Breathe by Rickson Gracie

Author:Rickson Gracie
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dey Street Books
Published: 2021-06-02T00:00:00+00:00

We engaged on our feet and pushed and pulled for close to ten minutes. When we finally went to the ground, Stefanos put his knee on my face and showed me that he understood the importance of discomfort in a fight. I knew that the pace was unsustainable for him, and after he exhausted himself, I took his back and submitted him with a choke. In twenty-five minutes of hard grappling, I made him tap five or six more times. He was shocked and disappointed afterward. “Nobody’s ever done that to me!” he said, before asking if he could be my student. I was happy to have Stefanos as both a student and a sentry at the Pico Academy. Not only did he raise the level of performance, but he also served as one of the school’s bouncers when necessary.

I could not be at the academy all the time and needed frontline soldiers to regulate things in my absence. In addition to the formal and informal Gracie challenges to be fought, my stronger students had to protect my weaker ones. For example, a big kickboxer whom nobody knew once showed up at the morning class. During a simple takedown drill, he kneed a white belt half his size in the face and broke his nose. Not only was this move unnecessary, it was obvious to everyone watching that it was not an accident. Luis “Limão” sent the white belt to the bathroom to stanch his bleeding and spoke in Portuguese to the Brazilian students, who translated his simple message for their American classmates: “We don’t want this asshole in here. He crossed the line by beating up on a white belt, and now he must pay.” For the next forty minutes, the kickboxer was thrown, submitted, and stretched over and over. He never again returned to Pico Academy.

It was also important for my students to see and know that nobody, including me, was above the fray. I never asked my students to do anything that I was not prepared to do myself. If you stepped onto my mats, I was going to push you the same way I pushed myself. Sometimes I chose to surprise my students. After surfing, I liked to show up at the morning class just before the hard rolling was about to begin. Even Limão would stiffen up when I walked in unannounced. I liked to shock everyone to their senses by putting them in unbearable situations that would force them to deal with the kind of fear that’s normal in a fight and teach them how to manage it. As Gracies, we were taught that there was no shame in being nervous or afraid; what mattered was what you did in the face of fear. The more I knew about my students’ strengths and weaknesses, the more I could teach them. It was better to learn these hard and sometimes humbling lessons behind closed doors, among friends, than out on the street.

Some days I would

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