April 21, 2009 On Wednesday I was unable to attend night class at the I.M.B. I thank Toyota for that! Fernando. April 6, 2009 March 23, 2009 Congratulations to our new Blue Belt students. Click on each image to enlarge. March 14, 2009 Picture taken today during the belt exam. January 28, 2009 Attention South Bay school students only:  For an unspecified period there will not be any Friday classes at South Bay school. We will post future updates as they become available.  January 11, 2009 Recap of review day. *Back. Throwing hooks in - break down. *Arm bar - mata leao - double collar choke. *Gogo choke - hand lock mata-leao. *Simple back escape - turn up back escape. *Foot lock. January 10, 2009 Big review day at the Riverside Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu school. All students from all 3 locations are welcome to attend. The focus will be on techniques from the Back and Knee on the belly positions. *Knee on the belly. Placing knee on the belly-sliding into mount. *Near side arm bar. Far side arm bar. *Paper cutter - claw choke. *Half guard escape - barrier - hip escape. January 03, 2009 The Vasconcelos family and the Gonzalez family celebrating Henry"s birthday. Henry and the kids December 30, 2008 Attention current students: (offer good until February 15, 2009) Bring a friend and choose to receive either a free month of lessons or a pair of wrestling shoes once your friend joins in.  December 24, 2008 List of students who have signed up for the February examination: Daniel David Tristen Biley We also received an application for the mid year examination from: Jaime Hernandez December 20, 2008 List of students who have signed up for the February examination: Steven Martinez JR. December 18, 2008 List of students who have signed up for the February examination: Paul Factora Sam Taina Able Taina Joseph Cablayan Nathan Wagner Simon Ochoa Holiday Schedule Riverside Brazilian jiu-jitsu school Closed  December 24,25,31and Jan 1 South Bay Brazilian jiu-jitsu school Closed Wednesday December 24 Wednesday  December 31 Fri 2nd of January 2,2009 Azusa Brazilian jiu-jitsu school Closed Friday December 26

***********************************************************************************************************
Here is the outline for this year’s instructor’s conference held at IMB academy in Torrance, California.
***********************************************************************************************************

“Hello and welcome to the 2008 IMB Instructors Conference.

My name is Fernando Vasconcelos and I will be instructing portion of the conference, which will focus on Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

I have been training BJJ for over 20 years; starting when I was a toddler when my father enrolled me under professor Rillion Gracie.I have been a certified professor of BJJ by, among others, Confederacao Brasileira de Jiu-Jitsu (Brazilian Confederation of Jiu-Jitsu) and the Federacao de Jiu-Jitsu do estado do Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro State Jiu-Jitsu Federation) since 1996.

I have had an extensive competitive career that has earned me several accolades, including (all as black belt): 3x US Open Champion, 3x Pan-American Champion and World Champion.

Today I will be covering what I believe is the most neglected portion of guard training: Getting Back Up. The guard is a wonderful position that I not only enjoy, but also use very much. It is a position that offers many great defensive as well as offensive opportunities to the man on the bottom.

With the guard you can hold the top man in a position where he can do less harm to you than any other bottom position. The guard is also one of the very few bottom positions that allows the bottom man the possibility of offensive regularity. There are leg locks, arm locks, triangles, chokes, Omoplatas, sweeps (reversals), kicks, hand strikes, elbowstrikes and many other techniques that can be done successfully from the bottom guard position.

Ultimately you can categorize what you do from the guard in 3 ways:

1) Defense: such as guard maintenance skills, guard reposition skills, defense against strike skills.
2) Offense: such as strikes, submissions and reversal.
3) Getting up.

Strategically speaking Jiu-Jitsu ultimately means positional superiority; aka, being in a place where I can do more harm to the other guy than he can do to me.

While many people can be dominating from the bottom, I think that is not the case for most people. Most people should use the guard as much as they have to and that is it. If the guard gives you the best chance to achieve success in a given situation, use it, if not, don’t.

If you have someone in your guard there are only three good ways to use it (or stop using it):

1) Putting him away (submission),
2) Putting him on the bottom or
3) Standing up.

Remember, position superiority means a place, a position, in a fight, in combat, where things are more to your favor.

In any case, my goal today is to open your eyes to the concept of getting up as a valid guard skill as well as demonstrate some technical concepts. We won't be drilling (much) and developing a specific weapon but we will stead broaden our focus and talk about ways that the specific drilling and developing can come about at a later time.

Basic Technical Stand Up:

1) Sit up; getting up from the guard
2) Getting up from a hook sweep situation (1, 2 and 3) 
3) Getting up from a hugging leg scenario (1 and 2)
4) Getting up from a side way guard scenario (1 and 2)***
5) Getting up from an unattached scenario (talk about distance and strikes but do not cover them)
6) Wall get up
7) High all fours stand up.

Fernando Vasconcelos School of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu”