So if you’ve heard through the grapevine that there’s a Rickson Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Acacemy in Vancouver, your information is out of date. There is currently no Rickson Gracie BJJ Academy in Vancouver.

If you’re in the Moncton area and you found this page while looking for information on Shane, I can tell you that he’s an amazing BJJ instructor. I trained with Shane at Universal for about a year, and it was lots of fun, I learned a tremendous amount from him, and I highly recommend that you train with Shane if you’re looking to learn BJJ safely and effectively from one of the best instructors in Canada.

They also added Muay Thai kickboxing and yoga classes since moving into their own facility. I don’t particularly care about the yoga, but combining BJJ with Muay Thai is pretty much the perfect workout program in my opinion. Fun as hell and two of the most effective martial arts you can possibly learn.

I’m moving back to downtown Vancouver next month (after spending six boring months in Langley), and even though there are at least five different BJJ schools in downtown Vancouver, I’m strongly considering getting a membership at North Vancouver BJJ and driving there because I think the drive will be worth it.

If you’re in North Vancouver, or a comfortable drive to North Vancouver, and you want to join the best BJJ school, with the best instructors, and the best and most friendly students and environment, I highly recommend you checkout North Vancouver BJJ.

Prior to joining Revolution, I wasn’t completely sold on the idea of training at an MMA-focussed gym, and I thought that I preferred training at a place that’s 100% BJJ-oriented. My logic in preferring a BJJ-focussed gym was simply that I have no real desire to train MMA. My preference is to learn BJJ and pretty much only BJJ. With that in mind, I figured I’d be best off joining a gym that’s mostly BJJ-orientented rather than an MMA gym that also teaches BJJ. Turns out I was wrong, and after a few BJJ classes at Revolution, I now that think I’m better off training BJJ at an MMA-oriented gym like Revolution rather than at the BJJ-oriented gyms I’ve trained at in the past.

My interest in learning BJJ is two-fold: 1) to stay fit, and 2) to learn a valuable skill (i.e. self-defence). I have zero interest in entering sport jiu-jitsu competitions, yet at all the other BJJ schools I’ve trained at, sport jiu-jitsu has always been pretty much the entire focus of nearly every class. Any time we’d learn techniques, the instructor would always mention how those techniques applied to sport BJJ, and in particular how many points would be awarded for the various moves we were learning. I couldn’t possibly care less about learning BJJ in the context of scoring points in a competition.

What I’ve really liked about the BJJ classes I’ve taken at Revolution so far is that when we’re learning techniques, the instructors often will explain how those moves apply to MMA and self-defence, or in other words, how those moves will work when your opponent is trying to punch you, or when you’re able to punch your opponent. I really enjoy that approach to BJJ. Punching is not part of sport jiu-jitsu, so at previous gyms I’ve trained at, punches and the applicability of BJJ when punches are allowed was almost never mentioned, ever.

So all in all, I’ve been very happy with how my first week at Revolution has gone. If you’re looking for a great gym in Langley with a world-class MMA program that includes BJJ and Muay Thai kickboxing, I highly recommend you check out Revolution.

And by the way, if you’re interested in training BJJ for sport (as many people are), I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Revolution has one of the best sport jiu-jitsu teams in BC and their students always perform extremely well at competitions. So even though sport BJJ isn’t the primary focus at Revolution, it’s still one of the best (if not the best) gyms in BC to train at if you’re interested in competing in BJJ tournaments.

Since I might be moving to North Vancouver in the near future, and I happened to be at the gym when North Van BJJ was about to start their class, I decided to hang around and check it out.

The class looked fantastic from start to finish, so I just wanted to share some info about the class for anyone who’s looking for a BJJ club in North Vancouver and considering joining North Vancouver Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

The first thing that I’ll point out about the class is that it had two black belt instructors running the class (Marc Marins and Jeff Meszaros). I’ve taken many BJJ classes run by purple and brown belts, and I’ve always considered it a huge perk to participate in a class run by a black belt. With that in mind, I was floored to see that North Van BJJ was running a class with two black belt instructors.

I was so surprised to see two black belt instructors at the same class that I asked Jeff if it’s a common thing for both him and Marc to be there on the same night, and he said yes, most classes have both Marc and Jeff there running things. Very cool.

The class started with a conditioning workout that lasted about 20 minutes and looked quite intense, but fun. Lots of bodyweight exercises such as jumping jacks, burpees, pushups, squats, lunges, etc.

After the warm-up, Marc demonstrated the first technique of the night, which was a guard pass that I had never seen before. Some classes Marc teaches the techniques, and some classes Jeff teaches the techniques. At this particular class, Marc taught all the techniques. After Marc demonstrated the first technique, everyone broke off into pairs and practiced that technique for about 10 minutes, with Marc and Jeff walking around the class and giving feedback and helping to ensure that everyone was learning and practicing the technique correctly.

One of the most memorable moments of the night for me happened next when Marc taught the next technique. The second technique of the night was a counter to the first technique that Marc taught. Any time I’ve ever learned an offensive technique in BJJ, I’ve always wanted to immediately find out the defense to that move. I think it helps me to better perform the offensive move if I know what the other guy may do to counter it, and it’s great to be able to know the defense if someone tries that move on me. So I think it makes a lot of sense to teach offensive and defensive techniques back to back like that, but prior to last night I have never participated in, or seen, a class that taught techniques that way.

After everyone broke off into pairs for about 10 minutes to practice technique number two, Marc showed the third technique of the night, which was another option that you can do if the if the second technique doesn’t work. Everyone practiced that technique for about 10 minutes, and then took a quick break to get ready for some sparring.

Sparring lasted for about 30 minutes. Not positional drilling, but open sparring starting from the knees. Sparring is always the most enjoyable part of every BJJ class I’ve ever participated in, so I was really pleased to see that North Van BJJ does about 30 minutes of sparring at each class. At other BJJ gyms I’ve trained at, many classes have spent as little as 5 minutes at the end of the class sparring, and I’ve always considered those classes to be a huge disappointment because the main reason I train BJJ is to get an intense workout and have fun, and the sparring is always the most intense and fun part of the workout. So the 30 minutes of sparring per class at North Van BJJ is a big plus.

Both Marc and Jeff sparred with many students during the 30 minute sparring session, which I thought was great. Not all black belts are willing to spar with their students. I was watching Marc spar for a while and I noticed him perform the exact move he taught earlier in the class (technique number two). He performed it exactly the way he taught it, so it was very cool to see him pull off a move during sparring that he had just taught earlier in the class.

After about 30 minutes of sparring, I thought the class was over, but that’s when the other most memorable moment of the night occurred for me. Marc had all the students line up along the wall, and he announced that they were going to try something new called the “fight of the night”. He chose two students from the group to have a BJJ match in front of the rest of the class. Jeff judged the match.

The match was very entertaining and involved a nice takedown, and several exciting positional transitions and scrambles. The match ended when one of the guys submitted the other with an ankle lock. What happened next was extremely cool. Jeff broke down some of the key moments of the match, including several interesting details about the ankle lock that finished the match. I thought it was very cool that Jeff did that, and I learned a bunch of new things about leg locks from Jeff’s breakdown of the match.

So all in all, I was very impressed with what I saw at the North Vancouver BJJ class, and I enjoyed the hour and a half that I spent watching. I only wish I had brought my gear and participated in the class. Regardless, if I end up moving to North Vancouver, I am absolutely planning on getting a membership at North Vancouver BJJ.

If you’re in North Vancouver and are interested in learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu from two very talented black belt instructors, I definitely recommend you check out North Vancouver Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

For example, since I discovered how much I enjoy Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) training, and that it’s more of an intense workout than I ever used to get doing resistance training workouts, I’ve almost completely stopped doing boring resistance training workouts and now I focus the majority of my exercise efforts on BJJ. Instead of dreading boring workouts, I now anxiously look forward to my fun and enjoyable BJJ workouts.

I also recently started playing hockey, which is an absolutely killer leg and cardio-vascular workout, not to mention it’s a ridiculous amount of fun and I look forward to playing hockey instead of dreading boring workouts.

Now granted, it would be stupid to completely eliminate all resistance training from your exercise routine. Resistance training is the only way to get a complete total-body workout for your muscles, bones, and joints, so even though most people (myself included) find resistance training painfully boring, it’s still important to do one or two time-efficient resistance training workouts per week to keep your muscles, bones, and joints healthy.

To make your resistance training workouts less boring, find the most time-efficient routines possible so you can get great results in the least amount of time spent exercising. For example, there are lots of intense 10-minute resistance training workouts on my YouTube channel that you can do at home with minimal equipment, and complete the entire workout in less time than it would normally take you just to travel to your local gym.

So if you find exercise boring, significantly reduce the amount of boring workouts you do each week (just do one or two very short but intense full-body resistance training workouts per week), and take up a sport or activity that you will enjoy and look forward to.

Once you stop dreading your boring workouts and start anxiously looking forward to participating in your chosen sport or activity, you’ll find it significantly easier to get in shape, and stay in shape.

Before I write about how my first BJJ class at GBV went, I want to mention that prior to my class starting at 6PM, there was a kids class going on and I watched the last 20 minutes or so of the kids class. What a real treat it was for me to see the kids having a blast learning jiu-jitsu. I’m not sure if there were ever any kids classes going on at my old gym, but I never saw any kids there. So it was very cool tonight to see the format that GBV was using to teach the kids. Basically it looked like they were making games out of various drills to make the training fun for really small children, and the children looked like they were having an absolute blast. It was fun to watch.

After the kids class wrapped up, it was time to start the fundamentals class, which I was there to attend. Evan Durand, brown belt coach at GBV, put us through a pretty intense warm-up involving various bodyweight exercises such as jumping jacks, strides, squats, pushups, etc. Mixed in with the bodyweight exercises were various jiu-jitsu specific movements such as bridging, hip movement, breakfalls, and a triangle warm-up exercise that I had never seen before and that I enjoyed quite a bit.

Also, something I enjoyed about the warm-up was the way that Gracie Barra builds a team environment by having the instructor count out reps 1 to 5 aloud, and then the entire class counts out reps 6 to 10. May seem insignificant but it really felt that it helped to foster a team environment, which I think is great.

After the warm-up, Tim Shears (owner, and head instructor at GBV) mentioned that this particular week in the fundamentals program we were supposed to be working on hip throws, but because the class was so full and there wasn’t a lot of extra room to have us throwing each other around, we instead worked on a guard pull to a pendulum sweep. It was a very cool technique and I was extremely impressed with Tim’s attention to detail when teaching it.

Next up we worked on the triangle from guard. This is a technique that I’ve learned before at my previous BJJ gym, but it was fun to learn it from Tim, as he taught it differently than my previous instructor. Nothing radically different about the actual technique, just the way that Tim explained it, and more specifically the steps that Tim broke the technique down into.

Then we worked on timed drilling from the guard. One person on the bottom, the other on the top, drill for a minute or two, and then switch positions. Very intense and a really fun part of the class.

Finally we wrapped up the class with some of the same exercises we did during the warm-up, followed by a very nice cool-down where we just stretched out on the mats and relaxed a bit.

So all in all, my first class at GBV was a very enjoyable one, and I’m looking forward to continuing my BJJ training with Tim Shears and the rest of the great team at GBV.

Some final thoughts about my first class at GBV:

• I really enjoyed how Tim paired people up based on experience, but not the way you might be thinking. At my old BJJ gym, the more experienced guys usually paired up together, and that always meant that the less experienced guys would pair up together (I figured that was the norm). At GBV, Tim explicitly told the more experienced guys to partner up with a less experienced guy. Very cool.
• Lots of very friendly and welcoming people at GBV. This was my first class there and many people seemed to notice that I was new and they made a point of introducing themselves and it really helped to make my first class a very positive experience.
• At the very end of the class, we lined up and everyone in the class went down the line high-fiving each other. Very cool and added to the team aspect of the gym. I liked it.
• I also liked that everyone in the class had a Gracie Barra gi on (this is a requirement at Gracie Barra BJJ academies). Again, this uniform requirement created a nice team feel to the class, which I liked a lot.
• After the class was over, Tim mentioned various extra-curricular activities that were coming up, such as the GBV Christmas party, an upcoming UFC get together, a planned event to raise money for a local charity, as well as various upcoming seminars and tournaments. Again, fantastic team dynamic at GBV.

If you’re interested in learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in Vancouver, check out the Gracie Barra Vancouver website, or send them an email and book your free intro lesson.

1. GBV offers about three times as many class hours as my previous gym. I’m particularly interested in the lunch hour classes and GBV offers five lunch hour BJJ classes per week. My previous gym offers two lunch hour BJJ classes per week. So I’m looking forward to the opportunity to either train more often than twice per week, or at least have more flexibility about which days I decide to train on.
2. I’m planning on moving outside of downtown Vancouver, and GBV will soon be much more conveniently located for me. When I’m no longer living downtown, I will prefer to do everything possible to avoid the chaotic downtown Vancouver traffic and parking.
3. I’ve spoken to Tim Shears (owner and head instructor at GBV), and Tim is very open to allowing me to film the training that goes on at GBV. My previous gym wasn’t very keen about having me bring a video camera to the gym to film the training there.

Also, I checked out a class at GBV a couple of nights ago and I was extremely impressed with the quality of instruction. In particular I like how GBV runs a curriculum-based fundamentals program.

The Gracie Barra Fundamentals Program is designed to teach the overall self-defense strategy of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. The curriculum has 32 classes spread across 16 weeks that restarts at the end of the cycle, making possible for the students to review all the techniques learned. You can join this program anytime.

I watched a fundamentals class a couple of nights ago and I was very impressed with all aspects of the class. The class started with a warm-up, followed by a great demonstration by Tim on how to do a proper forward roll and forward roll to break fall (two movements I struggle with). After everyone practiced those movements for about 5 to 10 minutes, Tim demonstrated a hip throw, and then the class worked on them for about 5 to 10 minutes. After working on the hip throw, Tim demonstrated some jiu-jitsu techniques, including the rear-naked choke, which everyone worked on for the rest of the class, finishing up with some intense drilling and finally a cool down.

I thought it was very impressive how Tim’s class went through such a clear progression of forward roll, then forward roll to break fall, then hip throw. Basically Tim wanted everyone to learn how to fall correctly before they started practicing hip throws on each other. It might seem obvious to do it that way, but at a previous gym, I was never shown how to do a proper break fall before learning the hip throw, and the first time we learned hip throws at that gym was the single worst and most discouraging experience I ever had at that gym. Although I question whether I’ll ever be overly comfortable being thrown, I believe that Tim’s progressive method of teaching those moves is going to work really well for me.

I’m also excited about switching over to GBV to get lots of great footage for my YouTube channel. I am interested in showing people how much fun BJJ training is, and how men and women of all ages and fitness levels, from all walks of life, use BJJ training to improve their health and fitness, reduce stress, improve self-confidence, and achieve so many other amazing benefits.

If you’re interested in learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in Vancouver, check out the Gracie Barra Vancouver website, or send them an email and book your free intro lesson.

Friday night is BJJ open mat at Universal MMA in downtown Vancouver. Something unique about the Friday open mat at Universal (compared to most other BJJ academies) is that the Friday open mat at Universal is open to students from other BJJ academies in Vancouver (or anywhere else) that want to stop by for open training (there’s a small drop-in fee for non-members). I enjoy seeing the new faces at the Friday open mat and having the opportunity to train with people from other BJJ academies in Vancouver. If you’re currently training BJJ at another academy in Vancouver, consider stopping by Universal MMA on Friday for the open roll.

Despite the lunch hour BJJ workout being incredibly intense, at one point during the workout I recall saying to Dave (owner of Universal MMA) that “I didn’t know it was possible to have this much fun while working out.” I wasn’t kidding around. It was a serious comment. I had a blast during one of the most intense workouts I’ve ever done. Sure it was grueling and difficult, but it was way more fun than just going to the gym and lifting weights or running on the treadmill.

The easiest way to get fit and stay fit is to find an activity that you enjoy that also doubles as a fantastic workout. If you can find an activity where you’re doing one of the most intense workouts of your life, and saying “I didn’t know it was possible to have this much fun while working out”, you will truly have found yourself a workout program that will produce lasting results.

If you’re in Vancouver and are interested in learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu from one of the top instructors in Canada (Shane Rice, BJJ black belt under Rickson Gracie), I highly recommend you check out Universal MMA.