Ivey League Mixed MMA continues to make big waves with it’s kids martial arts program. This past weekend has made those waves very big!
The kids team brought back 6 medals from the Pan Kids Championships, held in California.
Every year in February, the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) world hosts a monster kids tournament. That tournament is called Pan Kids. It features the best kids from all around the world.
The kids compete under BJJ rules against other top tier kids. If your child wins this tournament they’re considered on the very best in the world.
We make a point to never miss this event. We’ve been going since it first started in 2010.
At this point most of the schools affiliated with Team Lloyd Irvin send some kids to compete. This year we had kids from the following Team LI Academies:
-Camp Springs Maryland (Main Academy)
-Nashville MMA in Tennessee
-Crazy 88 in Elkride Maryland
-Ivey League MMA in Annapolis Maryland
-Purebred Academy in Guam
This year was by far the best showing for not only us but for all of Team Lloyd Irvin.
Ivey League brought 7 kids to California and came back with 6 medals, showing once again that if you want the very best martial arts training for your child then Team Lloyd Irvin is the only choice.
Below is a list of the Ivey League MMA Kids that competed and the medal won:
- Maddie Avila – Gold Medal, Grey Belt JR 1 Light
- Jacob Miller – Gold Medal, Grey Belt JR 1 Middle
- Laxi Garcia – Silver Medal, Grey Pee Wee 2 Feather
- Spike Bill – Silver Medal, Yellow Belt Teen 2 rooster
- Alexia Lara – DNP (No One In Her Weight Class)
- Michael Garlington – Bronze Medal Grey Jr 2 Light Heavy (Has Less Then 6 Months Training!)
- Dax Avila – Silver Medal, Grey Pee Wee 2 Middle
First up for the day was rising star and leading medal winner Jacob “Juji Gatame” Miller. Jacob knows tournaments and how to play the game. So what did he do?
He went out there and won his whole division! Not only that, he also submitted all of his opponents!
One submission that was particularly slick was a standing Osoto Gari switch off to a kimura from the guard…impressive!
Next up on mat 2 was young newcomer, 7 year old Dax Avila. Dax like always, fought tooth and nail for his victories. He made the finals but came up short, losing 8-3.
He did great and without a doubt has nothing to be ashamed of. I see big things for this young man in the very near future…
Third on the mats was another newcomer, Mike “Mouth” Garlington. Mouth ended up taking the bronze medal, losing a hard fought battle in the semis.
He’s been competing a lot and working hard in the room and that showed at Pan Kids. He already told me his plan is to come back next year and submit all opponents. I’ll hold him to that 🙂
Next up was Madeleine “WikiFish” Avila. WikiFish is young and might be new to competing, heck she’s new to martial arts in general but….
…She knows how to win…and win she did!
WikiFish won in the finals via paintbrush submission hold after a battle, and I do mean BATTLE!
She fought out of 3 different armbar attempts that I’ll be the first to admit looked like the end. She came back from being down on points to win the gold medal, Yay!
Going at the same time as WikiFish was Lexi Garcia. Lexi was competing on the far mat from WikiFish.
Lexi ended up losing in the finals 2-0. In normal Lexi fashion, she smiled and told her dad that she tried. I’m okay with that. Good work girl!
Alexia Lara was set to compete at 4pm. Just one problem…she didn’t have anyone in her division. She ended up being put into a combined weight/belt class. She lost first round by armbar from the guard.
Last for the day but certainly not least was the longer student under me, Brendan “Spike” Bill. At this point the best Spike’s been able to snag here in Cali is Bronze.
That changed this year when he made the finals and grabbed a silver medal in Teen 3 Yellow Belt.
In the end, the kid that beat Spike was just better, no excuses.
We’ll head back into the training room and fix the mistakes.
Next year will be the 4th and final shot Spike has for a gold medal. Getting that gold medal is 100% up to him. We’ll see in one year…
All in all, Team Lloyd Irvin did a fantastic job, placing second in overall team points. That’s pretty heavy stuff considering we traveled from Maryland.
Thanks so much to all the kids, parents, coaches and everyone else who made this trip to Cali truly unforgettable.
After the tournament we hit up our favorite burger joint, which was amazing. The parents still think that Five Guys is better…hmm I don’t know about that…
The epic pillow fight happened..but we’ve had better. We started doing battle at like 11pm at night. Yeah…not a good idea. The hotel didn’t like that very much and told us to stop.
The kids got in some good shots on me (Master Danny Ives) but with the help of coach and parent David Miller we laid down some beatings!
I’ll just call this years battle a tie 😉
Oh and then the next day we went to Disneyland! I had a blast, maybe more fun then the kids. Now I’m on the way how on a Jetblue flight. Time for some sleep…see y’all tomorrow for class!
