BJJ black belt, 1,94cms and 86kgs- well with this introduction you'd think we're going to interview a BJJ competitor, who has long legs to sweep his adversaries- but that's not the case this time. We caught up with main organizer of CBJJ events, Marcelo Araujo (aka Seriema).

Marcelo has been with the CBJJ organization since 1996 and his experience is large with tournaments such as Brasileiro de Equipes, Pan American, Brasileiro and Mundials. We conducted a very nice interview with the CBJJ's man and he talked to us about the innovations and plans of CBJJ for the sport of Brazilian Jiu Jistu.



DENIS MARTINS: How did you first become the organizer of CBJJ's events?

MARCELO ARAUJO: I got an invitation of Carlos Gracie Jr., to work in the newspaper Gracie and in CBJJ. We realized that to the events work, we need to have a control over the academies and fighters through a computer and this was one of the first things we did since I joined CBJJ.


DM: Is there any chance of you becoming the president of CBJJ?

MA: I don't believe in that. Carlos Jr. always worked for the BJJ and he has a huge interest in keeping the sport increasing, I'll be always at his side to support the good job we're making.


DM: I last five years the organization has had a lot of changes, and they were very well received by the competitors and federations. Do you think more changes will be made at the future?

MA: I loved this last Mundials and the adding of three referees, plus the electronic score were fantastic for the competition in all aspects. Nowadays we, from CBJJ, hear more opinions of our affiliates. Sometimes we hear things that by the first look they are not good, but we can mix and work over these ideas to make the things better. We've in our mind (CBJJ's one) that we always have to increase. But we've some very good ideas which have worked for a long time, and we're not changing them.


DM: How do you listen to the ideas of all affiliates?

MA: No way of listening to all of them, but we've the main academies and main black-belts to be listened. We have more than 1500 fighters at a Mundials and we can't listen to everyone. So Carlos Jr, Andre, Alvaro Mansur and I have collected the best ideas to insert in our plans to create the best environment possible to the
competitors.


DM: Was this Mundials 2006 the best in terms of organization?

MA: I believe so. The electronic score was one of the best ideas we had. In my opinion this was good- more for the time than for the points. I mean, the fighters could control their movement with more accuracy, because they knew about the time. Also, we used only two mats at the last day of competition, and this was better for comprehension of the crowd, who could know if the fight on the mat was semifinal, quarter final or etc. Of course, we announced the
fights a lot of times, but two mats were the perfect way to conduct the last day.


DM: How this idea of two mats come?

MA: I watched a GP of Judo and they had only two mats, becoming the competition infinitely easy and fun of watching. Also, once Luca Atalla (Gracie Magazine editor) was in a Wrestling competition at Olympic Games and he told me they used this system, and they had two commentators who knew everything about the wrestlers at these two mats- in my opinion it'd be impossible to be made in 4 mats. So if they adopted it, why couldn't we do it too, because if it was good for them, why not for us?


DM: What about the fights of this year?

MA: We've a very good generation of fighters. I like to see Marcelo Garcia, Xande Ribeiro, Roger Gracie, Andre Galvão, Braulio Estima and etc. I like fighters who look for the submission, and they make a good show.


DM: Any special fighter this year?

MA: I think Roger is special because he makes the BJJ to be simple. He makes things and people don't believe how he did. Roger lost the final to Xande, they fought very well and I can tell you that Xande was very tactical fighter.


DM: The absolute final was memorable match.

MA: We could not have had a better last match of the tournament than we had in that absolute final bout involving Roger and Xande.


DM: We watched a few fighters who don't compete often losing at the Mundials. Nino "Elvis" Schembri was one of those who surprised the crowd by the way he got submitted by Andre Galvão. How do you see that?

MA: In my opinion the academy training and the competitions are distant nowadays. The fighter who doesn't compete and just train, he will have a hard time at the tournaments. Of course Nino is a fantastic fighter, but he didn't have the same pace than fighters as the winners Galvão and Marcelo Garcia do. They're always competing and this is hard for someone else who's not in same rhythm to follow their paces.


DM: I know CBJJ doesn't comment about CBJJO; but people want to know your opinion about it. What do you think about CBJJO?

MA: There are too many events without the CBJJ's banner, and they have a good support and there's no problem with them. But the main problem of CBJJO was to harm our job in their first season, when they scheduled their first season in the same dates of our ones. They wanted to weaken us, but they didn't. I think our commitment with the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is bigger than theirs; to make an event is difficult; however