Are tournaments important?

A lot of people ask the question, should a BJJ black belt have to compete to get to that rank?

When dealing with the issue of standards, in this case, belt levels... there are always going to be discrepancies between academies.

i.e. A blue belt from one gym may be significantly better than a blue belt from another gym.

Some gyms may not require any type of competition to get a belt, whereas another school may require many tournament victories to get promoted.

When it comes down to it, competitions (and winning) are extremely hard and require a lot of sacrifice. On top of that, strength and conditioning, strategies for the tournament, and discipline to eat healthy and cut weight properly are also prerequisites.

When you have an instructor or team mate that has succeeded at difficult tournaments, it speaks very loudly about not only their skill, but their ability to achieve very difficult goals. And in my opinion, this puts a competition proven black belt above one that doesn't compete.

You wouldn't go and learn from a professor with no college degree, so in BJJ why is it any different?

Keep the standards high, and test yourself!

now a hook sweep technique