If they don't read the instructions literally directly above the date field, then they probably also don't read your post, sorry :D

Not sure why this keeps happening.

Like Christian said, I don't think 'those people' will read this but I'm glad I'm not the only one who this was starting to drive crazy! haha

Lol. I saw someone today post a promotion certificate they received for their first stripe on their white belt. The belt wasn’t tied correctly and didn’t have a black bar or stripe on it.

People give out certificates for stripes?

Saw it for the first time recently.

Seems unnecessary but okay.

Definitely agree. I have never received a certificate for any belt. To get one for a stripe seems ridiculous. Maybe it’s that everyone gets a participation trophy mentality.

You want a stripe certificate? This is me at the 0:42 second mark Lol https://www.youtube.com/w[...]38lu0Bi0Kk

You want a stripe certificate?

Maybe I will get one of them thar stripe certificates, since I'm clearly never getting a blue belt. :-D:-D:-D

I am pretty sure gracie barra is attendance based at least on the stripes lol and have a minimum amount of classes to be eligible for promotions. At least most of them are that way which is kinda dumb to be honest for anyone who cross trains, but they also don't tend to be fans of cross training so they prob just assume thats all you have been training which could also be the case

Someone who joined after me and trains less than I do (I think) just got promoted. He's definitely promoted people who are worse than I am. Starting to feel like Anna in The Art of Self-Defense.

The guy who was just promoted was male. He mostly attends evening class which is why I'm not 100% sure on his attendance. I know he started after me and got his 4th stripe the exact same day I did. I've seen coach promote a guy at 15 months (including 3 months of pandemic shutdown) who is not that great. No technique. Every time I roll with him, he just smashes me, though I'm getting better at getting to dominant positions despite his size and strength advantage. He hasn't subbed me in a very long time. I've only seen him promote one woman in my 18+ months there, and that was mystifying because she doesn't train anymore. She came to the seminar in December '19 and ~7 classes last summer and wham, blue belt. Then she stopped coming again. I can't say how good she is as I've literally never seen her roll. I'm the only white belt woman there who has trained consistently since I've been there. Others dropped out during the pandemic or haven't stuck it out. Maybe he'll spring a blue belt on me next week and my bitching will be for naught. But he striped several members of my class a few weeks ago and didn't promote me, and just striped more people yesterday, so I assume not. And I'm not the only one in class who thinks the non-promotion is getting weird given the other people he's promoted.

The real question is are their other white belt and blue belt women that you get to train with on a regular basis as it would be kind of hard to judge how you preform against men. If their are not many women at where you train that could be one issue and I just wouldn't sweat it.

For months there have only been three women who train consistently. One's a judo black belt (now a 4-stripe blue belt) and one is a 4-stripe blue belt with 7+ years of training (who imo, should be a purple belt). There's also a big size difference (I'm 6'0' 160 lbs, they're 5'1'-5'4' 115-125 lbs). They generally kick my butt; sometimes I hold my own. However, they're evening class people, so my rolling with them has been limited. I'm trying to come to Saturdays more now since they're usually there Saturdays.

Try to find somewhere that may have open mats or classes where you can roll with other white and blue belt women. This will give you a much better understanding of where you stand and help you improve and figure out what you need to work on as your not going to be able to gage that very well with men. You really want to find some women to roll or spar with even if its just once a week at some open mat or someone's garage. You can get a lot better training with men but you just won't know where you stand as well until you get to roll with women on a regular basis or start competing every so often.

The only reason I haven't been doing this already is because of the pandemic. Now that I'm fully vaccinated I have a few gyms I plan to drop in on. I believe one of the 10Ps in the area runs a large monthly women's open mat, too. I am thinking of competing. We'll see.

If they don't read the instructions literally directly above the date field, then they probably also don't read your post, sorry :D

Someone who joined after me and trains less than I do (I think) just got promoted. He's definitely promoted people who are worse than I am. Starting to feel like Anna in The Art of Self-Defense.

The guy who was just promoted was male. He mostly attends evening class which is why I'm not 100% sure on his attendance. I know he started after me and got his 4th stripe the exact same day I did. I've seen coach promote a guy at 15 months (including 3 months of pandemic shutdown) who is not that great. No technique. Every time I roll with him, he just smashes me, though I'm getting better at getting to dominant positions despite his size and strength advantage. He hasn't subbed me in a very long time. I've only seen him promote one woman in my 18+ months there, and that was mystifying because she doesn't train anymore. She came to the seminar in December '19 and ~7 classes last summer and wham, blue belt. Then she stopped coming again. I can't say how good she is as I've literally never seen her roll. I'm the only white belt woman there who has trained consistently since I've been there. Others dropped out during the pandemic or haven't stuck it out. Maybe he'll spring a blue belt on me next week and my bitching will be for naught. But he striped several members of my class a few weeks ago and didn't promote me, and just striped more people yesterday, so I assume not. And I'm not the only one in class who thinks the non-promotion is getting weird given the other people he's promoted.

General rule of thumb, I know many other instructors out of principle will not give belt promotion to someone who asks for promotion, or talks about deserving a promotion. There are many factors an instructors uses in awarding a belt to a student that you as another student may not be privy to. Like age, a handicap you may not know a student has but the instructor knows, the persons ability understand the details of a set of techniques the instructors deems as important for promotion. Those are just a few examples. Just keep training when you finally do get that promotion you will know you truly have earned it.

I get that, but I have definitely never said a word to him about promotions. I'm even nervous about saying anything about it in public here. I'm just confused.

But putting it out on here can get back to him.

The guy who was just promoted was male. He mostly attends evening class which is why I'm not 100% sure on his attendance. I know he started after me and got his 4th stripe the exact same day I did. I've seen coach promote a guy at 15 months (including 3 months of pandemic shutdown) who is not that great. No technique. Every time I roll with him, he just smashes me, though I'm getting better at getting to dominant positions despite his size and strength advantage. He hasn't subbed me in a very long time. I've only seen him promote one woman in my 18+ months there, and that was mystifying because she doesn't train anymore. She came to the seminar in December '19 and ~7 classes last summer and wham, blue belt. Then she stopped coming again. I can't say how good she is as I've literally never seen her roll. I'm the only white belt woman there who has trained consistently since I've been there. Others dropped out during the pandemic or haven't stuck it out. Maybe he'll spring a blue belt on me next week and my bitching will be for naught. But he striped several members of my class a few weeks ago and didn't promote me, and just striped more people yesterday, so I assume not. And I'm not the only one in class who thinks the non-promotion is getting weird given the other people he's promoted.