Running the Gauntlet is a tradition that more and more academies abandon every day. Most modern academies abandon it because it’s a legal liability and to put it bluntly, it’s bad for business in a world where you can get to a 2 stripe brown belt level over the internet.
Many jiu-jiteiros call this torturous procedure a “rite of passage” and believe that it creates a unified team front.
Team Alliance leader Fabio Gurgel recently went as far as admitted that the gauntlet was the ‘Biggest mistake he had done in Jiu-Jitsu as an instructor’
Fabio Gurgel: ‘The Gauntlet Was My Biggest Mistake as an Instructor’
Multiple times world champion and leader of Brasa, Felipe Costa runs the Rio de Janeiro academy Brazilianblackbelt.com is a very respected and loved figure in the BJJ community. During his recent seminar in Belgium he talked about the history of the gauntlet tradition in BJJ and he explained how he stopped doing it but was convinced by his students to bring it back. His students actually wanted it back:
Gauntlet in Poland:
