I'm the one who mentioned Haueter on reddit to point out that for this guy to be a 7th degree he'd have had to be promoted to black belt in 1989 and it would fundamentally change who we know as the first set of American BJJ black belts. The Dirty Dozen weren't promoted until the mid 90s. https://www.bjjheroes.com[...]irty-dozen

Just from what little I looked at this Id wager there is some real mental instability going on.

Just from what little I looked at this Id wager there is some real mental instability going on.

I'm the one who mentioned Haueter on reddit to point out that for this guy to be a 7th degree he'd have had to be promoted to black belt in 1989 and it would fundamentally change who we know as the first set of American BJJ black belts. The Dirty Dozen weren't promoted until the mid 90s. https://www.bjjheroes.com[...]irty-dozen

I trained in Albuquerque from 2012-2018. I ran into Lasu a few times, but was more familiar with him through stories I was told by his students who became my instructors, teammates, and friends. Full disclosure, I received my brown belt from his student/friend, Kevin 'Conan' Bankens in 2016. There is a very good chance Lasu is a legit black belt and probably at least one or two stripes. By all accounts (even from people who swear he's crazy) his BJJ is at a black belt level. Unfortunately he is locally infamous for striping himself and other people off schedule. He had an academy for a while in the 2008-2010 range but it went under for some reason. So one of the main reasons he's flown under the radar for the last 10 years is he only taught privates or 'seminars'. Since he's opened a new academy though, he apparently decided to ramp up his shenanigans. He obviously fell prey to the fear of not being prestigious enough and decided just having a brown belt as an assistant coach didn't seem as cool as having a two stripe black. A real shame for the assistant coach (Jordan Gregory), who I'm told was a brown belt for a few years.

This is a good example of why mainstream adoption of Beltchecker would not be a bad thing for the sport, at all.

This thread is rapidly highlighting one of the strengths of BeltChecker: that even when BJJ practitioners don't have BeltChecker profiles, we have enough of a community here to investigate sketchy belts/degrees and call them out.

Response from Carlos Machado's school (edited for punctuation): 'Hello Drew. Pure jiu-jitsu is not an RCJ Affiliate nor anywhere on our rolls. If they are falsely claiming that please let us know. According to Master Carlos, he joined our association with rank already and was asked to leave. ' This rabbit hole goes deep.

This explains why he stopped wearing the RCJ Machado gi and started claiming Fadda Lineage

So if he showed up at Carlos Machado's 'with rank,' who gave him the black belt?

So if he showed up at Carlos Machado's 'with rank,' who gave him the black belt?

That's just it. Cause he claimed Fadda only after Machado dropped him. I'm still going with fake. I keep hearing 'he's black belt level' it what is that being compared to?

And Fadda himself has been dead for years. But there must be former students who could tell us whether they've ever heard of him?

There is a very good chance Lasu is a legit black belt and probably at least one or two stripes. By all accounts (even from people who swear he's crazy) his BJJ is at a black belt level.

I'd like yo know who promoted him? That would go a long way in resolving this.

Moral of the story don't fuck with the jiu-jitsu community and present yourself as something that you are not. We will call you on it.

Of note - this isn't the first claim I was able to find of a brown belt jumping ship to him just for rank either

forget these guys. how about verifying my purple belt. it’s obvious something is fake about these guys

sooo I had to add my two cents to that thread on fb..... we'll see how this goes.

sooo I had to add my two cents to that thread on fb..... we'll see how this goes.