Popular local Jiu jitsu tournament All Vs All (AVA) just announced that they will be allowing smother chokes at the rest of their tournaments from now on.

Many local tournament tend to go the opposite way when it comes to legality of smother chokes. The choke is often considered to rough and dangerous.

AVA had followed suit and announced on their Instagram that they would not be allowing the smother at their tournaments:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cnh4G6wSOoG/?igshid=NDk5N2NlZjQ=

The post was met with a enormous amount of backlash though. The traction the post gained is largely because of how big the AVA tournaments have grown in the lower main land over the past few years. Many jiu jitsu practitioners even travel to take part in these events which has gained AVA a lot of attention.

In this case though many people were unhappy with AVA and their decision to ban smothers. Jiu jitsu practitioners agreed on the post that the smother choke is part of the sport and a risk that one takes when signing up for the competition.

AVA considered the oppositions point of view and shortly after announced that they would now be allowing smother chokes for competitors over the age of 16:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CnkTOHcvtSr/?igshid=NDk5N2NlZjQ=

This seems like a fair compromise as many competitors are happy to see the smother choke introduced into their categories, and the younger athletes taking part can still remain safe.

The next AVA tournament takes place March 4th and its almost guaranteed we will see lots of smother chokes.