Charles Gracie Richmond District is owned and operated by Alex and Mark D’Ercole. They are father and son that are both San Francisco and Richmond District natives. Coach Alex started training Jiu-Jitsu at 10 years old and has also spent many years training in Wrestling and Muay Thai. He has been active in local competition and has been teaching Jiu-Jitsu here in San Francisco since 2016.

Coach Mark started his Jiu-Jitsu journey at 56 years old and has been through anything and everything to make it to the rank of black belt at the age of 75. Once a parent at the academy watching his son, he started Jiu-Jitsu as a way to lose weight and stay active, but ended up falling in love with training and the benefits that came with it. He has a lot of experience on how to train with much younger opponents, strength and mobility routines suited for older grapplers, and has competed at the IBJJF Master World Championships in 2017 and placed second.

Our philosophy is that Jiu-Jitsu is for everyone no matter what your goals are. We used BJJ as a tool to improve many aspects of our own lives and would love to share those tools with you and our community. We and our instructors are here to help you improve your fitness, gain confidence, learn self-defense, or compete in sport Jiu-Jitsu.