Roger Gracie Academy

I spent a week training here when I was in the UK for grad school. The classes were mainly run by Alex Faria since Roger Gracie (at the time) was training for an MMA fight. Roger did roll once during a belt/​stripe ceremony (which was AWESOME).
For the most part, the place is a great place to train. Large mat area and some awesome drilling sessions. The afternoon classes are just as packed as the evening classes and no one really over-​does it when rolling.
The staff is very friendly and always greeted me when I came in (of course, being the only «Yank» in the gym helped). The locker room is pretty spacious and has what you need there.
I will definitely be back if I’m ever in London (or the UK) again. It should be on every Jiu-​Jitsu nerd’s bucket-​list.

Walking into this gym, you are welcomed by images of battles past, trophies of great winners, and proud pictures of the masters of old.
I have always been interested in Brazilian Jiujitsu (BJJ) ever since I accidentally channel surfed onto my first UFC event on Bravo (back in the days when it was unpopular and free to watch!).
I had been searching for a BJJ school for a long time, trying to find a balance between cost, location, and schedule.
Honestly, this school was not my first choice due to the distance from me. But I was impressed with the lineage of the instructor. The head instructor is Roger Gracie, grandson of one of the founders of the art, Carlos Gracie.
Although the school is named after Roger Gracie, I’m assuming that they use his name mainly for branding, as the majority of classes (that I have been to anyway) have not been taught by him. This is probably because he participates in many international competitions.
Despite this, the other instructors are great. They are all funny easy going guys, unlike those stereotypical instructors you come across who get an ego boost from pounding down on guys both physically and mentally. Consequently, the whole atmosphere is relaxed and friendly, which is one of the main reasons I really enjoy going to this gym.
After gettin thrown around like a rag doll in my intro class, I knew I wanted to continue, but for me the gym was just too far (2hr journey for me by london transport). So I decided to check out one of the other Roger Gracie branches in Farringdon. To cut a long story short, the Farringdon gym was not as good as this one in Ladbroke Grove (I will review this one in my next post).
Consequently I decided that I would rather spend two hours traveling to a school I enjoyed, rather than signing up to a closer gym that I did not enjoy (and probably would not end up going to as often).
So now I’m a fully fledged Roger Gracie member at the Ladbroke Grove branch, and that two hour journey no longer seems to bother me when I enjoy training at the place so much.
My only minor issues is that if you want to join, you need an intro class which you have to book in advanced. Would be nice if people could just turn up. Also, membership is a large part of £100/​month. Cost is really the only reason I have not given this place 5 stars, but bear in mind that you are paying for good quality teaching and a great atmosphere.

I trained at the Roger Gracie Academy from November 2006 until February 2009 (full details on my blog).
In brief: the Roger Gracie Academy is a great place to train, and not for the immediately obvious reason. Yes, you’re taught by one of the most dominant BJJ world champions in history, but even better, you also get taught by his father Mauriçio. When they’re not there, loads of other excellent black belt instructors are ready to help you improve: I had the pleasure of learning from Jude Samuel and Felipe Souza, who have been followed by several other brilliant teachers.
However, what I liked best about training at RGA was the depth of choice amongst your pool of training partners. It’s a HUGE academy, both in size and membership, which means you get a vast range of height, weight, skill level, age, strength, speed, flexibility etc, and it also means there are a good number of women training too.
I don’t think it would be hyperbolic to say this is one of the best places to train in the world, given the size, facilities and level of instruction. Of course, that does have the one disadantage of a world-​class price too (£90 a month for white belts, £100 a month for blues), but given that you can train every day except Sunday, normally twice and sometimes three times, I felt it was worth the cost. If I ever work in London again, I’ll certainly be returning to the RGA mats.