With the recent growth of Gracie Humaita over the past year, Royler Gracie has brought on two more schools to add to his U.S. based competition team. Gracie Humaita in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, is home to the original Gracie Humaita Academy where, for the most part, Rolker Gracie runs the day–to-day operations while Royler travels and resides in San Diego, CA with his family. Carlos & Helio opened the doors to Gracie Humaita in the mid 1900’s after the original closed its doors. Gracie Humaita has produced some of today legends & top black belts in the world from Leticia Riberio & Alexandre Riberio to Saulo Riberio, Royler & Rickson Gracie.
Throughout the United States, Gracie Humaita has many affiliate academies, but it was not until November of 2009 when Royler Gracie & the Humaita Team announced their first school outside of Brazil. With the opening of Gracie San Diego Competition Team run by Royler Black Belts Regis Lebre & Joao (AKA Johnny) Faria, this academy became the new home for Gracie Humaita students. Gracie San Diego has been opened for just over 1 ½ years and has brought home quite a few trophies & a ton of medals.
After about a year of Gracie San Diego being opened, Regis Lebre promoted Zak Maxwell to black belt. Along with being honored with his black belt, Royler gave Zak permission to open Gracie Philadelphia. This addition gave the Gracie Humaita Team both an east & west coast home while traveling to tournaments or visiting. After the expansion to the east coast, Royler then came back to announce the growth of the academy yet again. Gracie Humaita expanded to Gracie Delmar, Gracie Hemet, & Gracie Temecula. With the growth from one school to six in just under 2 years Royler, has expanded his teachings throughout the United States and has build what was already a powerful academy at tournaments to an even powerful & larger team.
Within these past two weeks, Gracie Humaita, yet again announced two more academies. The first of these will be here in Southern California Gracie Eastlake, run by top black belts Jimmy Sanchez & Elias Gallegos both whom are excellent teachers & have a great deal of competition experience behind their instruction. The other academy being Gracie Las Vegas, run by Mica Cipili, another widely know black belt in Jiu Jitsu. Mica has over 15 years of experience both in competition & training. With the recent growths of Gracie Humaita & another expansion in the works, Gracie Humaita has grown into the top five largest schools in the world.