Nutley HS student earns jiu-jitsu greenbelt

Nutley HS student Maria Villa earned a jiu-jitsu promotion to greenbelt on Saturday.

The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) practitioner was promoted by her instructor, Professor Chris Savarese of the Savarese BJJ Academy in Lyndhurst. The school is one of the top jiu-jitsu schools on the east coast.

Villa has been training a little over 2 years and has made a lot of progress in a short amount of time. Savarese calls her one of the top teenagers in the Academy. Villa recently started competing in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competitions and has fared well, taking 1st place at the recent North American Grappling Association (NAGA) tournament in Philly and the New jersey Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Federation (NJBJJF). Keep up the great work Maria!

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ)

Gracie Jiu-Jitsu or Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is the only art that gives you a realistic chance of defending yourself against a larger more aggressive attacker. The fundamentals program is our entry level, white to blue belt curriculum. This course is designed to make the student street ready by the time they reach blue belt, the 2nd belt in BJJ.

We focus on how to deal with the most common self defense situations with proper strategy, balance, leverage and technique.

At Savarese BJJ Academy, located in Lyndhurst, the student will learn the basic philosophy of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu as well as be exposed to basic competition style techniques.

For those looking to compete, we have one of the top competition teams in NJ, holding over 10 team championships in various tournaments on the East Coast. Our kids competition team also hold over 5 team titles in the last 5 years. We have classes for everyone (only 15% of our students compete), men, women (including women’s only classes), teens and kids.

Anyone looking to train at the Savarese BJJ Academy, please contact us to set up a free lesson by emailing [email protected] or calling 201-933-5134