SBG Ireland HQ - Dublin BJJ & MMA

the grass is always greener on the other side... I bet many of your friends living in Dublin or London sharing a flat wish they had your life. Don't compare yourself, you've got an arrangement that most would love to have but never managed. If things are going well at work, you are learning and progressing in your career then great! I'd suggest spending a few weeks here and there working from Dublin or London if you can... just get an airbnb, work from there and socialise in the evenings... then go back home until the urge comes back again. You can actually have a much better quality of lif source, 2025 ↗

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Yeah well I won 2 golds, my wife won 2 golds and my 2 sons won 2 gold at Dublin. Suck it. Just kidding, congrats, honestly awesome to see a family like this. Your kid will thank you for getting him into bjj so young. Imagine how happy your son was watching his dad win gold. source, 2022 ↗

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I'm a Blue Belt from Dublin, I'm delighted to get the chance to visit "Retard Jiu-Jitsu Academy" sometime over the summer 👍🏻😂 In all seriousness, congratulations on the baby and the club. COVID has been a right cunt for everyone's progress, and I'm delighted to see indications we're seeing the back of it! 🤙🏻 source, 2021 ↗

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What? SBG is primarily a jiu jitsu gym, Holohan was a grappler, even Duffy put a lot of focus in grappling too. Where in the country are you that there's a stigma against grappling? In Dublin at least it's very popular source, 2020 ↗

neutral

About 2 years ago, I was visiting Dublin for a few days and decided to take a jiujitsu class at Straight Blast Gym (where Conor McGregor trains).   This was at the apex of Conor’s popularity, and he was getting ready for a fight, so I thought I might get to see him, but at the very least, I’d get a good class in. I show up for an early morning no gi class and it is PACKED.  They tell me to head to the mats in the back, so I start stretching to get ready, and someone tells me I need to go weigh in.  I think it’s a bit odd, but maybe they want to pair people up by size for sparring, which doesn source, 2019 ↗

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Matt Thornton formed SBG in the USA in the 90s. Nobody of note really has come out of an SBG gym in the US. John Kavanagh in the early 2000s would have got his black belt in Brazilian Jiu jitsu (BJJ) from Thornton. Your instructor lineage is important in BJJ (not just for traditional reasons, it's also a form of quality control) so Kavanagh adopted the SBG name for his own gym to indicate his "roots". All continued as normal for over a decade. There were SBG spin offs that came and went, I'm not sure if any of the original branches still exist, there used to be one on Exchequer st. but HQ source, 2019 ↗

neutral

Was just about to suggest bjj. Your son will be surrounded by guys and girls all training and supporting eachother to get better. Not only will he learn a skill that will help him defend himself in future but the community in bjj is amazing. Some nights I don’t want to go to training because I’m tired or whatever but it’s the chat with the lads that gets me to go. *bjj is short for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and there are plenty of gyms in Dublin. source, 2019 ↗

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Competed in Dublin at the 2018 Irish Open this past weekend. Had a straight absolute division as there was nobody in my weight. I won all my matches by submission in under 90 seconds and won an all expenses paid trip to the 2019 Europeans as a prize. This was also my 5th Irish Open title at brown & black belt. Also reffed all day and saw some amazing jiu jitsu, the irish scene is blowing up right now, there were over 800+ competitors and they offered prizes for every absolute division for every belt including adult and masters. great tournament and vibe as always source, 2018 ↗

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