Yesterday, BJJ Eastern Europe announced that Rickson Gracie would officially be launching his latest project: a new Jiu-Jitsu federation.

Today, the new Federation now has defined a name: Jiu-Jitsu Global Federation (JJGF) and an official website www.jjgf.com.

We will have to wait a few days to find out about the JJGF’s plans, goals, rules, structure and more as the official launch is set for Friday July 18th.

The JJGF would rival the other two major BJJ federations: The IBJJF (presided by Carlos Gracie Jr) and the UAEJJ (which organizes the World Pro and is in a coalition with the IJF).

Sources close to Rickson have told BJJ Eastern Europe that the new federation will be open to all: IBJJF, NAGA, ADCC competitors etc and will be a platform for the major BJJ athletes today. There will also be self defense programs.

The JJGF’s Promo Video:

What to expect:

In past interviews, Rickson has talked about how he didn’t like the current sport rules of BJJ where many competitors are stalling, playing for points and advantages. He also feels that the ‘modern’ sport specific techniques are not applicable in a real life fighting situation.

We could expect a new set of rules which favor an attacking and less strategic Jiu-Jitsu. Something similar to his past venture, the ‘Budo Challenge’ (see more below) which gave extra point for submission attempts and negative points for guard pulls.

Past ventures- The Rickson Gracie Budo Challenge

This is not the first time that Rickson Gracie’s attempts to change the current set up of Jiu-Jitsu, which is separated between sport (IBJJF, UAEJJ), self defence, and Jiu-Jitsu for MMA advocates. In 2005, he launched ‘The Rickson Gracie Budo Challenge’

Rickson Gracie had said that the Budo Challenge was a very important milestone in his life. It was created in an effort to bring gi fighting to a much larger audience, and was designed to attract a larger fan base. Secondly, it was to provide an opportunity for gi competitors to earn both a decent living through gi style competition alone and to provide them with the “dignity, honor, and respect they deserve” (a theme he would often repeat throughout the days of production and backstage). Finally it was his intention to bring the sport back to it`s essence by encouraging competitors (and thus all practitioners) to bring the submission back to the sport, as opposed to searching for ways to win within the rules.

The Budo challenge was similar to Metamoris as it was filmed in front of a live audience at the Olympic center on October 19th 2005. It featured 6 weight divisions with the world’s best Gi competitors. Unfortunately, there was to be only one edition of the Budo Challenge.

Rickson Federation In Japan:

Rickson, together with his student Taka Watanabe, has also founded his own federation in Japan, the  Jiu-Jitsu Federation of Japan (JJFJ). The federation organizes the yearly Rickson Cup in Japan. They use an almost identical rule set as the IBJJF.

Some of the Jiu-Jitsu big names competing in this event were, Kron Gracie, Andre Galvão, Eduardo Telles,  Braulio Estima, Mendes brothers etc…