http://www.chokeacademy.com/statement.htmlOfficial Statement from CHOKE BJJ Academy
Dear students and friends,
last Saturday, April 1st 2006, I took part in the submission wrestling event called “Open Mat 8”, held in Copenhagen. My third match was against Mr. Mads Mekker and during the first minutes of this bout a scary accident took place. As I applied an americana lock (also known as “kimura”, a common type of shoulder lock submission), my opponent’s arm popped in a way I have never seen before in my 11 years involved with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
It was a fast move and as soon as I heard the snap sound I let go of his arm and stood up in shock, already aware that something had gone very wrong with his arm. Mads was evidently in pain and scared, but luckily he was assisted quickly and taken to a hospital where doctors took care of his injury.
Even though I had been informed that Mads was receiving medical treatment, I could not stop thinking about what had happened in our match and wondering how he was doing at the hospital. I have been injured myself and I know how awful it is to be alone in a hospital not knowing what is going to happen to you. It was a very hard day for me and I can only imagine how hard it was for Mads. Because of the shocking way the injury happened and because I was directly involved, I had a horrible night at home and could not get rid of the haunting memories of the accident.
The next day my first concern was to go visit Mads at Bispebjerg Hospital and find out how he was doing. So I traveled from Helsingør to Copenhagen along with my wife Kamille and my friend and assistant instructor Morten Pedersen. I was very glad and relieved to find out from Mads that the injury has been taken care of and that he will fully recover in due time.
This was also the first time Mads and I had a chance to speak to each other. He clearly is a very friendly and easy going guy. Despite all the guilt I was feeling, he made me feel at ease about it by saying that it was not my fault. I told him I wish this past Saturday could be erased from our lives and that we could have met under different circumstances, but unfortunately things are the way they are and there is nothing anyone can do about it.
Nevertheless I still felt bad about the whole incident and wanted to make up for it in any possible way. So I gave Mads a couple of presents to cheer him up at the hospital: a box of chocolates and the latest issue of M! Magazine with 100 hot babes inside (-;
Despite all the pain and inconvenience of his injury, Mads made it clear to me that he is totally hooked on his martial arts training, and that one of the things he regrets the most is the fact that it would take a while before he could return to the mats. Since some of my students are physiotherapists, I have spoken to them and Mads will be assisted with his recovery so that he can be back in top shape as soon as possible.
Mads was also very happy to find out that he now has a free lifetime membership at any CHOKE BJJ school, including my master’s dojo in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, if he ever travels that way. I also gave him a rash guard from my sponsor, ISAMI/Reversal, and made him promise to stop by my school in Lyngby as soon as he feels ready to do so.
Mads is a great guy with a good attitude and a captivating sense of humor. Just imagine that less than 24 hours after our horrible accident, we were both having a few laughs together in the hospital.
Despite his good spirits, Mads has one tough recovery ahead of him. The injury on the arm prevents him from working in the coming months, therefore his financial situation will suffer a direct hit. In order to help solve this problem, I, as the head of CHOKE Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Worldwide, am mobilizing all our students and friends to contribute with funds to help Mads through this difficult time in his life.
If you would like to be a part of this movement and contribute in any way, please contact me by email: mads@chokeacademy.com
Any help will be greatly appreciated!
2nd Part of the statement
Now let me move on to another subject, one that rose as a development of the accident described above.
Late at night on Saturday, I was informed by one of my students that there were some direct accusations against me on an internet forum. Even though I cannot speak Danish fluently yet, I can read fairly well, and was very surprised and hurt with what was being said about me on the net.
It is pathetic to have to respond to people who have none or very little knowledge of the subjects in question (grappling & the accident), especially when most of these people were not even present at the event. Still, I feel like such false and ridiculous accusations cannot be left unanswered. I am going to break my reply into items for a clear understanding. Here it is:
1- Jens Peter Breining or JP or Joao Pedro?
My name is Joao Pedro, which stands for John Peter in English or Jens Peter in Danish. In Brazil everyone calls me by my real name. In Denmark though, my students and friends have a hard time pronouncing my name correctly, so they all call me JP, my nickname. JP is the name most martial arts people know me for, and that’s fine with me.
My wife is Danish, she is called Kamille Breining Plon. Whenever I am among family members, they all call me Jens Peter. This started as a joke and as a direct translation of my Brazilian name since they also had a hard time pronouncing Joao Pedro. Little by little the name stuck with me, and whenever I am in the company of my in-laws, for example, they naturally refer to me as Jens Peter. Other than the eventual joke that I should be a farmer in Jylland, I am ok with being called Jens Peter.
When I signed myself and my team for Open Mat 8, I chose to use my Danish name, after all I cannot sign up simply as JP. But I never expected this small detail to become such an issue for some people. I have been accused on the net of trying to “fool the other participants” by using a name unknown to them. For God's sake! As far as I know, Joao Pedro Breining would also be unknown to pretty much everyone. Furthermore, how can I “fool” anyone if my intention from the beginning was to compete in the tournament?
As the name “Open Mat” itself makes it clear, the event is open to any martial artist residing in Denmark, and that includes me. When I got there to fight, I had no idea who my opponents were or where they were from. All I knew was their names.
I was in the dark just like the other guys. There was only one thing that mattered and that I needed to know: in order to be the champion of my weight division and the absolute, I would have to beat whoever my opponents turned out to be. And that was true for everyone, right?
2- The submission & the injury
Unfortunately during my third match a horrible accident happened. As I went for an americana/kimura lock, my opponent’s arm snapped in a very scary way. If you have read this statement from the beginning, you know that I have personally visited Mr. Mads Mekker in the hospital and that he does not blame me for what happened.
In fact, what no one knows is that his shoulder and elbow joints were not damaged by my submission at all! What happened was literally a freaky accident, the kind of thing you hear about in urban legends.
Even though I applied a joint lock on Mads, it was the bone on his upper arm that snapped and broke in half. And it broke before the shoulder lock could work. The fracture was NOT caused by the submission attempt, even though they are directly related. I never aimed at hurting him, much less breaking his arm. I have applied and received that same move a million times and nothing bad ever happened to me or my training partners.
Actually I don’t think me or anyone else for that matter would ever succeed in causing an intentional fracture of the bone. Just look at muay thai fighters, for example: they kick each other at full power repeatedly, often hitting bone against bone, and we don’t see limbs snapping. There is one famous short clip of an accident like this available on the internet, but other than that and what happened to Mads this past Saturday, I have never seen anything like it and hopefully will never see it again.
So let me stress the message here: I did not use a move to break his bone. I did not hurt Mads intentionally. What happened was an accident.
3- The Disqualification
After Mads Mekker was hurried to the hospital, the event organizer, Mr. Christian Graugart, informed me that I had been disqualified. But why? “Because you were too aggressive and your submission was not controlled – and that is against the rules”.
That means he was blaming me for what had happened. Everyone in attendance was shocked by what they had seen, and my disqualification indicated to them and everyone else who would hear the story afterwards that I did something illegal that resulted in Mads’ broken arm. All of a sudden I had been transformed in this monster that was there to break bones and hurt people.
Everyone jumped to conclusions without searching for facts to back their positions. Well, at the hospital it was clear that it was not my lock that broke his arm. What did it then? I have no idea, and neither does Mads nor his doctors. It was just a very unfortunate and scary accident. The bone is broken, but his shoulder and elbow are intact.
Regarding the DQ, I was very mad about it because I have never been disqualified of anything in my life. Not even when I was a kid in school. I am not a cheater and if anyone thinks I need to cheat to win Open Mat, then you really have no idea of what you are talking about.
Besides, Graugart did not have to disqualify me, because I was done fighting for the day. The only thing on my mind at that point was the horror that I had so closely experienced. Actually Mads and I are the only ones who truly know and share what happened on Saturday. It’s easy to go on a forum and write about what you THINK happened or what you HEARD happened. While you are taking wild guesses and making unfair conclusions, I have to go to bed every night with that horrible memory, unfortunately.
4- The second fight: Mr. Lasse A. Svendsen
My second opponent, Mr. Lasse A. Svendsen, was one of the first people to accuse me on the forum. Besides his personal guesses about the incident between Mads and I, he went on to say that I “popped his elbow” during our match. Excuse me?
I did not even have to fully stretch his arm for him to signal submission. One of my students who was ringside even made a comment about it as I was leaving the mat. And as soon as he tapped I released the armbar. I have the footage of the match and it is very clear. Actually, in no moment does Mr. Lasse make any sign of pain. He didn’t even complain about it at the time, and the referee was watching it very closely and considered the move entirely normal. So how come now he says I hurt him and begins to insinuate that I was at the tournament to hurt others?
5- The tournament
It has been mentioned on the forum that it was almost unfair of me to sign up for a beginner’s event like Open Mat. That is an illogical argument. Just look at some of the elite athletes that competed this past Saturday:
- Thomas LaCour – BJJ Purple Belt / MMA Champion in the USA
- Sunny Nielsen – Professiona MMA Fighter
- Carsten Ettrup – Black Belt in JJ / Danish National Team
- Morten Pedersen – BJJ & Submission Champion
- Joachim Christensen – BJJ & Submission Champion
- Milan Hansen – Black Belt in Judo
- Michael Bender - Professiona MMA Fighter
- Nic Osei – Shooto MMA veteran
These guys are some of the most accomplished martial artists in Denmark in their specific fields and categories. Is it unfair that I enter a competition where these guys are enrolled just because I am a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu? Of course not. If you really think so, I will take it as a compliment, but that will not change my opinion.
Now let me tell you what is unfair (and unacceptable): to allow complete beginners to compete head to head with highly trained professional fighters in a sport where throws, chokes and joint locks are allowed. It is unfair to the beginners who get their asses kicked and learn nothing from it; it is unfair to these elite athletes who do not have a chance to properly test their skills and keep improving; it is unfair to the audience who has to watch some totally mismatched fights instead of quality balanced bouts.
And how about allowing women (and also kids) to compete together with men? No one can question that the two girls at Open Mat 8 had good skills and a lot of courage, but to pit them against much stronger men is like begging for some tragedy to happen.
Just look at Thomas LaCour and Morten Pedersen, for example. Thomas (88kg) and Morten (77kg) easily won their divisions, finishing most opponents in a matter of seconds. Are Thomas and Morten really good? Yes, they are. But unfortunately we rarely get to see how good they are because they are always fighting people who do not belong in the same division as them.
* * *
I would like to finish this long statement by saying that the work my instructors and I do at the CHOKE Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu schools is a very honest one and of the highest standards. We are directly connected to the Gracies and the most traditional schools in Brazil.
I have taught BJJ to martial artists all over the world and to members of law enforcement agencies such as the Brazilian FBI, the Monaco Police Force and the Police Academy in Copenhagen.
I can proudly say that we are one big happy family that doesn’t stop growing. The Jiu-Jitsu I teach my students is not a fight or a sport, but a way of life that positively changes people and those around them.
All CHOKE students are friendly and welcoming guys. Just stop by one of our schools and check it out for yourself. In fact, our students don’t even look like fighters: they are not big, they don’t take steroids, they are not covered in tattoos. Browse through our site and you will see that the message we transmit is a healthy and positive one.
Unfortunately this weekend we could not focus on the great achievements of these guys (CHOKE won 2 out of 4 categories at Open Mat) due to the very unfortunate incident that occurred to our Norwegian friend Mads Mekker.
