“He has rich parents, that’s why he’s so good at BJJ” is a common phrase we’ve been seeing on message boards within the past 5-10 years. Due to the rising popularity of jiu-jitsu and it’s fairly middle class demographics, it is easy to see why some people jump to this conclusion. With that being said, a lot of Brazilian athletes in particular come from the favelas, or at least not a rich family.
What does not help the image of having rich parents in BJJ is the attitude of some kids alongside the Instagram era. In a world where photos can be made available for anyone to instantly see, it is no wonder that there is some jealousy and resentment. This is made worse as we already know that opening and running a profitable academy is not the easiest thing in the world and doesn’t make much profit (if any at all) to begin with.
This is where the Instagram rich kid gets berated. They will often show a new car, luxury watch, various customized meal plans and many other things which cost money. Sometimes these accessories are shown under the guise that they earned it for themself as they train/work so hard.
In reality, we know that the kid has rich parents – and that they have no job. Even if the academy was making $3000 per month, this is not enough money to show all the mentioned goods. Often a new academy will be making a loss until it can get enough members to sustain itself. If these kinds of people then post motivational videos and are telling other people how lazy they are in comparison to themselves, it is really quite easy to see how they earned such a despised reputation.
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Is It Really That Different To Paying For College?
On the other hand, is having rich parents in BJJ really that different than parents who pay for their kid’s college education? With degrees such as women’s studies and sociology now relatively popular, surely paying for your kid to get good at BJJ is a better investment than this?
Not everyone is clever to become a physicist or a doctor either. An average college education costs over $99 000 for 3 years. If we are to think that someone is an average blue or purple belt, this could be equivalent to someone who is ready to enter the college system in academic terms. They are both beginners but have a degree of competence.
If you were to train BJJ 6 days per week for 3 years at this level, it would probably cost you in the region of $3000-4000 in gym membership, $1000 in gi’s, $5000 in medical bills (top end). This totals only $10000 for 3 years training. Even if we were to add $5000 worth of private lessons per year, this would still only bring the total amount to approximately $25000, which is a quarter of an average college education.
It turns out BJJ is approximately 75% cheaper.
Of course you most likely won’t earn as much as you would if you were to get a good college degree, but you could earn more than a school teacher. It would probably be a lot more satisfying to teach BJJ every day than teach a class of 9 year olds how to do math as well.
Why Are People Jealous Of Gordon Ryan’s Success?
Contrary to popular belief, Gordon Ryan DID NOT have rich parents. He has detailed his parent’s story many times in which they became involved in a land dispute and pretty much lost their entire life’s savings when Gordon Ryan was approximately 7 years old.
When he was 17-18 years old he worked at a yogurt store and at one point also had a full time job clearing up bags of grass. In addition to this, he had to save money he had been gifted from Christmas and birthdays as without this money his parents could not afford for him to train.
This is quite far removed from people who claim “Gordon Ryan is only good because he had rich parents”. In any case, there are a lot of people who train BJJ with rich parents. None of them are as good as Gordon Ryan, even with financial assistance.
So overall it is quite strange to see a false rumor surface so often, especially when Gordon Ryans’ struggles are reasonably well documented. I am quite sure a lot of people have had more adversity than him, but he certainly wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth and has done exceptionally well for himself.
Does Having Rich Parents Make It Easier To Train BJJ?
Quite obviously, yes. In almost all cases it will make it a lot easier for you to train BJJ if you have rich parents. This becomes quite apparent as if you don’t have a full time job, these hours can be turned in to training hours. The fact this training is also “free” as you haven’t paid for it personally makes it easier to buy other things too.
Overall your life will be a lot more simple with no financial worries. If you are in this privileged position then you will still have to work, you won’t get good at BJJ by simply throwing money at it. You will however have an edge over your competition, although it’s up to you how that edge is used.
On the contrary, having rich parents can actually make your life harder. There are many examples in life of rich kids simply being raised badly by their parents. They end up having no motivation, no goals and no meaning in their life since they have been handed everything.
Even though their parents are able to pay for their BJJ training and they don’t have to get a job. It will all simply be wasted. Obviously, they will be better than the average person that comes on to the mat and trains at their belt level. But they will never have the required mindset to become an elite athlete since they have never struggled and simply do not want it enough to reach the top.
