” And those options are always evolving with the addition of new techniques.
Arizona-born Dern started training when she was three. Her father is Brazilian martial artist Wellington Dias, who was taught by Hélio Gracie’s son Royler. Only later did she realise that not all the other kids did Brazilian jiu-jitsu after school, as they did in her dad’s homeland. But over the years, she’s witnessed the sport explode in popularity in the US. “Now, it’s crazy,” she says. “I see kids with sponsors.”
Brazilian jiu-jitsu is not something you do purely for money, however. Even after more than 20 years, Dern – whose parents once grounded her from training when she lied about going to a party while in high school – still hates to skip a session. “It’s so fun: getting choked out by friends, choking them out,” she says cheerily. “It’s definitely relaxing. It takes your mind off stress.”
Close Combat
Sam, the second person I roll with at Fightzone, works in music. Having run a few marathons, he was looking for a new challenge as 40 loomed and was inspired to take up jiu-jitsu after listening to a podcast by Jocko Willink, a Navy Seal commander-turned-life coach who extols its benefits for wellbeing. “I’d never done any combat sports, so there was an allure to testing myself,” says Sam. After a year and a half, he has gained self-confidence, strength and mobility: “I stretch now, because I’ve got a reason to do it.”
He also points to another potential motivator. With each new stripe on his white belt (four denotes the stage just
before blue), Sam gets the same satisfying sense of “levelling up” that he used to get from computer games, minus the empty feeling with which the latter left him. “Besides, if you’re feeling nervous about something, having some fat guy sit on you really puts it in perspective,” he says.
I can vouch for what he calls “stress inoculation”: in my third lesson at Fightzone, I’m trying to escape from the guard of a bald, trim guy called Rich, who is 51 but could pass for much younger. I make the mistake of leaning forward too much, allowing him to choke me. I’m not prepared for this but, to my surprise, I don’t panic and somehow wriggle out. When my wife messages me later to ask how my day’s going, I reply, “A guy tried to choke me. But I handled it.” For modulating a chronically overactive fightor-flight response, it’s hard to beat a bona fide fight. “It’s a mortal struggle with no consequences,” says Sam.
Rich, who runs an art gallery, joined Fightzone at the same time as Sam, and they’ve become friends. He heard about Brazilian jiu-jitsu through The Joe Rogan Experience, the podcast of the comedian, UFC colour commentator and black belt. “I knew it would be a bit scary to be in a fight, and I wanted to battle that frightened part of me,” says Rich. The low-impact nature of Brazilian jiu-jitsu makes it accessible even for older men. (Chuck Norris became a third-degree black belt at 75.) When Rich was forced to take six months off because of a freak neck injury, his “happiness rating” dropped significantly. “I’m uplifted when I’m doing this,” he says. “It gets all the aggression out. It’s fun, too. Trying to strangle your mates, giving them a hug afterwards.”
This is, perhaps, where Brazilian jiujitsu has a real hold over other, less tactile active pursuits. As uncomfortable as the prospect of close physical contact with a stranger might be to many, research suggests it’s something we all need more of. Studies conducted by the Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami have connected “touch therapy” to reductions in depressive symptoms and pain. Touch also lowers heart rate and blood pressure, while boosting immunity. Oxytocin, the “cuddle hormone”, promotes bonding and social behaviour. Cuddling and choking are not quite the same thing – but maybe they’re not always so different.
Rolling Thunder
The competition-only class at the Roger Gracie Academy in west London is more serious than anything I’ve experienced so far. Instead of a gi, the students wear compression gear in the gym’s monochrome livery, or rash guards and board shorts. At the far end of the room hangs a row of solemn-looking Gracie family portraits. Over the course of the session, the floor becomes slick with sweat and blood from an accidentally contacted nose, which splatters over a pair of trainers discarded at the edge of the mat. The humid air fills with the sound of slaps, grunts… and laughter.
Some of the laughter is emanating from Roger Gracie himself, a 14-time Brazilian jiu-jitsu world champion, the chairman of the UK Jiu-jitsu Federation and widely held to be the sport’s greatest of all time.
“It’s a friendly community: we beat each other up, but in a nice way”