Rocha 1 Dallin Rocha Mrs. Hutton English 4/28/21 Research Findings For my additional research I chose to find out how many people drop out before the first rank. I chose to investigate this because Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a pretty tough sport to stick with. One who chooses to begin must start at the basics. The martial art takes a lot of patience and conditioning. This is achieved by live matches during practice, which could be considered a scrimmage. The two opponents will grapple until one submits the other with a choke, or pain. It is physically exhausting and can be mostly painful. My question was, who would endure something like that, and consistently? I found a website called the Jiu Jitsu Times explaining how and why. According to Kitt Canaria, Author, states, “Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu features the highest dropout rates of all martial arts. Rener Gracie knows this fact, and he has an explanation for JJ dropout rates. For starters, Gracie mentions that BJJ is incredibly complex and challenging. 90% of people never make it to blue belt, and then 1% of blue belts advance to become black belts” (Canaria 1). As mentioned in the quote, Rener Gracie is a 4th Degree Black belt and instructor at Gracie University. The team is a relatively popular website that instructs BJJ. Gracie himself is a well-known figure in BJJ community and had a successful career. According to the BJJ Heroes website, “Rener participated in the first Southern California Pro-Am Invitational, a 16-man single elimination tournament with no time limits. Rener was the only one of 16 competitors to wear a Gi. He won first place submitting all four of his opponents. His opponents were Joe Rocha 2 Stevenson (UFC Fighter), Cassio Werneck (BJJ World Champion), Jason "Mayhem" Miller (UFC Fighter), and Tyrone Glover” (BJJ Heroes, 1). As an instructor and very good wrestler himself, he sees and knows how often people dropout. According to the first quote only 90 percent make it to the blue belt rank. This is the first rank and takes a year to complete. The fact that only 1 percent of the 10 percent that made it to blue belt go on to the final rank is shocking. To get to the final rank takes extreme dedication and practice. From my research I thus concluded that people drop out because of lack of dedication. Anyone can become good at something if they dedicate enough time to it, but not just anyone chooses to do it. Rocha 3 Works Cited BJJ Heroes. “Rener Gracie.” BJJ Heroes, 8 Feb. 2019, www.bjjheroes.com/bjj-fighters/renergracie. Canaria, Kitt. Jiujitsutimes.com, 2016, www.jiujitsutimes.com/why-are-bjj-dropout-rates-sohigh/.
