RGAB News

March saw a special guest grace the mats at Roger Gracie’s affiliate academy in Buckinghamshire, as senior instructor Thelmo Calmon joined Kevin Capel’s troops for a seminar.

A native of Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro, Thelmo gained his black belt under Gracie Barra legend Vinicius ‘Draculino’ Magalhaes before moving to Europe in 2003. After initially teaching in Portugal, Thelmo made a switch to Spain and is now head instructor at Gracie Barra Marbella.

Despite his broken English, Calmon successfully delivered an extremely interesting class. The Brazilian covered a range of attacks from side control before moving on to discuss submissions from the mount. Thelmo finished the seminar by answering students’ questions and overseeing a sparing session.

After the class – with the help of an interpreter – I asked Thelmo about his first memories of jiu jitsu.

“My first memory of jiu jitsu was back in 1993,” explained Thelmo. “I remember watching Royce Gracie beat Tank Abbott at UFC 3 and being so impressed. Seeing a small guy like Royce beat a much bigger opponent made me realise I needed to learn jiu jitsu – because I’m a small guy as well!”

Calmon started his journey as a fresh-faced white belt 15 years ago, training alongside the likes of Romulo Barral, Samuel Braga and – of course – Draculino.

Thelmo said: “Being a lawyer, Draculino is a very intelligent and professional guy. He studied under Carlos Gracie Junior so there is nothing more that needs to be said. If you train under the best you will become the best.”

With a black belt around his waist, Calmon left his native Brazil to teach in Europe. The Carioca was one of the first Brazilians to bring jiu jitsu across the Atlantic - and the sport has been evolving ever since.

“I came to Europe seven years ago and originally lived in Lisbon,” said Thelmo. “Five years ago there was no jiu jitsu in Europe but now, it is exploding. Even though there are not many European black belts yet, everyone is training and jiu jitsu is growing.”

After picking up a gold medal in the first ever European jiu jitsu championship, Calmon set his focus on becoming a referee. Having officiated at the Europeans for a number of years, Thelmo has bared witness to the development of jiu jitsu first hand.

Calmon said: “Four years ago there were 500 people in the European championships, while in Lisbon 2010 there were 2,500 competitors. This shows how much jiu jitsu is growing and growing.”

Thelmo was quick to acknowledge the standard of jiu jitsu at RGAB and went on to stress the importance of training with an open mind.

“I don’t like the idea that people cant train at different academies, training with different people enables you to learn different things,” said Thelmo. “If a blue belt comes to my academy he will have different attributes to my blue belts and they can learn from each other.

“Obviously if my instructor had a feud with someone a long time ago it would be un-professional of me to train with them. But, my academy is open to everyone and exchanging knowledge is healthy.”

With tournament participation increasing and new academies opening every day, jiu jitsu seems destined to become a global language sooner rather than later. With this in mind, I asked Thelmo what he though the future holds.

“Jiu jitsu, or grappling, belongs in the Olympics. I think they should take out tae kwon do and replace it with jiu jitsu!

“If this is going to happen we need more people training jiu jitsu and more structure behind it. I’d like to see different countries setting up their own federations so they can enter the Olympics independently. At the moment Brazil and America have their own federations so everything is more organised and this mentality needs to spread.

“But things are going the right way. Jiu jitsu has taken off in England just like it has in Portugal, and many other places. It won’t be long before the Europeans are tapping the Brazilians! Let’s see where we are five years from now.”

Well one thing is for sure, Thelmo can expect a few visitors at Gracie Barra Marbella in the near future. As for tapping the Brazilians...that may have to wait for the Olympics!