One of the most famous black belts in BJJ - Royce Gracie. Photo by superwebdeveloper.
Belt promotions are a hot topic in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Hang around the mats and changerooms of any BJJ academy and you’ll hear lots of talk about who does and doesn’t deserve a promotion. Stories abound of instructors who intentionally delay promotions with the intention of giving their students the edge in competitions. But what does a belt really mean? And where did the colours come from?
This is a timely topic because I was recently promoted to purple belt. It was a funny experience because while I’ve always been the first person to downplay the importance of promotions, it would be a gargantuan lie to say that I wasn’t stoked to have my instructor call me up to the front and pull out that belt.
History of Belt Levels in Martial Arts
Most of us have heard the old story that in the old days you’d start with a white belt and over the years it would get dirtier until it was finally black, at which point you’d been training long enough that you’d probably reached black belt. There’s great symbolism in that, but my Internet search didn’t turn up any confirmation that seemed reliable so I turned back to the conventional sources.
Since Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu’s origins are in judo, that’s where I started. According to Neil Ohlenkamp’s article “The Judo Rank System” from the excellent Judo Info Site, Mikonosuke Kawaishi introduced colored belts to judo in 1935 when he began teaching in Paris because he thought that the westerners would be happier if they had more frequent progress markers.
Donn Draeger’s article “What is Rank? The Matter of Integrity of Judo Ranks” was originally published in the 1970 edition of the AAU / USJF Handbook and gives a historical perspective on the judo ranking system.
“Belt Colors and Ranking Tradition” is a detailed article written by Don Cunningham, the founder/director of Edo Machi-kata Taiho Jutsu, an organization devoted to researching, training, and teaching taiho jutsu (traditional Japanese arresting arts).
In his awesome book Jiu-Jitsu University, Saulo Ribeiro has an interesting breakdown of belt levels in BJJ:
- White – survival
- Blue – escapes
- Purple – the guard
- Brown – guard passing
- Black – submissions
After reading those articles, I put down a few random musings:
Belts Don’t Matter
If you have BJJ training partners whose combat sports backgrounds are in boxing or wrestling, you’ve probably heard this one… Q: What’s a belt for? A: To hold up your pants. In a practical sense, this is 100% true. You’re as good as you are, no matter what belt colour you happen to be wearing.
Belts Matter
On the other hand, saying that belts don’t matter is pretty insulting to your jiu-jitsu instructor, who has devoted hours of their life to helping you improve your skills and is staking their own reputation on you by promoting you.
Belts are important for newcomers to your Brazilian jiu-jitsu club. I’m often amazed at how confidently some white belts will give bad instructions to other students. If a beginner has a technique question and they see a purple belt sitting there, they can be pretty sure that they’ll get good information from them.
Belt levels are also an important factor in the development of the large-scale Brazilian jiu-jitsu community because they encourage more BJJ practitioners to compete. Who wants to compete if you’re continually being smashed by higher belts? Exactly. When competitions are split into belt level categories, more jiu-jitsu players are likely to attend competitions, meet members of other clubs, and be exposed to different styles. Improving your competitive game is a huge motivator to fine-tune your favourite techniques and experiment with new ones.
Don’t Worry About Getting the Belt. Be the Belt
Many Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu students fixate on possession. How often have you heard a training partner say wistfully, “I can’t wait to get my blue belt”. Wrong angle. A more realistic attitude would be, “I can’t wait to be a blue belt”. See the difference? Which leads us to…
Let Your Instructor Make the Decision
You’ll hear the discussions at every BJJ academy. This guy should be a blue belt because one time he tapped out a blue belt. That guy did well in a competition and needs to be promoted. Buddy over there got his purple belt but still can’t sweep that white belt wrestler guy. But there’s a lot more to it than that. Technical knowledge is a huge part of the Brazilian jiu-jitsu game, and who has the experience to recognize the subtleties present in everyone’s techniques? Your instructor (hopefully).
Forget About Belts
At the end of the day, forget it. You want to work on one of your weaker positions but think you’ll lose face if people see you in a bad position against a lower belt? Quit being a weirdo. If your instructor gave you a blue, purple, brown, or black belt you probably deserve it, so put that thing on, forget about it, and get rolling.
The Fightworks Podcast polls gives points for further contemplation:
- Do you deserve your Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Belt?
- Should the IBJJF mandate belt promotions after set timeframes?
The International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation (IBJJF) ranking system.
Sources:
- Don Cunningham. “Belt Colors and Ranking Tradition”. http://www.e-budokai.com/articles/belts.htm
- Donn F. Draeger. “What is Rank? The Matter of Integrity of Judo Ranks”. http://www.usadojo.com/articles/whats-rank.htm
- Neil Ohlenkamp. “The Judo Rank System”. Judo Info Site. http://judoinfo.com/obi.htm
- Saulo Ribeiro. Jiu-Jitsu University. Victory Belt Publishing. 2008.
Nice reading!
And I agree with all that you say!
Thanks for reading Rune. I appreciate the input.
Interesting perspectives on the bjj belt levels, promotions, etc. I couldn’t agree with you more at being stunned when you overhear white belts handing out awful instruction, usually to other, even more green white belts. It’s like they are just asking for a blown out knee.
Also thanks for the reminder on JJU. I really need to go back into it. When I last read it I was a blue, but now I’m a purple and I’m curious to see what he says about it. You’ve got it labelled as “The Guard.”
I do have to disagree with you a little bit on the belt levels and competition. You asked the question who would want to compete if they were getting smashed all the time. I put a post up on my blog that goes over this exact thing but in regards to wrestling. I think this is why wrestling is the best style for moving over to mma because there is no separation by skill. It is a sink or swim sport and I think it makes wrestling athletes even tougher.
Hi Steve, thanks for taking the time to read and comment, much appreciated. I read your article and agree with everything in there. The competition structure of wrestling definitely builds some of the toughest athletes on the planet. I was looking at it from the angle of overall sport popularity. My point about belt levels in BJJ competition was that they encourage more people to compete, which probably helps the sport grow as a whole (for better or for worse).
My background is in judo but lately I’ve been learning some wrestling from my training partners. My favourite aspect is the control factor. A great wrestler decides whether the fight stays on the feet or goes to the ground. It’s also damn fun.
Sometimes I lose sight of what you wrote, the popularity, the growth, encouragement. I often see sports as win or lose. I’m not a sore loser but I hate losing more than I like winning.
You are absolutely correct looking at it from that angle. If people don’t enjoy it, they’ll quit. Who would want to compete if they are just spending money to get destroyed in 30 seconds. And if people quit, that stunts all of our growths.
Yeah judo is not fun. As you can probably tell I am a wrestling convert. Being that I’m 40, there’s not much opportunity to wrestle. But they do mix in randori a couple times a week for us at bjj. Judo is so flipping hard it’s not even funny. Talk about exhaustion. Any dedicated judo player has my respect because doing stand-up for that long makes mentally and physically strong people.
Hey, thanks for liking me on fb!
[...] Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Promotions – History and Musings [...]
[...] from your notebook is the perfect way to push past a plateau and help you work your way through the Brazilian jiu-jitsu belt progression. And there’s a cool phenomenon at work here. Since taking those notes, you’ve been training and [...]