Masters division?

[bobby rivers]

I think you should have a choice, to be able to compete in adult or masters division. Im 31, so I have to compete in masters, and the biggest complaint I have is that oftentimes there are only a couple people in my division, so I end up only having one or two matches. Im a small guy, and not a lot of people in the masters divisions are in my weight class, and its really a bummer when you train hard for a competition and when you get there you realize its just you and one other guy. Almost all the guys at my gym are younger than me, and I have no problem holding my own against these young "whipper snappers." I think it would be nice if I could compete in the adult division if I choose to.

Really? They wont let you? I always compete adult and plan too.

[Jack LaBarge]

I would kill to be almost 32. lol

[bobby rivers]

[Brandon Mccaghren]

Zogs the perfect example of overcoming shit and still being a badass. He had to adapt, part of it.

Zog is a killer, no doubt. But he's been a killer for a long time. He was a killer before he got old.

[Brandon Mccaghren]

The real question my brother, what isn't Jiu Jitsu?

So good.

[bobby rivers]

Zog, would you say you're more or less deadly now?

[Greg W]

+1 for the old guys. I need to go to work on Monday to feed my family, but still want to learn from competition.

[Josh Passini]

Between 29-33 years old should be your prime for combat sports becuase your smarter and not fired and unaimed like a 21 yr old. So I would do both if they let you so there is no question who is the best if you win both.

[David 'Lo Pan' Callaham]

I have been competing back and forth in Masters and Adult divisions for the last five years (since I turned 30, which more or less coincided with my first tournament), and here's my take:

- In Adults you are likely to get more people in your bracket and they obviously will be younger and, more often than not, faster than the guys in Masters. The trade-off is strength. The guys in Adult, especially the ones in their early 20's, don't typically have the full-body strength of the older guys. It's not that they're not strong, it's just that oftentimes they haven't figured out how to best utilize and manage their growing body yet. Practically speaking, what this has meant for me is that the Adults can outpace me and scramble much faster than me, but if I can get my hands on them, I'm probably going to manhandle them physically (just talking about strength vs strength here; technique obviously varies guy-to-guy).

- In Masters, the inverse is true. The guys tend to be slower... and what's more important, they KNOW it, so their approach is usually more thought-out and specific. You don't get a lot of dudes in Masters whose general plan is "just get in there, fling myself around, see what happens." Instead, you get guys who know what their limitations are and work very diligently to avoid them. On top of that, the strength difference, in my experience, has been nothing short of alarming. I know we've all heard of "old man strength," and when we're young we scoff at the notion, but let me tell you little fuckers what -- that's for real. It's life's tribulations manifested into physicality. To a man, the strongest guys I have ever grappled with were in Masters divisions. You don't know what strength is until you've been grabbed by a dude who spends his weekdays wrangling his three sons.

There's an extra dimension to this conversation worth mentioning -- the skill level at Masters has the potential to be WAY higher than Adult, especially at the lower belt levels. Now of course you can have a prodigy like Ant who is a fucking killer at 18, but more often than not, if you're in a Blue Belt Adult division you are looking at guys who have been training for a few years, max. But in Masters, you get these dudes who have been blue belts for 8, 9 years, but who changed jobs, had kids, got deployed, whatever... point being, as you get older life happens, and for some of these guys it interrupts training and delays promotions. Which is fine... like I said, that's life. But a 7 year Blue Belt with Dad Strength is not the same as a whip-quick 21 year-old who just got his Blue Belt.

So that's my take. I've won tournaments in both Adult and Masters and gotten fucking shellacked in both as well. Nowadays it just comes down to what sort of shape I feel I'm in and what kind of experience I am looking to have: If I want fewer matches but each of them to feel like getting run over by a truck, I do Masters. If my cardio is up and I want to throw someone around (assuming I can catch them), then I do Adults.

To each his own, though.

The Aristocrats.

[bobby rivers]

Perfect. Thanks David.