Now this was my gauntlet... One lap per minutes in a match(10 laps) .. Last and final run ever!!!

https://i.ibb.co/JvKM1XT/[...]allery.gif

Hand made custom belt by Korean craftsman if you're still looking https://www.etsy.com/shop[...]=530864229

Doesn't deliver to where I am at :(
I think I'm settled to try Kataaro...

Kataaro for the win.

I've had my blue belt from them as they are local to me, a very good quality belt. I have a Kenpo black belt from them and everything is very good quality.

Usually host an annual seminar where most promotions take place but there are always promotions during the year, like after a big win in competition or someone who didn’t make it in our annual seminar.

Promotion ritual akin to belt gauntlet :)
https://twitter.com/rexch[...]7620886528

(yes, and sorry for a bit of deliberate trolling)

All the schools I’ve trained at have always done the gauntlet.

since i left my team/organisation i do surprise promoting.(we were doing promotion by the master at annual seminars)

now when i feel the guy/girl is ready, i ask to the advanced to roll with and put pressure as a last test to see how he react/roll.

at the end of the class, (when breeding became suffering :-D ) i say a little word on the progress made and put the belt/stripe on.

i throw him/her and everybody congratulate...

no gauntlet (they are too crazy to let them doing this :-D )

Normally we have had promotions after seminars and sometimes we got suprisingly promoted after class (like i got my purple). And yes, we have that not-so-wise gauntlet tradition .

The head of our Academy, Peter de Been, likes to stuff your new belt into your old belt from behind. Preferably while you're rolling. The element of surprise makes for good theatre. Here is a video of my recent promotion:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com[...]BM5t7p96V/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/[...]4929062764

Very cool

I decide someone is ready for a promotion I tell them to pick a day so they can have people there after class we shark tank them, I give them a hug and strap them up

At my gym, the professor does surprise promotions.

Gauntlet is a tradition, even for girls :) (we don't hit them hard tho)
In the end, all black belts throw you, and that's it.

Would not change the gauntlet part for anything, it's a thing of honor for me personally.

What do you guys think of giving the student a choice between gauntlet and getting thrown as I could see how some people may not want the gauntlet?

I personally think when someone earns a non black belt it should just be part of a normal scheduled class and not that big of a deal should be made about it. Give it out and take a picture if you want then move on to the techniques for that day or sparring.

Let it be an individual thing...don't group all the promotions together. Just promote one person at a time when you think they are ready.

For black belts if you want to have some thing and call in their family that's cool.

Our academy doesn't have a special time of the year or day that promotions are done. Belts are awarded when the Professor is ready to award them. Could be on a Monday night, a Thursday morning. With that being said, however, he does like to do them when a lot of our training partners, friends and family are present. The more the merrier!

We are usually given a date and a number of people are graded together. No test as such as Coach keeps a close watch and decides when he feels your ready to grade. There is a shark tank style grading with the time frame adjusted for each belt which is relative also to the person being graded and emphasis is on showing heart and application of technique under pressure. Belts are presented at the end of the night and stripes etc are announced. There is generally a seminar organised for the day before. Sometimes its more of a surprise. Coach always adds some dialog afterwards during the presentation on the progress from belt to belt in general the entire dojo is encouraged to take part in the grading.

Hello all,

From my vantage points, one of the best lessons BJJ has taught me is patience for things that I can not control. I learned this lesson with the anxiety I had from blue to purple belt. My sensei promotes when he feels you are ready. Well I felt I was ready (like I would know what a purple belt was supposed to be). I was beating purples in class and even competition! What more could there be? I was unconsciously incompetent as to what a purple belt meant at Neutral Ground (my school).
As I look back, I realize how silly I was in letting my ego project that I knew better. IDK the right or wrong way for a school to promote, but hindsight, I learned a lot by having to put faith in my sensei that he would promote when I was ready.

~Josh

My professor usually does tests for all belts except for black. You get notice of when you’re testing. He will also at times just promote people on the podium, at an open mat or after a class but that’s less common for any belt other than black. Black belt is a complete surprise. He usually gives a black belt from the school, but at other times, he gives you his black belt until you get one. That’s what happened with me a few days ago.

Congrats on your black sir!

Thanks!!

Personally, I always want it to be memorable for the students. And for me the most memorable was when an emotion or physical condition was tied to it. I change how I feel about it with the wind, but currently most of the promotions I do are surprise motherf&c%er you get a X belt. It's usually during open mat. I let everyone get some good rolls in and then do a quick promotion and put them on the side of the mat for 15-20min(no rest) of 1-2min rounds from everyone that wants to partake. I want them to learn to survive and know you can't always "win" and surviving and staying safe is a "win". I also want them physically exhausted so they remember the day. I always get consent first.

Hi everyone. Some schools test and some don't and, empirically, both systems seem to produce high-level grapplers. I am Maths teacher so I have always leaned towards the concept of testing, if done correctly. I tested for my black belt in karate and I tested for my black belt in judo. Both had demo elements and sparring elements so it's always made sense (to me, not necessarily for anyone else!) to test and be tested.

Any assessment (formal, informal, summative, formative ...etc.) is an art and I feel it deserves attention. I think that there are better and worse assessors and, therefore, it is possible to become better at assessing.

At EKBJJ, every belt is tested. We do tests twice a year. big event. Lots of fun. The tests always follow the same format:

Group warmup
Students partner up and take turns to demonstrate a long list of self defence techniques. This is a reasonably challenging list from white-to-blue and grows with every belt.
As the belts get darker, more and more challenges are added (resistance, surprise...etc.)
After that it's sparring in different formats:

Clinching a striking opponent
Grappling on the ground against a striking opponent
Gi grappling
Nogi grappling

When I took my jiujitsu black belt (along with Shukie Lok and Shaun Escoffery), we did a 5 hour long test consisting of:

Teaching 4 different 15-minute mini-privates to a group of 3-5 students, while Eddie walked around to check how we are delivering these and interacting with the students
Performing every technique from Helio Gracie's book "The Master Text". Cover to cover.
Defending ourselves against random attacks in the centre of a "Self Defence Circle"
Defending ourselves against random attacks from an attacker surprising from behind
Stand up clinching against a striking opponent (fresh opponent every minute)
Ground sparring against a striking opponent (fresh opponent every minute)
Regular gi-sparring (fresh opponent every minute)
Regular nogi-sparring (fresh opponent every minute)

I came out of that test feeling a strong correlation between the work we regularly do in class and the outcome that was tested and I really enjoyed being part of the event. Everyone testing that day had their significant others there and all our friends where cheering us on. I had friends from 4 different teams come watch. Afterwards we all went for a big meal and left with great memories. It was great.

That said, as a teacher, I know that tests aren't for everyone. Testing just for testing's sake, in my opinion, doesn't achieve much.

I have been through a couple different formats and there are aspects of both that I loved. At BTT JAX we typically do large promotion ceremonies with throws from the black belts to celebrate the achievement a couple times a year and it is great getting a large portion of the team together and celebrating with family and friends. Previously when I was down south I trained at ATT and there we had a couple big ceremonies a year and random ones inserted throughout the year. When I received my purple belt I was mid roll and my coach started beating me with the belt while rolling then promoted at the end of the round. At ATT we did throws by all higher belts as well as the gauntlet to anyone who wished to do it. The level of comradery built with the team during the gauntlet was immeasurable, also immeasurable is the pain of getting hit in the ear while bear crawling through the gauntlet . :)

We used to do all promotions at Seminars with our upline coach (UFC Fighter "The" James Krause). Recently we went to doing stripes in class not long before the seminar and then did belt promotions at the seminar. got 2 new purples (one of them being me!) and like... 5 or 6 new blue belts.

As far as after... we used to gauntlet... but when my coach got his brown, he dropped it because he didn't want to walk it 6 times for brown and 8 for black (which he got at the last seminar!).

We do stripes when people reach the appropriate curriculum benchmark, belts 4 quarterly if people are ready for them.

We abandoned the belt whipping crap and do rolling gauntlets. 20 minutes for blues, 30 for purples, 45 for brown, 60 min for black.

My gym is generally surprise promotions at the end of class. Occasionally my coach will tell people to make sure they're at class on X day so he can do a bigger promotion and have more people attend. As far as rituals go, on the nights I have gotten promoted my coach has paired me up with the best guys there and told them (in secret) to go hard on me. Other than that, he just gives a little speech and hands out the belt at the end of class. No promotion fees or belt gauntlets or anything

whenever I get a new belt I raise it over my head like a tusken raider at home

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Mixed, in the sense that some people miss promotions.

We don’t do gauntlet. All black belts attending do throw promoted, except if a brown gets black he/she gets thrown bot don’t get to throw :)

Also we have a sparring system of 20 minutes on the mat shark tank per grade.

20 for blue
40 for purple
60 for brown (this one sucked)

And at black you just get thrown and enjoy