Seminars, and Why You Should Go

Question: Name another sport where you can have legitimate access to its top practitioners with relative ease and have it remain not financially stupid?

That was a lot, I know, but let's think about that for just a moment. One of my favorite things about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is the accessibility to its top practitioners. If you want to train with Andre Galvao, you can--all you need to do is walk into his gym, Atos, is San Diego and sign the hold harmless agreement and that's that. How about Marcelo Garcia, Renzo Gracie, or Garry Tonon? The same principal applies--as long as they're not out across the country competing or giving a seminar, but you know what I'm saying here. But to that point, the sport's biggest names often travel around the world giving seminars. If you happen to not be able to fly across the country to drop in to a gym to train with a BJJ Hero of yours, chances are that sooner or later they may come close to you.

'What's a seminar," you ask? Well, a BJJ seminar is when a top level practitioner travels to a gym to give lessons and teach techniques for a few hours. Traditionally, you'll pay a fee to attend (that is how these big-name-guys make money) and that fee can be relatively inexpensive and go up depending on how big of a name the person giving the seminar is. I've seen seminars for as low as $20.00 USD and have heard rumors of what Rickson Gracie has charged--but to be fair, I've heard Rickson's fee was worth every single penny.

Photo Credit: Kron Gracie Academy Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/krongraciejiujitsu/

So dig if you will a picture: you're a into BJJ and someone (of some significance) from our sport is going to be close enough to you--or maybe even AT your school--to give a seminar. You should go. Why? Well because it's fun. Even they go over techniques that you're familiar with, it's fun to hear it explained to you from another perspective. Everyone has their own take on BJJ (another one of my favorite things about this sport), so it's cool to hear something your familiar with mapped out in detail to you from someone with a new point of view. 

Recently I got to attend a seminar by Kurt Osiander. Kurt got a powerful shout out in the last WBS--so if you haven't checked that out yet, please do--but Kurt is a BJJ Hero and Black Belt under Ralph Gracie in San Francisco. I live in Pittsburgh, PA (on the other side of the country, for those geographically challenged), so my opportunities to train with Kurt are "limited," to put in one way. I've been a fan of his for sometime (again, see previous WBS), so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to take his seminar at Edinboro University. Edinboro has a storied wrestling program. Anyone in the grappling world could rattle-off names of the mat savages that went there, so it was truly a cool experience to be able to be in that wrestling room for the seminar.  The Edinboro University BJJ Club , headed up by Dr. Korey Kilburn, hosted and organized the whole thing. (On a related note, if you're near the area, be on the lookout, they/Korey get a lot of great seminars coming through.)

Dr. Korey Kilburn and myself inside the famous EU Wrestling room

So, more to the point: Kurt's seminar was fantastic. He came as advertised, and then some. Being a fan of his Move of the Week YouTube series, I was vaguely familiar with his teaching style, but I was truly impressed by his love of the sport and desire for everyone at the seminar to pick up on what it was he was teaching and come away with more knowledge. Which, is exactly what a seminar should be. 

It was fun to make the two hour drive with my training partners, spend four hours on the mat learning new BJJ from someone so cool, and then get to hang out with them all afterwards. So what does that mean to you as a lower ranking (or maybe higher rank) BJJ practitioner who has never been to a seminar? It means that you should take advantage of seminars when they come around.

A seminar is more than just paying someone for their knowledge, there's a lot more to it than that. It could be a bonding experience between you and your training partners. It's a fun road trip. It's a destination in life--to maybe check off an item on your Bucket List to get to train with someone. It's supporting the community, both financially and otherwise, in a very cool way--and you get to learn some cool shit! How do you learn about seminars? Well start by looking up your favorite BJJ player's websites and social media. Most of them usually post where/when they're going to be somewhere, and how much. Also, get friendly with the other local gyms in your area. They may have people coming through and post about it on their sites. (But the political B.S. aside, we're all family). 

Kurt and myself, telling terrorists where to go

WBS Crew taking in carbs after 4 hours on the mat

WBS Crew Road trippin & Trafficjamin

That should be enough to get you started. But if you do go, or have gone to a seminar, get in touch with us on any/all forms of our social media WBS on Instagram-- come Follow! , WBS on Facebook-- Please come LIKE!, and of course WBS on Twitter--also, please come Follow!

Send us pictures, stories, and whatever else you have about your seminar experiences. We'll RT, Share, and whatever else to get your fun story out there to help inspire others to get out there and do the same. 

Coming soon: An announcement for a new sponsor... it's cool.

This week's WBS brought to you by:

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Trust your boy, Jesse WBS, when I tell you that you won't be disappointed in your purchase. I'll personally guarantee it. And if you don't like what you buy, you can some bow & arrow choke me into darkness.


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Tapping Online Resources

You may be shocked to learn that WBS isn't the only online resource for BJJ stuff. I know, I know, you're shocked. But dig this: the Internet is a wild and wonderful place where knowledge is unrestricted and fact checked by Internet Trolls. BJJ is such an ever-evolving sport that such knowledge is able to be shared, for free, and still allow people to make a living doing what they love. In this post we're going to spotlight some of my favorites. I'm certain that in the future there will be more posts just like this where we'll look at some others, but this is the list, for now.

1) Reddit is sweet, but the sub-Reddit pages are wormholes of delicious topic-specific knowledge for you to gobble up. BJJ, of course, has its own sub-Reddit /r/BJJ. 

In this sub-Reddit you'll find a ton of links to new BJJ stuff. If you're not familiar with how Reddit works, it's pretty cool. Links climb the rankings to the top of the front page based on the volume up UP Votes they receive. An UP Vote is positive, and conversely, a DOWN Vote is bad. The reader votes accordingly. So, the front page will have the links that are currently receiving the most UP votes and the subsequent pages will have less popular links in descending order. 

 Why is that cool? Well, it's a huge community. You can pretty much bank on finding interesting and useful stuff here that's currently relevant to today's BJJ. Tomorrow's BJJ will be completely different and so will the front page of /r/BJJ. This is where you can go to see, read, and discuss all things that are currently happening in the community. It's also where you can meet and talk to some new people, and sometimes big names in BJJ (Keenan posts on there often). My friend Matt Kirtley (AKA Aesopian) is also a mod there. So go read and say hi to Matt.

2) Instagram is quickly becoming one of my favorite places to get new BJJ moves and see the community. By Following BJJ people (Like Jesse WBS, your favorite online BJJ blogger--So ADD) you can see pictures and video of things that they're doing and what they're up to.

Additionally, as you can see in the picture here, you have the ability to search various hashtags to be able to see subject specific content. I like to look up stuff for inspiration and motivation. It's also cool to see your favorite athletes personally posting things from their training and personal lives. 

Why is that cool? It's cool because it's handy; and like Reddit, it's always changing and moving along to the next post. You can download the app to your phone and literally have new BJJ material at your fingertips--that's cool. It's also inspirational to see pictures and videos of just normal BJJ players out there training and living the #jiujitsulifestyle. You can Like pictures and video, meet and connect with friends and athletes, and get your BJJ fix in those down times without having to get on the mat.

 3) Kurt Osiander Move of the Week

First of all, no one is cooler than Kurt. Kurt's BJJ Heroes Bio will break it down for you if you don't know who he is, but he's--more or less--your cool uncle in the BJJ family. 

Kurt started doing his YouTube web series, Move of the Week a few years ago and it's been completely useful and absolutely a must to work into your off-the-mat schedule if you're not doing it already. Every week Kurt posts a short video, usually about 3 minutes, with some new move for you to work into your game. Sometimes it's not something that you're currently working on, but it's good to watch it to not only know that the move exists (and can and will be used against you), but in case you want to come back to that move later. 

Why is that cool? Well Kurt is one of Ralph Gracie's main instructors at his main San Francisco gym, so it's basically like getting some sweet one on one time every week with one of the coolest and best instructors out there--for free. YouTube also has a app for you to subscribe to the channel, but if you have a phone capable of apps. you can also Google it later if you don't want to bother with the app (or come back to this post for the link (ily)). Kurt has an honest approach to BJJ that lends to the younger generation a fun sense of seriousness. When Kurt uses swear words, it's like when you were a kid and an adult used them with you casually. Check Kurt out each week for something cool, fun, and free. And that's cool.

4) http://www.learningbjj.com/

Kaeli Sweigard is your favorite White Belt, you just don't know it yet. Kaeli runs her blog, LearningBJJ.com, and consistently puts out fun and informative content.  What's different about her approach is that she admits to being scared and through that she continues to push through it to inspire others. 

Kaeli often has guest posts--your's truly wrote something for her that you can read here--that will give you fun stories and pointers for surviving BJJ. Kaeli will also tell you all about her trials and tribulations with BJJ. It's fun to follow along with her (especially if you're also a struggling White Belt) and share her feelings. Beyond that, she's also a great human. She's super smart and very inspirational. She's into nutrition and will often help me during my weight cutting with positive vibes, encouragement to eat more "green things."

Why is that cool?  Well, man, we've all been there. We've all been terrified of setting foot on the mat and grinding it out again. We've all thought about how we'll 'never get better,' but Kaeli has the balls to put it out there for the world to read. She's very active on all social media, too, so chances are if you need some inspiration or motivation and ask her, she'll deliver. She also makes BJJ-themed coloring book pages for all those little ones in your life who don't have that. Now what's cooler than that?

That wraps the list--for now. As I mentioned, there's so much cool stuff out there that this post would be entirely too long, so we'll revisit this topic a little later on down the line. I already know of some things I want to highlight, but for now, I think this is a good mix of the obvious, to the less obvious. PS. I just text Kaeli that I'm putting her webite in this week's WBS and she text back "hahaha OMG, I'm terrified, but excited." See what I mean? So let's wrap there. Obviously, if there's something you guys want to see featured on here, let me know! I'm now available on all forms of social media at WBSurvival, but here's the links:

https://twitter.com/WBSurvival

https://www.facebook.com/WBSurvival/?fref=ts

https://instagram.com/wbsurvival/

Thank you to this week's sponsors:

VVV Fight Co.

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