Fightauthority:
“Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) is a grappling martial art that uses joint locks, strangulations, strong positioning to cause an opponent to submit / tap-out in competition or pass-out or break a joint in self defense.
It is primarily a ground-fighting art and is well-known for its use in Mixed Martial Arts fights. It was made widely popular by Royce Gracie of the Gracie family who have basically “invented” BJJ.
Royce’s father Helio Gracie was taught Japanese Jujutsu / Kobokan Judo and refined it to work for his small stature.There are many schools and BJJ instructors in USA now. Primarily the art is now competition based – both grappling and MMA competitions. People train it without the gi and with a gi. Many schools are now called Submission Wrestling schools who train no-gi and also use more wrestling takedowns as well.
The training is excellent for physical fitness as well as self-defense. Many argue that all fights go the ground eventually and that is where BJJ shines.”
From Wikipedia:
“Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) is a martial art and combat sport that focuses on grappling and especially ground fighting with the goal of gaining a dominant position and using joint-locks and chokeholds to force an opponent to submit. The art was based on early 20th century Kodokan Judo, which was itself then a recently-developed system (founded in 1882), based on multiple schools (or Ryu) of Japanese Jujutsu.
It promotes the principle that a smaller, weaker person using leverage and proper technique can successfully defend themselves against a bigger, stronger assailant. BJJ can be trained for self defense, sport grappling tournaments (gi and no-gi) and mixed martial arts (MMA) competition. Sparring (commonly referred to as ‘rolling’) and live drilling play a major role in training, and a premium is placed on performance, especially in competition.
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Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu came to international prominence in the martial arts community in the 1990s, when Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu expert Royce Gracie won the first, second and fourth Ultimate Fighting Championships, which at the time were single elimination martial arts tournaments. Royce fought against often much-larger opponents who were practicing other styles, including boxing, shoot-fighting, karate, judo, tae kwon do and wrestling. It has since become a staple art for many MMA fighters and is largely credited for bringing wide-spread attention to the importance of ground fighting. Sport BJJ tournaments continue to grow in popularity worldwide and have given rise to no-gi submission grappling tournaments, such as the ADCC Submission Wrestling World Championship.”
