Mixed Martial Arts in DC News Blog

Crazy88 Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

ELKRIDGE, Md. – Many Brazilian jiu-jitsu practioners can trace their start in BJJ from watching Royce Gracie when he dominated the competition early in his career and submitted larger opponents in the octagon. His performances inspired many current school owners to start training in the 90′s. Brazilian jiu-jitsu brown belt Julius Park was a teenager in high school when he saw Gracie defeat fighters such as Dan Severn. Inspired by his performance, he decided to start training.

“I got a tape of the UFC…and it blew my mind,” he said.

2010 World Champion (Blue Belt Division) Evan Gideon

Julius went on to start wrestling in his sophomore year of high school because there were no BJJ programs close to his area of New Jersey. After graduation, he left for college in NY at Cornell University and got his first experience in training Brazilian jiu-jitsu (1998). A training club at the university gave him the opportunity to do what he wanted to do back in high school.

Years later after his start, Julius has established a grappling team under Team Lloyd Irvin that regularly competes at national and international tournaments. Competitors such as Jon Delbrugge and Evan Gideon adhere to a strict training regiment in pursuit of the world championships. A team of Crazy88 jiu-jitsu competitors will travel to Lisbon, Portugal this week for the IBJJF European Open.

David Zwanetz assists students with the spider guard

“We haven’t really taken any time off since the 2010 World Championships so the European is not really the first tournament of our year. For us, it just marks the start of the ‘post-season’ with Europe, PanAms, Brazilian Nationals and then the Worlds,” said Julius.

The program at Crazy88 BJJ also has opportunities for people who work long hours during the week. David Zwanetz is a personal injury lawyer at the law firm of Shapiro and Mack in Columbia, Md. and regularly works 60-70 hours a week. He still manages to find the time to teach BJJ and also compete. His dedication to the program resulted in a silver medal in his weight division at the 2010 World Championships in the blue belt division.

Also featured in the curriculum are no-gi grappling and women’s only classes in BJJ. Cathy Tran-Zwanetz works at Crazy88 and trains regularly. A third place finish at the 2010 New York Open in the blue belt division showed that persistence pays off.

MMA Fighter Jon Delbrugge (L) works the guard

When asked about the instructors, BJJ student Mike Kellogg said, “The instructors here are pretty much beyond reproach. They are world class.”

Julius went on to comment about his competition team stating, “The team has been on phase two of their year round strength and conditioning program and are also on very specific gameplans developed to build up weaknesses. We are going back to killer A gameplan soon enough but for right now, its still filling up the cracks!”

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More Crazy88 BJJ Articles:
Crazy88 BJJ Martial Arts Academy Overview
Crazy88 Muay Thai Program Review
Crazy88 Fighter pursues MMA dreams

Watch Instructor David Zwanetz teach the Sunday BJJ class at Crazy88 BJJ:

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