So recently there has been much talk about the state of Jiu-Jitsu competition in relation to the benefits competitors gain. I am specifically talking about the monetary status. While events that pay the top athletes are gaining popularity and becoming more popular every day we are still far from becoming a professional sport. Some athlete have even gone as far as deciding not to ever compete in IBJJF competitions , or in the case of Marcus Almeida deciding to only compete in the World Championship. While the IBJJF is now giving prizes to its top competitors at the end of the year and in few other specific instances these are very few throughout the year. With some athletes having to pay for hotels, travel and of course the hefty entrance fee, it seems silly there isn’t a monetary prize… especially for Pans, Worlds and the Europeans. It really doesn’t make sense that the largest promotion in the world doesn’t pay its athletes, but many smaller promotions do. Obviously there is a lot of expenses the promotion carries, but non that come even close to outweighing their profit margin, and most of these expenses are probably tax deductible at the end of each year. With most of the athletes agreeing here are the top ways the IBJJF and Other large organizations could remedy the situation.
- Prizes for Pans, Europeans and Worlds- The biggest complain people have is that even the elite competitions don’t pay. Maybe it is too much for the promotors to pay prizes for every single open, but they should at least pay at the elite tournaments.
- Offer sponsorship for high level athletes the way Five Grappling did. This could be a smaller step in the right direction, but at least the athletes would feel appreciated and possibly still make profit competing.
- Don’t Charge an entrance fee to the top 10 ranked competitors in each division or belt. This may seem small, but it would not only help athletes who compete often save money, it could also increase the odds of bringing more talent around the world. Athletes could use the money they save on entrance fees for travel to competitions they normally don’t attend and thus you could have bigger brackets worldwide.
