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Interview with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Super Star Marcelo Garcia
Here at Team Tooke, we recently had the pleasure of hosting a seminar by none other than Marcelo Garcia. Marcelo is one of the friendliest people you'll ever meet. He is constantly smiling, and it's contagious. Jeremy: "You're just coming off your big win at Abu Dhabi. Tell us a little about your physical and mental preparation."
Marcelo: "For this Abu Dhabi I think I was feeling in my best shape, you know. I was in my school in New York and I proved to myself that I can train outside of Brazil, and get in my best shape. And the results made me feel that I was better than from the last two Abu Dahbi's. I was feeling really good this time."
Jeremy: "So what kinds of things did you have to do differently, since you didn't have the same team to train with?"
Marcelo: "You know, the problem is that I have to focus on the school, and focus on my training. I have to split my time for this. But because I don't have as many black belts to train with as I have in Brazil I started to use a little bit more of my free time to work more of my conditioning. I have been doing cross training and that helped me a lot. I guess what I did outside of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu helped. I had a personal trainer to train me, and I think this helped a lot this year."
Jeremy: "Can you tell us a little bit about what you would recommend to get prepared for competitions."
Marcelo: "It depends on what you are going to compete in. I'm pretty sure that if you're going to train Jiu-Jitsu, if you're going to compete in Jiu-Jitsu, then you only have to train Jiu-Jitsu. Because first you have to really really understand, and really dominate the techniques of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. It's not going to help too much if you just do half Jiu-Jitsu, and half work out. Most of the time you have to do Jiu-Jitsu. And that extra time, and that extra energy that your body has, then you can do something outside. But if you're going to do No Gi, work out with No Gi. But first, if you want to be a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter then you have to concentrate a lot on the Jiu-Jitsu training. You have to have a lot of hours of mat, of training on the mat. That's the most important. That's what makes my techniques good."
Jeremy: "Many people like Gi better than No Gi, or No Gi better than Gi. Tell us about your approach to each one."
Marcelo: "I just started to do No Gi when I moved to Sao Paolo, like five years ago. So I still feel that No Gi is really new for me. And I think it's easier to do Gi and then you move to the No Gi. I don't know if it's easier if you do No Gi and then you put the Gi on. I saw many people go train at their school and they use to do just No Gi, and then when they put on the Gi sometimes it's worse. You know, sometimes it's much harder. You get warm a lot. And the lapel, the collar, the sleeves bother you so much. So when you take the Gi off you feel so much more free and you can do much more fast movements. I think it's easier but you have to train first with the Gi then train No Gi. Or maybe train both at the same time. It's easier if you already train both. I didn't have the chance. The No Gi in Brazil was not very famous and my first two coaches didn't work too much with No Gi. In just the last five years when I moved to Sao Paolo, and I started to train with my coach Fabio Gurgel, that's when I started training No Gi."
Jeremy: "So when you made the transition from Gi to No Gi, did you miss having the Gi to grab onto to do certain techniques with?"
Marcelo: "Sometimes, before I had a really good grip to cross the arms. Then I started to do the arm drags. You're going to miss the Gi a little bit, but you can take advantage of this and do it with speed. I think what you mean to grab, just do it a little faster and it's going to work. That's how I feel."
Jeremy: "Can you tell us a little about your MMA plans."
Marcelo: I was waiting for somebody to make a good proposal about my career. I feel I have a good career in Jiu-Jitsu and No Gi. And I don't want to just try MMA, you know? I want to make my career in MMA. So I waited for somebody to make their own proposal, to make this transition for me. And the big proposal I have, the best proposal I have is from K-1. I was in LA just to watch the K-1. They invited me to watch the show, and then they came with this proposal and I felt really good and confident to do it. Now I feel pretty much that I'm going to like MMA fighting. I'm going to work this for the next years of my life, I'm sure. I have a few years now to make my career. That's going to be my challenge now. Before, I had the challenge of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and No Gi. And now I have my next challenge, MMA. I hope I can do the same as what I did in the Jiu-Jitsu and the No Gi. It was a hard transition to go from Gi to No Gi. And I know it's not going to be easy now to do MMA but I know I can do it. I know I can prove to myself, I can adapt all my years of training to MMA now."
Jeremy: "What kind of training have you been doing for MMA?"
Marcelo: "Today I am working a lot of the transitions, between the stand up and the ground. That's what I'm going to have to concentrate more on. Because this is my beginning, my debut, I'm pretty much not a MMA fighter. I'm a Jiu-Jitsu fighter. But I'm going to adapt Jiu-Jitsu to MMA. Some day I'm going to try to be good in everything. I'm going to try to have a good stand up, good take downs, and a good ground game. That's why I use No Gi now. Today I feel comfortable even with the take downs, even to pass the guard, even to do the guard. I was not like that in the beginning of No Gi. I didn't have any skills in the stand up in No Gi when I started. So, I know I can get use to this. I can work a lot to get comfortable in the stand up, strike, kick, pass, ground and pound, and submissions. Everything, you know?"
Jeremy: "Can you give us some recommendations on how to improve in Jiu-Jitsu, in general."
Marcelo: "You know guys, I can tell you the things that I did when I was a blue belt, or a white belt. I spend the most time that I had in the school. I would think twenty-four hours a day about Jiu-Jitsu. Since I was a white belt I felt like I wanted to do this with my life. And I hope I do this forever. But don't try to find different stuff. Don't try too much to find secrets. The only thing people have to do to be good in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is train in Jiu-Jitsu. Spend all of your time doing Jiu-Jitsu. One day, when you can not train more, when you can not have more classes of Jiu-Jitsu, if you still have energy then ok, you can say "let's go improve my cardio, let's go improve my muscles". That's what I mean, that's what worked for me. I think it can work for you guys."
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