If I had a penny for every time I had to have the “talk” with parents who know nothing about grappling and martial arts and who try to be sideline coaches, I’d still be having those conversations, I’d just be a lot richer than now. Jokes aside, parents play a huge role in their child’s grappling performances and there is a clear lack of communication on the subject between parents and coaches.
Enter the Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD. This collaboration between the BJJ legend and a sports psychologist delivers a blueprint on how Jiu-Jitsu coaches should prepare parents to guide young grappling athletes toward developing a winning mentality for sports and life. It is a great resource for coaches and parents alike!
Key Takeaways
- A 4-part instructional with nearly 2 hours of material on the psychology of BJJ.
- Aimed at parents of young grappling athletes who have no experience with BJJ.
- Invaluable for both coaches of kids classes and parents of young grapplers.
- BJJ World Expert Rating: 9 out of 10.
AVAILABLE HERE: RISING CONFIDENT ATHLETES DVD
The Role of Parents In Kids Jiu-Jitsu
As a BJJ coach with vast experience in teaching kids classes (still do and I will never give up on those classes until I am involved in the sport), I often find coach-parent relations to be way more difficult than dealing with the children. While it is a mutual relationship, in the end, the thing parents need to understand is that they do not know BJJ (most of them, anyway) and they need to leave coaching to the professionals.
Parents obviously play an integral role in the life of a child, as they should carefully navigate, guide, and manage the development of their child into a functioning adult. When they enroll kids in competitive sports, such as BJJ parents introduce another variable int the mix, which is the athlete mindset.
Most of the time, parents are not equipped to put their child’s needs first, the reason being they do not understand the sport. This means that coaches should also dedicate a small portion of their time to coaching them on how to be the parents of athletes rather than just those of kids.
Such an investment in time is going to have incredible returns in how coachable the kids are, as well as how the parents aid in the efforts of coaches rather than inadvertently impeding them. The Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD, as the first of its kind, is the ultimate resource to help parents and coaches achieve such a relationship.
The Coaches Behind This Project
This one-of-a-kind BJJ instructional is a collaboration between BJJ celebrity Andre Galvao and a sports psychologist named Mayra Ramos. Both have vast experience in the realm of professional sports which encompasses high-level practice, world-class competition, and exceptional coaching.
Mayra Ramos is a Brazilian clinical psychologist specializing in sports psychology. She was also a professional figure skater for over 20 years and a part of the Brazilian national figure skating team with impressive accomplishments such as World Cup runner-up and Pan and South American doubles champion.
Mayra continued her career in the realm of mental coaching after she hung her skates up, focusing particularly on young athletes as well as their parents. She is the founder of Academia do Atleta Campeão, a platform dedicated to mental training for athletes.
Andre Galvao is a name well-known to everyone in the BJJ world. The Brazilian has more world titles in IBJJF, ADCC, UAEJJF, and CBJJO than we can count. He also had the longest winning streak of ADCC super fights, from 2013 to 2022. Andre is the founder of the Atos Team which has produced countless talented grapplers such as the Mendes brothers, Ruotolo brothers, Keenan Cornelius, etc throughout the years.
Galvao’s daughter Sara Galvao, a World Champion and purple belt and currently a brown belt went through the BJJ ranks, starting at a very early age. Her career has brought together ANdre and Mayra Ramos, a partnership which now resulted in the Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD.
Full Review: Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD
The unique Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD offers roughly 2 hours of material that covers all the key psychological aspects of managing child athletes. Over the course of four volumes, Andre Galvao and Mayra Ramos provide invaluable information for both coaches and parents on how to build the best relationship that includes both them and the child.
Part 1 – Parents and Mental Coaching of Young Athletes
As this unusual Andre Galvao DVD kicks off, the first chapter addresses the theme that runs throughout it – how to raise confident athletes as a parent of a young grappler. The idea is that parents should not just be there to transport kids to and from training, but rather an integral part of the team.
A short guide outlining three different layers of behavior change set the tone, providing invaluable information for parents and coaches alike. The first part of the instructional wraps up with a section covering how to best build realistic self-esteem in children who practice competitive sports such as BJJ.
Part 2 – Building a Relationship With Children
As the Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD goes on, Mayra and Andre lead us through some of the best tools that can help parents guide their kids to be coachable, as well as outlining the main reasons why kids tend to quit sports they’re good at.
Ramos also explains how parents sometimes project their insecurity on their children and how they can do the same with confidence instead. This leads straight into the most important chapter of the entire DVD, which addresses strategies for supporting a child after they lose in a tournament.
Part 3 – Crafting the Championship Mindset in Kids
The third part of this Andre Galvao parents coaching DVD goes over the dynamics that the coach shares with parents, as both have immense influence in the child’s grappling career and life.
Aspects such h as balancing Jiu-Jitsu, family, and school, fostering a supportive environment both during training and in competitions, and allowing kids to grow feature heavily in this section of the instructional. I found the chapter on helping kids understand why they shouldn’t compare to others, particularly informative and helpful.
Part 4 – Being Supportive
The final portion of the unconventional but information-rich Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD addresses mindfulness and how to foster a champion mindset in kids. This includes the role parents play in the aftermath of a tournament, regardless of the outcome, as well as the basics of ensuring optimal health and fitness in a growing competition.
The final chapter in the DVD is a very original one that I didn’t expect – it addresses how to approach the competitive BJJ development of kids who are home-schooled, as this introduces a different social aspect in these children’s lives.
Raising Better Athletes
The task of developing competitive grappling athletes from the youngest age possible rests not just in the hands of coaches, but also their parents. Coach only sees the kids a few hours per week, whereas parents spend most of the time in their day with the kids, so they get to influence them a lot more than the coaches.
The most important variable is how to ensure the steady development of a growth-oriented competitive mindset in young athletes who still have to discover who they are. It is easy for adults to get lost in the competitive nature of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, let alone children who still try to make sense of the world.
Since access to a sports psychologist is not an option for most BJJ gyms that offer kids classes, the next best thing is having the ability to consult with one or use the best-proven principles of coaching sports mentality in kids. That is exactly what the Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD offers, and it delivers.
RAISING CONFIDENT ATHLETES ANDRE GALVAO DVD DOWNLOAD
Own Up!
As someone who has been coaching kids martial arts classes, including BJJ for the better part of 15 years I wholeheartedly recommend the Raising Confident Athletes Andre Galvao DVD to any adult athlete who practices grappling. The usefulness of this instructional is twofold – it will benefit both parents and kids coaches but it will also benefit those who are competing themselves and are yet to have kids.
A resource such as this is incredible to help instill a healthy competitive mindset in kids from an early age, using methods that fit their age and needs, as opposed to the one-size-fits-all-ages approach we commonly see in BJJ gyms. A true gem of an instructional, even though it doesn’t offer the latest inverted Mikey lock modification to a double triangle.
