
Originally Posted by
Hanno Vermeulen
Hi sapateiro,
Correction... I am NOT a brown belt. I did the test and eddie has it "pending" as he needs to confirm more information. If you know me and train with me you will know that all my students know that I did the test. There is a big diffirence between doing the test and actualy receiving a belt. ONLY Eddie will decide and formally communicate that. I have been training for 13 years and been doing 10th planet for 5 btw. So you are welcome to come and chat to me in person so that I can learn your real name and enjoy the system.
As u can see I didn't mention any names as I wanted to authenticate any belt claims. That was why I've just been asking if there's a list of brown belts or criteria without wanting to accuse.
So here's the facts...
I teach BJJ and hear from your students that u have your brown belt in BJJ.
I find this surprising as
1. I'm not aware of you ever competing in a real BJJ tourney. Am I right?
2. You're currently a white belt in BJJ and a 3 belt jump would be quite a feat.
3. Despite your claims to 13 years of BJJ, the fact is that the first 8 years of this wasn't BJJ at all so it's irrelevant.
4. The remaining 5 years of 10P you claim are basically from books and videos, apart from perhaps the odd visit to a 10P club abroad.
5. So... Number of years of experience training under a real BJJ instructor... Practically zero. Am I right?
There is no doubt that u lead your students to believe that u have been doing BJJ for 13 years and have passed your brown belt grading under eddie bravo. As someone who has put in the time/effort/money to learning from a real instructor and earning my belt I'm seriously concerned that this sort of thing is bad for the sport. Now, it may be that you've been training hard and are sparring well (I don't know) but white to brown? Really? Yes cape town is remote but you've had a BJJ school within 20 mins for the last 5 years so there's no excuse.
This is an open forum, and if any of my 5 assumptions above are wrong feel free to correct me. I'm passionate about the art and want nothing more than to maintain the standards of belts. 10P is growing fast and has many great bjj guys - I just think 10P's integriry needs to be maintained and the time and effort of its belts not be undermined, especially as its probably the most furtive and imaginative side of sport bjj right now.i
Anyway, I hope that any confusion can be cleared up and we can all get on with teaching and growing the art.
- Gary.
Fao 'the gut' - please note that my thread was about a belt database and criteria, I didn't mention any names. And I did put these questions to hanno via personal email, twice.