Company: Panther Productionss
Name: Gracie Brazilian JiuJitsu - Purple Belt Techniques Volume 1
Tape Cost: $29.95
Length of Tape/Time: 40 minutes
Number of Moves/Techniques: 11
Return Policy: for damages and defects
Experiences in dealing with this company: Fair
Instructor: Carlson Gracie Jr
Company's Address: 1000 Century Blvd, Midwest, OK, 73110
Company's Phone Number: 1-800-626-2787
Web Page: http://www.centurymartialarts.com/accessories/media
E-Mail: customerservice@centurymartialarts.com

Primary Grading Criteria:

1. Production/Tape Quality: 10
2. Instructors demonstrated skill level: 10
3. Comprehension Score/Immediate Understanding: 10
4. Degree to which this will make someone a better Martial Artist: 9
5. Score on delivery vs hype: 8
6. Degree to which we would recommend this product: 8
7. Wasted Time ( The higher the number, the less " fluff" /repetition ): 10
8. Playback Score/Watching it over-and-over again: 8
9. Would I purchase more of this company's products: 9
10. Overall grade based on cost vs. value: 9

Grand Total: 91% (Good = 2.75 Stars )

Secondary Grading Criteria:

1. Beginners benefit: Good
2. Intermediate benefit: Good
3. Advanced benefit: Fair
4. Time to benefit: Most material is of immediate benefit.
5. The need to buy additional tapes to understand this one: Probably

Written Summary:

Like the previous 2 tapes in this series, this one showed about 11 techniques, if you count a couple of variations.

You know it's kind of tough grading a series, because there are so many perspectives to look at it from. Such as: Does this one tape stand on it's own? Are other tapes required to understand this one? Does this one tape rise above or below the other tapes, and if it does, in judging the tape or series fairly, could it have more value than originally thought? I must say that this tape suprised me. I did see a couple of things on this tape that made me feel it had more value than the previous two. That by no means is meant to imply yet one should run out and get this series, just means it was a little bit better than the previous two tapes. And so you are probably wondering "Well how much better was this tape?" Let's just say that I couldn't picture watching the previous two tapes more than 3 times each (if that). This one, I could picture watching maybe 6 times. It still wasn't one of those kinds of tapes I could picture watching dozens of times, hundreds of times, or everyday forever.

One of the biggest problems I have with this series, that I've failed to mention until now, is this, at times it's very hard to get through Silveria's accent and understand what he's saying. I found myself in numerous places on each of these tapes, rewinding and playing certain techniques, a half dozen times or more, trying to make out what was said. Is Silveria to blame for this? In fairness to him, I think not. When it comes to tapes that are marketed to English speaking cultures, and an instructor has a foreign accent that's so thick, that after 6 rewinds you still can't understand him, here's what I suggest. The tape production company should either put text at the bottom of the screen explaining things, or at least, naming the technique. Throughout this series, Silveria used names for certain techniques that I still can't figure out, and I really tried too. I can't help but wonder why the tape production companies, or tape marketing companies, don't first go through a tape, or it's master, and rectify this sort of issue.

As said, I saw some things on this tape I really liked. Techniques were explained better and more thoroughly. Counters to techniques were covered better. Transistional points-of-danger were covered better too.

Enough said, here's what I saw:

1. Pass the Guard to the Side Control
2. Transitioning from Mount to a Choke
3. Transitioning from Mount to an Arm Bar
4. Another Mount to Choke
5. Another Mount to an Arm Bar
6. Open Guard to Triangle (2 variations shown)
7. Defending the Triangle to an Arm Bar
8. Avoiding escape from Side Control
9. Mount to Side Control

I'd say there were maybe 1 or 2 more slight variations to numbers 1-9 from above, bringing once again the total number of techniques to about 11.

In closing, this wasn't a bad tape, nor was it great, somewhere in between, but IMHO better than the previous 2 in this series.

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