Jeremy Skinner is a black belt under Lachlan Giles (and Craig Jones I guess) of Absolute MMA in Australia. He has appeared in a number of domestic competitions in Australia and also flown to the UK twice, where he has picked up two submission wins in Polaris.
Jeremy took a few minutes to talk to us about his career in jiujitsu, and Scramble.
Jeremy’s jiujitsu career started unexpectedly – initially he was on the side of light, doing karate like a good boy, but he soon spotted the dark side, shrimping in the corner:
“While attending a karate class as a teenager, there was a Jiu Jitsu class happening on the other matspace and I thought “That looks cool” 😅
In terms of his BJJ competition record, Jeremy is most proud of his submission wins in Polaris so far. It’s not surprising – Polaris is the biggest and best jiujitsu stage in Europe, possibly the world, with a consistently high calibre of athletes invited to compete on its mats. Jeremy has two submissions on the show, wins that were watched by tens out thousands of people wordwide.
We asked Jeremy what his week looks like, in terms of jiujitsu.
Currently I spend more days teaching now! Typically I’ll train or teach class twice a day with technique study inbetween. I find a large amount of my development comes from study: reviewing footage, taking notes and testing.
With the Polaris wins under his belt, we wondered what the goals would be in jiujitsu and grappling moving forwards.
Competitively my primary goal is ADCC (both qualifying and winning) with the secondary goal of submitting high level competitors. Personally I want to develop all aspects of my Jiu Jitsu continuously and constantly push for my skills to be at the cutting edge of the sport. Long term I intend to focus more on my role as a coach in the sport: looking to build up and support aspiring competitors.
Many of us grew up in the sport with heroes, or people we aspire to be like.
I don’t believe in heroes in Jiu Jitsu. Maybe a cynical answer but I think it’s important to remember everyone is human.
It’s a fair point. I have lost count of the number of heroes I have met so far doing the sport, and almost all of them turn out to be very human indeed 😉
Jeremy Skinner’s Top 5 Jiujitsu Techniques are:
1. Rear strangle
2. Inside heelhook
3. Kata gatame
4. K guard
5. Bodylock pass
We have been supporting Jeremy for a while, but I could not remember what the first Scramble item was that Jeremy bought or owned. “Semi-custom gi and purple ranked V2 rashguard,” he says. The Scramble Standard Issue semi-custom is not surprising – it’s one of our best-selling gis, and one we try to keep in stock year round. The ranked rashguard is also a popular staple. Speaking of which, it’s probably time for a new one.
As to Jeremy’s favourite current bit of Scramble kit in rotation?
Combination shorts. Perfect for both training and day-to-day. I always wear compression shorts underneath other shorts so to have it all in one is just right for me.
Not a massive surprise there – the Combination shorts are one of our best-selling items. They took many months to perfect with a lot of samples discarded.
If you want to check out more from Jeremy Skinner, have a look at his Youtube Channel, his Instagram, or consider buying his heel hook / leglock / positional instructional at Techniqly.
