Nicky Ryan has never entered an IBJJF event and does not plan to.
His reasoning is business-minded – as for competitors, he says, the financial model does not work:
I’ve always been kind of against doing IBJJF. I’ve never done a single one of their events… I always thought it was f*cked that you could never make money competing for the IBJJF.
Only the IBJJF makes money…
Why go win this, pay to compete and make zero dollars? That organization makes so much money.
No, I’d rather just do super matches or do ADCC.
Competitors pay entry fees and receive no prize money for winning, a setup Ryan rejected from the start of his career.
He does acknowledge, however, that the organization has changed in recent years with the Crown – which covers gi, and the Grand Prix, which covers no-gi, and both offer prize money.
But he is just as firm about his decision when it comes to competing in the gi:
I’ll never be transitioning into competing in the gi… Number one, it’s not something that really interests me.
I enjoy training no-gi a lot more. And number two, there’s just way more money in no-gi.
His goals now reach beyond winning ADCC at his weight class, and he is in no hurry:
I don’t want to rush this. I’m still young. I have a ton of time left.
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