Workshop Jiu Jitsu

⚡️TUESDAY

4pm Workshop Kids 🐒
4:45pm Youth Jiu Jitsu
6:30pm Gi Express
7:30pm BYD - rolling and game design

Heads up Workshopians, this Wednesday, Amy, Myself, Maude and Ernest will be heading up to Hawkesbay for Damians funeral.

** In place of our regular Wednesday Longgames (7:30pm-8:30pm) will be a rolling session, no-gi. **

Wednesday Lunchtime class is scheduled as normal.
Wednesday Nuts & Bolts is scheduled as normal.

Our friend Damo passed away.
We loved him.
Damian Smith was infectiously passionate about life, especially his friends, his club, his students, his boys and his rock - his wife Lenka.
This end is so abrupt - like someone tripped on the cord, during the best bit of your favourite song. Damo was such a wonderfully bright spark, and seeing him was regular highlight of traveling to different competitions, he always had time to talk (and talk ❤️) proudly about our students, families, and jiu jitsu.
Sending all our love from Workshop to Tyler Smith, Lenka & the boys, to the Gracie Allegiance members, and Damian's friends. We lost a true goodie.

Congratulations to 2 hardworking grapplers!

Adam Gray is a consistently challenging training partner and OG Workshopian. His perky jiu jitsu is always problematic to deal with, and he is a cornerstone of the hardy lunchtime crew. Congratulations on your Brown Belt, Adam!

Nick Clendon now at Blue Belt, his skill and dedication to training makes this promotion the easiest of decisions. Congratulations Nick!

We're calling it! No classes tonight - the roads are terrible. Fingers crossed for tomorrow # # #

Congrats to our magnificent Josh "O Captain!" Montague, Workshops newest Black Belt.

Our hardworking Josh Montague is a magician on the mats, and sets a high standard for work ethic at Workshop. Talking to Josh about progress on his latest project is often met with a "Slowly but surely" refrain, which is contradicted by Josh's consistent training- it really isn’t that slowly at all!

Josh is always spares time for eager Workshopians helping them evolve their tactics, and improve as competitors.

Josh is amazing to watch and a fearless competitor, with over 100 wins (80 by submission!). One notable memory was when he lead our 2nd quintet team to victory with 3 back-to-back wins, the rest of the team was much relieved when he left some for the rest of us.

Josh's competition game is only exceeded by his tight shorts game, and all we can say is that the RDLs really do work.

Well done Joshua Montague, it's wonderful to have you be part of Workshop, we're so glad to award you your black belt.

A few belts!

Big congratulations to Zachary Benz Zen Neethling Meng Hing Teh and Amon!

Today we awarded Koji Shigeeda his black belt in jiu jitsu.

Koji is an OG Workshopian who has had a massive impact on his training partners, especially his regular lunch class cohort. He's been on the mats since childhood through judo, MMA, and jiu jitsu, and is a lifelong athlete who played and coached professional rugby in Japan, plus has marathons and Ironman races under his belt. And through the last 16 years of it, he has maintained a steady, unwavering commitment to jiu jitsu.

A gym and business owner himself, and a stupendous father to his intelligent and caring son Tomi.

After 16 years of jiu jitsu, Koji is a formidable black belt. He is tough as all heck, with undeniable pressure and a uniquely flexible seated guard. A proven safe yet relentless rolling partner.

Koji is a wonderful friend and student of the art, and we're so glad we could share how much we all appreciate him today at his grading ceremony.

Congratulations, Koji!

⚡️SATURDAY

10am-1pm NoGi Open Mat ROLLLLLLING