Since Bellingham BJJ opened downtown in May 2019, we’ve brought nearly 100 amazing guest black belts to town. Now, it’s time to take it to the next level and create an annual, sustainable event that will bring folks from all over the world — including world-renowned seminar instructors and some of the best coaches in the Northwest — right here to Bellingham.
Bernardo Faria, Dominyka Obelenyte and other all-time greats of the art will join us during the second week in March, March 6-10, 2025.
We’re calling this five-day event Gi To Sea.
In addition to Bernardo and Dom, we’ll have other outstanding national instructors, including Jake Whitfield. We’ll have some of the best local Pacific Northwest instructors, too, including Hillary VanOrnum of Unicorn Jiujitsu, James Weed of Newborn Cascao and many more. Gi to Sea will feature a street fair, outdoor demonstrations, free self-defense seminars that are open to the public, food trucks, live music and some of the greatest martial artists on the planet. Whether you’re near Whatcom County or not, we hope you’ll come train with us!
On Saturday, we’ll have a very special seminar with Bernardo Faria, one of the sport’s best ever and owner of BJJ Fanatics. On Sunday, we’ll have an outdoor event in front of Bellingham BJJ featuring public art demonstrations (Dominyka will hand-paint custom gis!), vendors, and entertainment from arts martial and otherwise.
Out of town folks, we’re partnering with local hotels for special rates. If you come in from elsewhere, you can use these links to get deep discounts on your hotel stay without even entering a code! We hope this makes it easier and more enticing for you to come up for Gi to Sea. It helps that these are our favorite hotels in the area:
The Heliotrope Hotel
Hampton Inn By Hilton: To Book: To book an individual reservation either call the hotel and mention that you would like to book under the BJJ Gi To Sea group block rate or book online by using the following link:
https://group.hamptoninn.com/16goh9
REGISTER NOW: You can register for the Bernardo Faria seminar here! That is $80 for members, $100 for non-members. You can register for the ENTIRE WEEK OF EVENTS here! The full week ticket is $100 for members, $120 for non-members. Each special class will be $30, so if you think you’ll go to at least two special classes, this is a great deal. Here’s a link where you can pay by the class — so, if you know you can only go to Dominyka, or James Week, or Jake Whitfield, or Hillary VanOrnum, you can pay by the class there.
The fun will start on Thursday, March 6: Here’s the tentative schedule:
THURSDAY, March 6:
Special guest instructor: Jake Whitfield of Chapel Hill Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, 6 p.m.
FRIDAY, March 7
All classes on as normal, with 6 a.m. class potentially having a guest instructor
Noon class: special guest instructor, Hillary VanOrnum of Unicorn Jiu-Jitsu in Portland
Evening: Special class with Dominyka Obelenyte, four-time world champion, currently teaching at Frogtown Jiu-Jitsu, 6 p.m.
SATURDAY, March 8
11 a.m.-2 p.m: Bernardo Faria seminar. Bernardo is an all-time great and an IBJJF Hall of Famer, a five-time World Champion and absolute champion, as well as the owner of BJJ Fanatics.
SUNDAY, March 9
Special morning class at Bellingham BJJ with James Weed at 10 a.m. James is the head instructor at Newborn Cascao Jiujitsu in Spokane, one of the Northwest’s top competition teams.
Also, we’ll shut down Commercial Street at Holly St. for an art fair featuring outdoor events including musc.
Art vendors will run booths from 11 a.m.-5 p.m., with outdoor martial arts from noon-5 p.m. The booths will be around a big outdoor mat where we can do grappling events: There will be demonstrations of judo, jiu-jitsu, self defense training and more! We will also have music and artistic performances during this time.
At 11 a.m., Dominyka Obelynyte will set up a public art performance: hand-painting gis that will be one-of-a-kind.
At noon, we do a judo demonstration of about 30 minutes. During the break:
Jesse Lang (music)
1 p.m.: 30 minute Self Defense seminar / demo with JT Taylor and Jesse Johns. During the break:
Jesse Lang (music)
2 p.m.: Wrestling demo with Whatcom Wrestling Academy.
MONDAY NIGHT
Getaway day: A full day of classes with featured guest instructors, including a special Monday night class.
All of this is subject to tweaks, but the Saturday and Sunday events are locked in. Come train! See you there.