Enson Inoue is a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and MMA athlete from Honolulu, Hawaii. He began training BJJ in 1987 aged 20. Like many practitioners, he began learning BJJ for self-defense, as he puts it “I started training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for self-defense on the street, at the time I was still in college and there was a course at the University of Hawaii called Gracie Jiu Jitsu, with Relson Gracie as the instructor. In Hawaii, a lot of problems are solved by street fights“. He then achieved his black belt in 1999 under the dirty dozen member John Lewis who he claims has the biggest influence on his grappling style. These days Inoue currently trains and teaches at his own gym, Purebred in Japan.
He goes on to add to talk about the culture of fighting in Hawaii saying “I think in Hawaii, the culture has a lot of street fights. We actually grew up fighting. Fighting isn’t that big a thing for us so I guess there’s a lot of jitters [in professional MMA] but not as much as someone whose never been in street fights, it’s very normal”.
Obviously known for his history in MMA, he says his fighting weight was between 95-98KG. This was at an unlimited weight class, so he was a lot smaller than some of his opponents. He goes on to mention the Pride drug testing routine and claims “So the contract listed a whole bunch of contraband like marijuana and all these things they test for. Instead of not listing steroids, they actually put a clause in saying ‘we do not test for steroids’. In a way it was like saying ‘you can take it’. I almost want to say testing for cocaine may have been seen as a performance enhancer but marijuana definitely isn’t”.
Inoue favors the armbar from closed guard when training BJJ. He prefers this old-school style and says his biggest achievement in MMA was hitting this armbar from guard against Randy Couture. He claims his toughest opponent was Antonio Nogueira. Power-wise it was Mark Kerr and the toughest all-round was Frank Shamrock. He goes on to add “There are different aspects of toughness”. Like many fighters, he’s had his share of war wounds and says “In fighting, I’ve had an accumulation of injuries, I’ve had a broken finger, broken jaw, perforated eardrum and swollen brain. Because of the swollen brain, I had to have a lot of CT scans to make sure it wasn’t bleeding. They had to wait a few days for it to go back to normal size, I didn’t feel any smarter with a bigger brain haha”
He is also good friends with Baret Yoshida, another Hawaiian native who trained with Inoue in Japan, whilst Yoshida also trained BJJ under Inoue’s brother Egan.
He also discusses the recent issue with IBJJF and his black belt not being recognized by the organization, adding “The reason why I was trying to get my certificate for my black belt is that I wanted to allow my gym Purebred to continue to carry to Purebred flag. My students used to compete in IBJJF under a registered student of mine who passed away last year. Because he didn’t pay his dues, he was taken off the list and that made my gym not certified anymore. We competed under Purebred in the IBJJF for over 12 years and in the Asian IBJJF, I think Purebred has won the team points about 5 or 6 times now. So when my student passed away I didn’t realise they were going to make my gym non-official anymore. The IBJJF’s logic is that I was never registered under IBJJF, there’s no history with me at any belt so they didn’t acknowledge my belt, it’s weird.”
He continues “I think it’s about never being registered with them, I was willing to sign up, get the CPR certificate and pay what I have to to be qualified, but they told me if I tried to sign up now, I’d be considered a provisional black belt for 2 years and what that means is that I’m not accepted or acknowledged as a black belt and after 2 years they’ll make a decision. So it probably takes them 2 years to go on the internet, google my name and figure out who I am. My whole thing was like ‘hey I started Jiu Jitsu over a decade before the IBJJF was even formed’ I got my black belt 3 years before the IBJJF even existed. So if they don’t legitimize my black belt, I almost feel like I shouldn’t legitimize their association haha”.
Due to his status and life in Japan, Inoue is known for his links to the Yakuza which he has spoken about before – here he states “I have really close friends that are part of the Yakuza. A little difference in Japan is that they’re all over the place. You know when they’re gathering. It’s something in a society that is accepted but not accepted, you know? For instance, Pride was with Yakuza but lost all their sponsors. Only because the Yakuza affiliation was made public in the news. Everybody knows that every big affiliation has a link with Yakuza but the only reason why it became a problem is that it’s not something that’s really talked about in the media. For instance, even though I know the Yakuza, if my affiliation hits the main news then I would be a figure who would be avoided by any television or news station. I think it’s hard to stereotype all Yakuza. There are ones who are really bad who do bad work but there are ones who are very honourable with regular businesses. It’s a wide range. In Japan, you have doctors, school teachers, gas attendants and then you have Yakuza. In America you don’t talk about the mafia or any business with them, in American society it’s taboo. In Japan I have friends who I go to dinner with, it’s a little different”.
In terms of future plans, he says “I’m doing a lot of Jiu Jitsu right now but I’m not thinking of competing. I just want to exercise and get back into the movement of Jiu Jitsu. Who knows, if I feel like I’m capable I may get back into competing, but there are no plans right now”.
You can also check out his website called Destiny Forever – which details his charity work, helping people who lost everything they own after the 2011 Tsunami. He also has a book out which can be seen here.
