Draculino talks about the Evolution of BJJ (Interview)

Recently I managed to catch up with Vinicius ‘Draculino’ Magalhães and pick his brain about the ongoing evolution of Brazilian Jiu-jitsu.

Draculino started training in Rio in the 1980′s, back in the days when many of the big names in BJJ were just young kids with blue and purple belts around their waists. Plus he’s trained many great competitors in the sport, as well as having personally competed in BJJ, ADCC, and MMA himself!

In our 24 minute conversation Draculino talked about:

• How beach fights for the hottest surfing spots brought him into jiu-jitsu
• What it was like training with the top Gracie and Machado fighters in Rio in the 1980′s
• How self defense and vale tudo training were incorporated into class back in the day
• The early BJJ competition scene, and how BJJ has changed over the last 3 decade
• How the spider guard evolved, and the criticism he received for pioneering this position
• Why he gets more nervous for BJJ competition than for MMA fights.
• Why many matches at the 2012 Mundials reminded him of two spiders trying to mate
• The rule changes, he’d like to see to make jiu-jitsu competition more exciting,
• And why he makes even his BJJ world champions do self defense twice a week

To listen to, watch or download the interview several different ways:

1. Hit play in the middle of the black bar (the audio player link) at the bottom of this list, and/or
2. Right click on this link and select ‘save as’ to download this mp3 file to your computer, and/or
3. Subscribe to the Grapplearts Podcast in iTunes (RECOMMENDED, because this allows you to also listen to previous interviews and podcasts), and/or
4. Watch a video of the interview at the bottom of this article.

AUDIO FORMAT INTERVIEW

VIDEO FORMAT INTERVIEW

Click here to watch the same Draculino interview on YouTube.

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