Getting promoted is no easy feat in bjj, and it used to be even harder. You can read many interesting stories of old times around the web, times when even a blue belt would be a rarity at the gym.

Carlson Gracie Jiu Jitsu Team was considered one of the most successful teams in Jiu-Jitsu history. lead by the charismatic Carlson Gracie, they had fighters such as Ricardo Liborio, Amauri Bitetti, Paulo Filho, Murilo Bustamante, Ze Mario Sperry, Cassio Cardoso, Fernando Pinduka, Walid Ismail, De La Riva, Ricardo Arona, Ari Galo, Sergio Bolão etc..

In 2000, things fell apart at Team Carlson Gracie. Carlson Gracie had moved to the USA in the 90’s and the students left behind still had to pay the academy a percentage of their fight purse when competing. Murilo Bustamante, Ricardo Liborio, Mario Sperry and Luis Roberto Duarte left the gym to form their own school, focused completely on training fighters for MMA. Brazilian Top Team was born. Ricardo Arona, Vitor Belfort and both the Nogueira brothers joined BTT. In 2003, there was another break up as Liborio left Brazil for Florida and established American Top Team. In 2007, the Nogueria brothers would leave BTT and form their own gym. Their students include champions like Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, Paulo Filho and Rafael Cavalcante. An offshoot of ATT is the Blackzilians.

No matter what the criteria is that your coaches around the world are using to promote, odds are it’s very different from what Carlson Gracie Senior used. As per the words of his son, Carlson Gracie Jr:

“In my day in order for the guy to get promoted a black belt had to retire. At the blue belt there were several who wanted to be the number 1 blue belt, so the black belt had to retire so that the number 1 brown belt could go to black, in order for the number one purple to go to brown, and for number 1 blue to move to purple.

Those were the old days. Nowadays the sport has gotten popular, and there are many people. At the gym there were all types of training, sometimes there were brawls and only the brave would stay and my dad valued that highly.

So the guy sometimes wouldn’t move up – many stayed on but many more quit.

It was a very arduous path but also a very serious one, which is why the greatest team of all time emerged. ”