About Us

Welcome to Schuylkill County Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, LLC home of Schuylkill County's premier Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Judo Academy. For the past decade SCBJJ has offered Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Judo classes for kids, teens, adults, as well as children with special needs. SCBJJ is an affiliate of Team Third Generation Brazilian Jiu Jitsu one of the largest BJJ affiliations in Pennsylvania. SCBJJ is the home of five Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Black Belts, one Judo Black Belt, as well as, a variety of students of all skill levels, ages, shapes, and sizes. At SCBJJ you will find a family friendly environment steeped traditional martial arts values: honor, welfare of others, and respect. 

History of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

Much like Judo was a refinement of the ancient Japanese Juijutsu, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a refinement of Judo.  Having learned Judo from one of Kano's original students, Carlos Gracie and his younger brother Helio, opened their own school in Brazil in 1925.  Helio, much smaller and frailer than Carlos, was forced to alter the techniques that he learned by placing a greater emphasis on leverage and using an opponent's strength against him.  

While the genius of Dr. Kano and  his Judo was the revolutionary concept of daily competitive sparing against a resisting opponent, the Gracie's believed that Kano unnecessarily placed too many limitations on training.  For example, competitive Judo only allows submissions to the elbow joint along with strangleholds.  Pressure to the face is illegal.  Judo students only train in the gi.  Additionally, to make Judo a better spectator sport for the Olympics, the rules of Judo place a greater emphasis on aesthetically pleasing throws than on effective ground grappling.  The Gracies, believing these limitations weakened Judo as a martial art,  rejected them, and formed their own art, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.  

Through the alteration of Judo techniques in order to allow a smaller, less athletic person to defeat a much larger opponent, and through their changes to the rule-set of competition to allow a fight to proceed naturally, the Gracies developed their own, independent martial art, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.