Featured Traveller: Jorgen Matsi – BJJ Globetrotters
Jorgen Matsi BJJ
Age: 37
Belt: Black
Profession: I’m a personal coach / counselor in a CRM software company called Pipedrive.
How many years in BJJ: 16
Other martial arts: Aikido for a few years before starting BJJ and MMA at age of 20 back in 2003. Parallel to BJJ I’ve trained quite a lot of MMA and related combat sports (wrestling, judo etc).
Where do you live: Tartu, Estonia, where I’m the head coach of Võimla (literal translation: The Gym) – the oldest official BJJ and MMA club in Estonia.
Where are you originally from: Pärnu, Estonia
Other fun or curious information you would like to share: Still to this day, I like to secretly think that one of the main things that inspired Graugart to start this awesome camps project after his around the world trip was how awesome the big BJJ & MMA Summer Camps I put on in Estonia were (I think Christian took part in 3 of those).
Also, in my MMA heyday I was an actor in an obscure Estonian music video. And you can watch the odd promos we did for the biggest MMA event back in the day (subtitled).
I don’t know, it came really naturally. I was part of the group that kickstarted BJJ and MMA in Estonia, so to learn and develop myself I also had to travel, since YouTube didn’t exist back then :D Nowadays when I’ve again done a few international camps again (after dedicated 5 years of raising small humans) it’s just my favourite type of vacation away from my day-to-day life.
Tell us about your most recent travel and your upcoming travel – where have you been and where are you going?
My most recent trip was a work-related one to Lisbon (my company has an office there), but I managed to visit 3 different gyms in the 5 days I spent there. I worked during the day and trained in the evening; it was the perfect work-vacation, and all three gyms were super nice and accepting of visitors.
Jorgen Matsi BJJ
What are the things you enjoy about traveling?
I’m the kind of person that actually enjoys the “everyday vibe” the most. I’m not big on specific sightseeing – I just like to wander randomly around places a bit, spend time with local people and train. All of which is nicely facilitated by doing a small fringe sport which has quite a welcoming community – BJJ :)
Can you give us some examples of experiences you had that makes it worth traveling and training?
Unfortunately I’m kinda boring in that regard – I’ve just enjoyed spending time with people I’ve befriended and with whom I still communicate online even when we might not actually see each other for a few years in between common travel locations. To me, connecting with other people with whom I, by default, share the love for BJJ yet in comparison to whom I’m often a very different person with a different history – that’s the most enjoyable thing. Also, I first played real live DnD in Heidelcamp last year :D
I learned a hard lesson on how to not be a douchebag and got choked unconscious for the first time in my life. In 2012, me and my wife were visiting Amsterdam (this was also the time me and my wife first met in real life our wonderful friend and fellow Globetrotter Daniel Bertina). In addition to visiting Carson Gracie BJJ, we also visited R-Grip, the home gym of female MMA pioneer Marloes “The Armbarian” Coenen whom I was and am still a fan of. I was a purple belt with 9 years of MMA and BJJ and coaching experience so there were definitely some ego-demons I hadn’t conquered yet – yes you can say it – I was cocky.
The nogi BJJ class was taught by R-Grip head coach Roemer Trompert, and it focused on a front headlock series which included the famous Matt Hughes choke over Ricardo Almeida. I had seen the fight and thought it was somewhat of a fluke. Hughes had freakish strength and Almeida slept on it (pun intended) not taking urgency to defend. So I didn’t think it was something that could be systematically replicated by average people on someone who has decent awareness and choke defence (and that would include me of course).
So Roemer came to us and asked how we were doing and I said something like “Yeah I don’t think that’ll really work.” He was super polite and said he’ll demonstrate on me, and I was like “Alright, I’ll let him put it on me and then casually defend.” I remember thinking “Okay, this is tighter than I thought it was gonna be but it’s OK…”. Next thing I remember is feeling super weird and looking up from my back instead of being on my knees and a bunch of worried faces (including my wife and Marloes Coenen herself) looking at me weird. Despite that episode, everyone was still super nice to me, and I had really nice polite rolls including one with Roemer in the end of the class.
Are you a budget traveller – and if so how do you plan for a cheap trip?
I used to be in my 20s, but now I am old and lazy and have a stable income. I’ve done my fair share of sleeping in gyms and couches, and kinda have had enough. I wouldn’t mind it still if other conditions were so appealing, but I avoid it if I can. Food-wise I still like to pack some apples, protein powder, and a bag of nuts in my carry-on luggage whenever I go to travel because I don’t want to get stuck with being hungry in the middle of the night or having fast food as my only option. When I didn’t have to count every Euro anymore, I realized that more expensive flights can sometimes be literally cheaper enabling easier transfers, spending less money on food etc.
If you were to pass on travel advice to your fellow Globetrotters, what would it be?
Contact gyms you’re going to beforehand. You’ll get a good idea in regards to how they are with visitors, and you’re going to have the best time in gyms that are actually excited about having visitors. At the same time – and depending on your goals / level – you might want to sniff out the largest open mats in the area for best rolls. If you’ve got competitive aspirations there’s nothing like competitive rolls with people you don’t know.
