04/19/2026
Yesterday was a great day.
We promoted four new black belts: Cammie, James, Rob, and Billy. Each of them put in years of work—countless hours on the mat, pushing through injuries, and never quitting. A black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is one of the hardest things to earn, and they earned it.
That brings us to 72 black belts, six of them women—something I’m extremely proud of.
We also promoted 10 new blue belts and three brown belts, and awarded Daniel Kim his second degree on his black belt.
Huge thank you to Marcus and Miranda for the amazing tacos—definitely one of the highlights of the day. Appreciate our photo booth team for coming out, and Alex Gomez for capturing great shots of our black belts.
The energy was real all day. Nothing forced. You can’t fake Jiu-Jitsu, and you can’t fake a community like this.
Congratulations to everyone who was promoted, and thank you to everyone who came out to support.
We truly have something special at Ares Arizona Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.