I thought the team in Moscow was big. Turns out Serbia is the real home of Europe’s largest grapplers. In mid-September I began a rail journey across Eastern and Central Europe, starting in Greece, then heading to Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Hungary and Czech Republic. Kimura Jiu Jitsu Academy in Belgrade, Serbia’s capital, was my first […]
I’ve trained martial arts in buildings that would collapse in an earthquake. Gyms converted from industrial sites and clubs located down alleyways so ominous I half expected to find Batman hunting for villains. Academy Cyprus breaks the mold. The club has a number of sites in different cities around North of Cyprus; the portion of […]
I was warned about training in Russia. Rumours trickled down to me about how rough the teams would be and how I was safer just watching. But the opposite was true. For a city with a lot of square, uniformed buildings, Moscow is a lot harder to navigate than it sounds. Before my first session […]
Brazilian Jiu Jitsu can be a pretty niche sport. But in India it’s really niche. Delhi is the country’s capital with over 20 million people hurrying around its packed streets under smog covered skies. Despite the mass of people I could only find one club, which by chance was a 15 minute walk from my […]
