Key Takeaways
- Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD — a two-volume, eight-chapter Fast Track BJJ instructional that condenses Lovato’s Gi mount game into about 100 minutes, covering the Ezekiel choke, arm triangle, armbar and X-choke.
- Who it’s for: blue and purple belts who can already reach mount but struggle to hold it or turn it into a finish, plus upper belts who want a focused, affordable tune-up of a position they already play.
- Main strength: Lovato teaches the exact submissions he finishes at the highest level — his documented wins include the armbar (19), mounted X-choke (5), katagatame/arm triangle (5) and Ezekiel (3).
- Main limitation: at just under an hour and forty minutes, this is a compact entry point, not a full system — there is no passing or route to mount, and it is Gi-only.
- BJJ World Expert Rating: 9 out of 10.
Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD AVAILABLE HERE
The mount is where Lovato’s top game ends. For most of two decades, Rafael Lovato Jr has used the position not just to control opponents but to finish them — 77 of his 143 career wins have come by submission, and a heavy share of those finishes happened from top mount. Fast Track BJJ: Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD is the American black belt’s attempt to compress that finishing game into a single, affordable sitting: two volumes, eight chapters, and just under an hour and forty minutes of focused instruction on holding mount and choking or armbarring from it in the Gi.
Positioned in BJJ Fanatics’ Fast Track BJJ line — a shorter, lower-cost series that launched with Bernardo Faria’s pressure-passing system — the course is deliberately not a full-length Lovato system. That is both its appeal and its limitation. The honest buying question is not whether the material is good; it is whether about 100 minutes of Gi mount content is enough to actually own the position, and who that 100 minutes is really for.
Why Mount Control Decides Grappling Matches
The mount is the most dominant position in Jiu-Jitsu, and in the Gi it carries a particular sting: collar and sleeve grips give the top player chokes and arm attacks that simply do not exist in No-Gi, while the bottom player’s escapes are slower and more predictable. Yet most grapplers reach mount and stall. They win the position, then lose it — or they hold it without ever threatening a finish. The gap between achieving mount and submitting from mount is exactly where this course lives.
Lovato’s framing is that mount is where the top game should end, not a resting point. Every technique in the course is built on control first: stable mount, precise weight distribution, and grips that shut down the bridge-and-roll and the elbow escape before the attack even starts. That ordering is the through-line of both volumes, and the submissions — the Ezekiel choke, the arm triangle, the armbar and the X-choke — are presented as the payoff for correct control, not as standalone moves.
This is a different beast from Lovato’s full-length Top Game Devastation release, which covers the pressure-passing and top-game architecture that gets a grappler to mount in the first place. The Fast Track course assumes the pass is already done. It is also worth keeping the two Lovatos straight: this is Rafael Lovato Jr, while his father, Rafael Lovato Sr, has his own Timeless-series mount course covered in BJJ World’s Timeless Mount review.
The Instructor: Rafael Lovato Jr
Rafael Lovato Jr is one of the most decorated American grapplers ever, and his record is precisely why a mount course from him carries weight. Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1983 and raised in Oklahoma City, he began Jiu-Jitsu at 13 under the eye of his father, who was learning from Carlos Machado in Dallas. Lovato received his black belt from Carlos Machado in August 2004, just after turning 21, and went on to work extensively with Saulo and Alexandre “Xande” Ribeiro, relocating to the Ribeiro brothers’ academy in 2005.
The competitive record is the credibility hook. In 2007, Lovato became the first non-Brazilian to win the CBJJ Brazilian National Championship as a black belt and only the third American to win the IBJJF World Championship at black belt, adding the European and Pan titles in the same year. In 2013, he became the first non-Brazilian to win the Brazilian Nationals absolute division. He is also a No-Gi world champion, an ADCC silver medalist (2024), and an undefeated Bellator Middleweight World Champion in MMA.
What matters most for this course is how he won. Of his 77 submission victories, the armbar leads with 19, followed by the mounted X-choke (5), katagatame/arm triangle (5), and Ezekiel (3). He teaches what he actually finishes.
Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD Review
The course splits into two volumes that map cleanly to learn to hold it, then learn to finish from it. Volume 1 front-loads the control problem; Volume 2 front-loads the submissions. Eight chapters total, no filler.
Volume 1: Mount Basics, Ezekiel Choke and Arm Triangle
Volume 1 opens with basics and key concepts, and it is the concepts chapter that earns its runtime — just under 13 of the volume’s 52 minutes. Lovato’s recurring themes are keeping the hips heavy and low, denying the elbow escape before it starts, and using collar grips to frame and post rather than to attack prematurely.
Those set up everything that follows. Then come two detailed tutorials, the Ezekiel choke from mount and the arm triangle from mount, plus a chapter that chains them into an arm triangle-Ezekiel combination for when the first attack draws the reaction the second one needs.
Volume 2: Armbar, X-Choke and Finishing Touches
Volume 2 opens with the armbar, Lovato’s most proven finish, and pairs it with the X-choke from mount before some Lovato-level finishing touches that address the small gaps which let opponents escape late. The armbar is taught as a control sequence rather than a throw-and-hope swing: the transition off the failed choke, the grip breaks, and the weight shift that keeps the leg from slipping.
What is genuinely here versus a well-organized version of standard material? The techniques are classic mount attacks, not new. What Lovato contributes is the sequencing and the control-first ordering. It reads as pressure-tested because the setups mirror his competition finishes, but it is a curated highlight reel of his mount game rather than an exhaustive system.
Attacking Without Losing Mount
The Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD is a course a grappler can actually finish — and rewatch — in a weekend. At roughly 100 minutes, it is a notably compact Rafael Lovato Jr instructional, short enough to watch in one sitting and rewatch before competition.
The realistic path is two to three weeks on Volume 1’s control concepts and the Ezekiel and arm triangle chain, then adding Volume 2’s armbar and X-choke. Because the volume is small, the time investment is honest: a practitioner can absorb the whole thing without the eight-to-ten-hour commitment of a full-length system.
The caveat is that the course does not include the passing or top-game work needed to reach mount in the first place — that side lives in Top Game Devastation. This is a mount-holding and mount-finishing course, so it pays off fastest for grapplers who already arrive in mount regularly.
DOWNLOAD: Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD
Who Is This For?
The sweet spot is the blue or purple belt who can secure mount but cannot keep it or turn it into a finish. White belts get a clean, correct introduction to mount control BJJ fundamentals and the four core Gi mount attacks — the Ezekiel, arm triangle, armbar and X-choke — but they may want more repetition and more escape-defense context than 100 minutes provides.
Brown and black belts will find little they have not seen, though the sequencing and finishing details make it a worthwhile tune-up, and it is cheap enough relative to Lovato’s full-length releases that the value proposition holds.
Who will not benefit: No-Gi players, since this is Gi-specific (a separate No-Gi Mount Masterclass companion exists on Lovato’s own site), and anyone whose real problem is passing guard rather than finishing from mount. If you cannot get to mount, this course starts one step too late.
Pros And Potential Drawbacks
Pros:
- Elite, relevant credibility — Lovato’s documented finishes (19 armbars, five mounted X-chokes, five arm triangles, three Ezekiels) are the exact submissions taught, so the claim that these are the best submissions from mount is backed by his record, not marketing.
- Genuinely compact — about 100 minutes is watchable in one sitting and easy to rewatch, a real advantage over eight-to-ten-hour systems for time-poor grapplers.
- Control-first sequencing — the emphasis on holding mount before attacking fixes the single most common failure mode in the position.
- Clear, focused structure — two volumes, eight chapters, no filler, with setup and finishing mechanics separated in every tutorial.
- Affordable entry point — at $97 it is a low cost of admission to a Lovato mount game, cheaper than his full-length releases.
- A coherent attack chain — the arm triangle-Ezekiel combination shows how the moves connect rather than existing in isolation.
Potential Drawbacks:
- Short and narrow — 100 minutes means depth is limited, and there is no coverage of getting to mount, so it is not a standalone top-game system.
- Gi-only — the collar-dependent chokes and grips do not transfer directly to No-Gi, so No-Gi players need the separate companion.
Mount Like You Mean It
Fast Track BJJ: Gi Mount Masterclass delivers what the Fast Track line promises: a focused, well-sequenced slice of Lovato’s mount game at a low price and a low time cost. The material is pressure-tested and taught by one of the few people whose competition record proves he finishes from mount, and the control-first ordering quietly fixes most grapplers’ mount problems.
What it is not is a complete system — there is no passing, no route to mount, and no No-Gi crossover. For the blue or purple belt who already arrives in mount and cannot finish, the verdict of this Gi Mount Masterclass Rafael Lovato Jr DVD is a clear buy. For the grappler whose real problem is getting there, start with Top Game Devastation instead.
