The Academy

Welcome to the official website of The Tiger Academy of Martial Arts. Established in 1998 the Tiger Academy is Atlanta’s premier self-defense martial arts academy exclusively dedicated to the teaching of Gracie Brazilian Jiu Jitsu technique and philosophy as developed by its founder the late Grand Master Helio Gracie. We believe that this system of jiu jitsu is an incredible means of developing self-defense, physical fitness, and a multitude of positive life style benefits. Thus, our slogan “Tying Self Protection with Self Perfection”

Our Mission

To teach the most proven and practical martial arts in the world in a positive, friendly, high energy, family environment. We want each and every student to be able to defend themselves in a real world attack regardless of size, strength, age or athletic ability. While many martial arts are developed for sportive competition we recognize that in a real fight there are no referees, no points, no time limits and no weight divisions.

The Academy

The Tiger Academy located in Roswell Georgia boasts a modern 5000 square foot facility with over $20,000 of Olympic judo mats and private parking. The academy is run daily by true black belt experts and a professional staff. We pride ourselves on having a super clean training environment and therefore clean and disinfect the entire school daily. Tiger Academy is home to more than three hundred active students.

Why Gracie Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?

The fact is that most self-defense situations happen as a surprise, involve a larger attacker, quickly move to a very close range and eventually end up on the ground. Gracie Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is the only martial arts system that has proven it self effective over and over with regard to these four criteria. Demonstrated to be so effective in the original Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), it is the official and only martial art used in the U.S. Army Combatives program.

One of the great advantages of this system is that it was developed by a smaller person who was looking for reasonable answers for the problem of having to fight a much bigger stronger person. Grandmaster Helio Gracie, the systems founder, was 135 lbs when he developed GBJJ. He quickly realized four things. First, an attacker is most likely to be bigger and stronger than you. Second, most real self defense situations start as a surprise attack and so you must be able to defend from such attacks in order to survive a self defense situation. These include headlocks, grabs, sucker punches, bear hugs, chokes, and gun, stick and knife attacks. Third, the last thing you want to do if attacked is get fatigued trying to defend against a superior sized attacker. Forth, a bigger taller opponent has really only one major advantage, the length of his arms.

A person with longer limbs can generate superior rotational force. So just imagine two opponents one tall and one short swinging away at each other. Who has the most power in their strikes? Yes, the person with the longer arms. Think of a baseball bat hitting the ball out of the park. That happens at the end of the bat not close the hands because the end of the bat generates maximum rotational force. Grandmaster Helio realized that to exchange strikes with a bigger, stronger person was not only dangerous, but also not a good strategy to end the threat of a violent attacker. Instead, what he concluded was to clinch, get so close to the person that they can not effectively strike you, take the fight to the ground, and apply a much more effective technique called a submission hold.

A submission hold is generally a choke, armbar, shoulder lock or footlock that uses a superior part of the defenders body against an inferior part of the attackers. For example the arm bar submission uses the defenders hip, his most powerful joint against the attackers elbow joint, a weaker joint. Once the submission hold is in place the size difference does not matter, a one hundred and thirty five pound person can easily control or seriously injure a 220 lb persons arm. The beauty of a submission hold is that you can decide whether to hurt an attacker or simple control them and stop their aggression. This final point is very important for kids who train martial arts. In fact Gracie Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is the only martial art in the world that allows you this level of control.