Rener Gracie: ‘The Girls Are Not Misrepresenting Their Jiu-Jitsu Rank’
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Oct 12, 2015GileBJJ NewsComments Off
Rener Gracie: ‘The Girls Are Not Misrepresenting Their Jiu-Jitsu Rank’
Teen sisters Maycee and Emma Barber run the Fort Collins Gracie Jiu Jitsu in Colorado.The sisters are Jiu-Jitsu blue belts and Gracie University students. They are both Karate black belts too.
Pictures on their academy’s Facebook page and website show them giving Jiu Jitsu lessons, as they are wearing BJJ black belts and Gracie Jiu Jitsu Gis. These types of black belts have red bars and are only used in BJJ.
The sisters teach BJJ and Karate at their school, and according to several students who train there, they use black belts when teaching karate and blue belts when teaching jiu-jitsu.
The Gracie Academy in California issued this statement supporting the girls:
Like many CTCs, Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins offers multiple disciplines under one roof. In the wake of the fraudulent black belt post, a jealous person in their community falsely accused the instructors of misrepresenting their rank. Emma and Maycee do an amazing job with their kids karate program and are amazing Gracie Jiu-Jitsu instructors. Not only are they proud Gracie blue belts, but they’re savages to roll with! Here is a statement from our Fort Collins CTC:
“There has been some speculation regarding the rank of instructors, Emma and Maycee Barber, at Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins. The Barber Sisters trained in karate for 12 years and jiu-jitsu for 4 years at Sykes Family Martial Arts in Fort Collins. They earned black belts in karate and were active instructors in the dojo. After Emma and Maycee went through the Gracie Academy Instructor Certification Program, the Barber Family acquired Sykes Family Martial Arts from it’s previous owner in 2014, and they decided rebrand the school as Fort Collins Martial Arts/Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins. Due to the success of the karate programs at Sykes Family Martial Arts, the Barber Sisters continued teaching the standalone karate program at Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins in addition to all the Gracie Jiu-Jitsu programs authorized by the Gracie Academy. Although the eventual goal is to transition all the kids karate students into the Gracie Bullyproof program, in the meantime the Barber Sisters do a great job teaching karate to a solid group of dedicated students. To clarify any misunderstanding, while they almost always wear Gracie gis in the academy, regardless of what they’re teaching, the Barber Sisters wear their karate black belts when teaching karate, and when teaching Gracie Jiu-Jitsu they always (and proudly) wear their jiu-jitsu blue belts, as indicated in the photos below. As always, we invite anyone who lives in or around the Fort Collins area to come in for 10 days of free training to experience the amazing programs we offer.
-Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins”
Rener Gracie appeared on the BJJ Hour podcast and expressed his support for the girls. He said that there was no representation of rank.
The only problem is that the pictures feature a black belt with a red bar and white degrees which are specific to BJJ Not to Karate or Kenpo. In the girls karate style (Kajukenbo), there is no belt which looks like a BJJ black belt and their own instructor had no red bar on photos from 2013:
karate black belt
Kajujenbo is the style of their karate instructor Seth Sykes (Gracie affiliated before he went to jail for sexually molesting a minor) are the different types of black belts in that art http://ngsgungfu.tripod.com/blackbelt.html .
[post-views]
Oct 12, 2015GileBJJ NewsComments Off
Rener Gracie: ‘The Girls Are Not Misrepresenting Their Jiu-Jitsu Rank’
Teen sisters Maycee and Emma Barber run the Fort Collins Gracie Jiu Jitsu in Colorado.The sisters are Jiu-Jitsu blue belts and Gracie University students. They are both Karate black belts too.
Pictures on their academy’s Facebook page and website show them giving Jiu Jitsu lessons, as they are wearing BJJ black belts and Gracie Jiu Jitsu Gis. These types of black belts have red bars and are only used in BJJ.
The sisters teach BJJ and Karate at their school, and according to several students who train there, they use black belts when teaching karate and blue belts when teaching jiu-jitsu.
The Gracie Academy in California issued this statement supporting the girls:
Like many CTCs, Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins offers multiple disciplines under one roof. In the wake of the fraudulent black belt post, a jealous person in their community falsely accused the instructors of misrepresenting their rank. Emma and Maycee do an amazing job with their kids karate program and are amazing Gracie Jiu-Jitsu instructors. Not only are they proud Gracie blue belts, but they’re savages to roll with! Here is a statement from our Fort Collins CTC:
“There has been some speculation regarding the rank of instructors, Emma and Maycee Barber, at Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins. The Barber Sisters trained in karate for 12 years and jiu-jitsu for 4 years at Sykes Family Martial Arts in Fort Collins. They earned black belts in karate and were active instructors in the dojo. After Emma and Maycee went through the Gracie Academy Instructor Certification Program, the Barber Family acquired Sykes Family Martial Arts from it’s previous owner in 2014, and they decided rebrand the school as Fort Collins Martial Arts/Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins. Due to the success of the karate programs at Sykes Family Martial Arts, the Barber Sisters continued teaching the standalone karate program at Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins in addition to all the Gracie Jiu-Jitsu programs authorized by the Gracie Academy. Although the eventual goal is to transition all the kids karate students into the Gracie Bullyproof program, in the meantime the Barber Sisters do a great job teaching karate to a solid group of dedicated students. To clarify any misunderstanding, while they almost always wear Gracie gis in the academy, regardless of what they’re teaching, the Barber Sisters wear their karate black belts when teaching karate, and when teaching Gracie Jiu-Jitsu they always (and proudly) wear their jiu-jitsu blue belts, as indicated in the photos below. As always, we invite anyone who lives in or around the Fort Collins area to come in for 10 days of free training to experience the amazing programs we offer.
-Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Fort Collins”
Rener Gracie appeared on the BJJ Hour podcast and expressed his support for the girls. He said that there was no representation of rank.
The only problem is that the pictures feature a black belt with a red bar and white degrees which are specific to BJJ Not to Karate or Kenpo. In the girls karate style (Kajukenbo), there is no belt which looks like a BJJ black belt and their own instructor had no red bar on photos from 2013:
karate black belt
Kajujenbo is the style of their karate instructor Seth Sykes (Gracie affiliated before he went to jail for sexually molesting a minor) are the different types of black belts in that art http://ngsgungfu.tripod.com/blackbelt.html .
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