Some quick results from the Copa do Mundo aka the other Worlds (run by the CBJJO)

Kron Gracie took first in his division (purple belt leve) winning all five matches by submission.

Chris Moriarty took third in the brown belt absolute division.

Rafael Lovato Jr. has been sidelined this year with mono. He provided some excellent commentary and predictions here: http://www.jiujitsugear.com/forum/index.php/topic,62768.0.html

The grand opening of the OTM Fightshop: Pacific Beach (a suburb of San Diego) was extremely successful and a lot of fun.  The store is beautiful; it completely blew away my expectations, and store owners/managers Seth and Dave are as friendly as they come.  If you’re anywhere near the area, you HAVE to check the store out at 1020 Grand Ave in Pacific Beach.

With a grand opening comes celebrity guests and it was a chance to catch up with some old friends.  First one in was Mike Fowler.  Mike is of course a recent East Coast transplant from Lloyd Irvin’s school and he’s really, really taken to the San Diego lifestyle.  He’s preparing for the Mundials right now and I expect him to represent the US well.

Next in was Carrie Vera, who won her professional boxing debut the night before (a unanimous decision in four rounds), and she came looking as beautiful as ever, literally not a mark on her and I had to take her word she had actually been in a fight!  Her husband, some guy named Brandon was literally hoarse from shouting instructions to her the night before, I swear the fight took more out of him than her!

Speaking of Brandon Vera, he promised me a major announcement very soon about his next opponent.  He was obviously very excited, but couldn’t say anything until it was officially signed.  Expect to see more of “the Truth”  in a major way as he is doing many magazine shoots (mainly in the Philippines for right now) and is appearing in the next Black Eye Peas video as a dancer.  Or dancing.  Something like that.  Either way I can’t WAIT to see this.

Dean Lister was next in the shop.  Dean has a match coming up at 185 pounds at the Ultimate Fight Night in August against a Japanese opponent who’s name I can’t remember right now.  After hanging out in the store for a while, we decided to take a walk down to the beach (it was a beautiful day, and I had never been to the beach in San Diego).  We stopped by an outdoor bar to grab a drink, and Dean was literally mobbed by fans.  It was unreal the amount of people that recognized him and were coming up to him.  And buying us beer.  Awesome.  Wee couldn’t get more than 10 yard along the beach without someone running up to him.  I’m really happy for Dean, he’s an extremely nice guy who deserves all of the accolades he’s getting now.  I can remember a time in the not to distant future when we were getting thrown out of bars and couldn’t get the time of day from some girls (actually, there is a very specific incident I am thinking of that I may detail later).

The last special guests to arrive were BJ Penn and Tony DeSouza.  They might have been the first guys in had they not got extremely lost, and at the point they came in it was well after most of the crowd had left.  No matter, it’s always good to see them.  BJ I’ve known for 10 years now, we started training at the same time and although we’re good friends it’s been a little while since we’ve seen each other.  Tony was a bit of surprise to see, as visa troubles had kept him out of the US for sometime, but he’s got that all taken care of now and will be fighting in a high profile show very soon.  If you’re not familiar with him, you will be soon as his highly unorthodox (but effective grappling style) is extremely entertaining to watch.  More than anything, Tony just looked extremely happy to be there, maybe just appreciating what it took to get here.

At some point today (not sure when) I’m going to get on a plane for San Diego for the Grand Opening of our third OTM FightShop.  As amazed as I am at the progress the sport and OTM has made over the years, having our third shop by the start of summer literally blows me away as we literally had no idea we would be venturing in this direction at the start of this year.

It’s a theme that’s come in in conversation a lot recently, whether talking at the academy, or with my brothers (one of whom just graduated High School and one who has graduated College) or on a radio interview I did last night  for FightWorks Podcast about how life is definitely full of unexpected surprises and you have to roll with opportunities you get.  When I graduated college I honestly had no idea what I’d be doing with my life, I wound up in the tech industry as much by accident and proximity as anything else, and I certainly never figured on running a Martial Arts/BJJ company, and a retail store?  Now that’s just crazy talk!

Right now I could envision myself running OTM until the end of time, but who knows what the future might bring?  I consider myself extremely lucky to have been happy the entire time and to have been able to take advantage of the opportunities presented to me.  But as a famous jiu jitsu artist once said, you have to be prepared to “flow with the go.”  One thing that I have learned from all my experiences, and this applies to pretty much all of my life, is that I’m trying to run a marathon as opposed to a sprint most of the time.

To complete my midlife crisis (or alternatively, bowing to peer pressure), I finally activated my MySpace page.  I still believe that no one over 30 should be on this thing, but if you must www.myspace.com/GumbyOTM

We will have a new absolute champion as Jacare has withdrawn because he wants to concentrate on MMA.

Other notable drop outs include top American competitor Rafael Lovato Jr. who unfortunately found out he contracted Mono.  Lovato, along with rival Robert Drysdale are the American’s best hopes for a medal in the black belt division.  Drysdale is in fact the defending champion in both the CBJJ Mundials and the CBJJO Copa da Mundo.

Speaking of rumors, the biggest one is that after an absence of several years, the athletes from Nova Uniao will return to the Mundials.  The CBJJO was actually formed by Nova Uniao founder Andre Pederneireas after a dispute with the CBJJ.  Traditionally Nova Uniao has been dominate in the lighter weight classes, but there are some serious contenders for the heavier classes as well.

The favorite for the Absolute Title has to be Roger Gracie this time around, who come in second two years in a row.  He certainly the man everyone is gunning for.  Roger’s teammate Braulio Estima is going to be very dangerous as well.  Former Absolute Champion Margardia is rumored to be entering specifically gunning for Roger.  When he is on Margarida is among the most dangerous competitors of all, the problem is over the last few years he has been inconsistent.  Xande Riberio will likely do damage in the Absolute division as well and wants the title as badly as anyone in the division.  Xande has victories over all the big guns mentioned, so far, Jacare, Margarida, Braulio and Roger, although Roger is way up on the scorecard against him.  Xande earned OTM Jiu Jitsu player of the year honors in 2005.

The division to watch this year will be Medium Heavy (Meio Pesado), which loses defending champion in Margardia will have Braulio, Demian Maia, and Romulinho.  Marcelo Garcia is also moving up to this weight class, and has huge momentum coming in as the Brasilieros Absolute Champion.  And along came Nino.

Now for those of you who are new enough to the sport to only know Antonio “Nino” Schembri (or Elvis as he has been called lately) from his MMA probably have no idea why I’m so excited to see him in the Mundials.  Nino is my personal favorite sport jiujitsu competitor of all time, and in his prime in a submission only scenario I would consider him the favorite against anyone short of Rickson Gracie.  Nino has an incredibly flexible, creative style of jiujitsu all of his own that makes each match looking like a highlight reel; in contrast to the smash mouth jiujitsu that is more in form right now, Nino moves so effortlessly.  Nino may have the most unpassable guard in all of sports jiujitsu.  Pretty much anyone who got into sports jiujitsu before 2000 will tell you that Nino is their hero.  We were lucky enough to have him at our academy (Ralph Gracie’s) in the very begining and his nickname was “Jiu Jitsu Jesus” there.  He told me as long ago as last year that he was planning on making a return to the gi.  Realistically of course he is a few years away from his days of being a top gi competitor (he is the jiujitsu coach and representing ChuteBox in the Mundials) but believe me when I say that all eyes will be on him when he steps on the mat.  More than any other competitor I figure Nino is magic and that anything is possible with him.