Pan American Championship
- GoldSuper Heavy2005–2009, 2012, 2014
- GoldAbsolute2006, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014
- SilverSuper Heavy2004, 2010, 2011
Professor James Boran, One of America's First Twelve BJJ Black Belts
About Us
Your Trusted Place for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Training
To empower individuals through Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu training for confidence, strength, and effective self-defense.
- Strong BJJ Community
- Confidence & Strength Building
- Professional BJJ Training
- Fitness & Mental Growth
To be a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu academy inspiring excellence, discipline, and personal growth in Costa Mesa and beyond.
- Leading BJJ Academy
- Inspire Excellence
- Promote Lifelong Growth
- Build Strong Individuals
To provide structured training programs improving fitness, focus, and grappling skills for all ages.
- Discipline & Confidence Building
- Fitness & Focus Improvement
- Practical Self Defense Skills
- Quality BJJ Instruction
Meet Your Instructor
Professor James Boran
6th Degree Black Belt · IBJJF & USBJJF Certified · One of the Dirty Dozen
“I genuinely believe in the value of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu training. My goal as an instructor is to provide my students with the highest level of instruction at a competitive price.”
1996Promoted to black belt
2000Opened the Costa Mesa academy
12Americans in the Dirty Dozen
James Boran grew up in New York with his parents, three brothers and a sister. His athletic focus as a young man was football. He played linebacker in the Ivy League for Columbia University, and was signed as a free agent by the New York Jets in 1979.
While in college he began studying martial arts, starting with Tae Kwon Do, in which he earned a black belt. In 1983 he moved to California searching for a more effective system and studied Hapkido for four years. Then he met a student from the Hapkido school who had been training with the Gracie family in Brazil. Despite outweighing him by seventy pounds, Professor Boran was tied in a knot within moments, and he knew immediately what he wanted to learn next.
He set up a private lesson with Professors Rorion and Royler Gracie and never looked back, going on to take weekly private lessons with Royce and Rickson Gracie. He received his blue and purple belts from Professors Royce, Rorion and Rickson Gracie, and his brown and black belts from Professor Joe Moreira. In doing so he became part of an elite group of martial artists known as the Dirty Dozen, the first twelve Americans ever to receive a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
In 2000, with many years of athletic competition and martial arts training behind him, he opened Boran's Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Academy in Costa Mesa to share the sport with men, women and children, providing individuals and families with excellent instruction in a safe and friendly environment.
Competition Record
Decades of Results at the Highest Level
Professor Boran has competed and medalled across the sport's major IBJJF championships.
- 24Gold
- 4Silver
- 1Bronze
- 4IBJJF championships
World Master & Senior Championship
- GoldSuper Heavy2012, 2013
- GoldAbsolute2013
- BronzeAbsolute2012
No-Gi World Championship
- GoldSuper Heavy2008, 2009
- GoldAbsolute2008
- SilverAbsolute2009
American Nationals
- GoldSuper Heavy2009, 2010, 2011
- GoldAbsolute2009, 2010, 2011
Our Program
Explore Our Professional Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Training Programs
Our programs are designed to develop discipline, strength, and confidence through structured training for all ages and skill levels.
Our Students
What Training Here Actually Produces
Medals, belts, and the quieter changes that show up at school and at work. This is what 26 years in Costa Mesa looks like.
Competition
Our students compete, and they come home with medals
Boran students train alongside a professor with Pan American, World Master and No-Gi World titles, and that standard carries onto the competition mat. Students who choose to compete enter local opens and IBJJF events, and regularly place.
Competing is always optional. Plenty of students never enter a tournament and progress just as far, but for those who want to test themselves, the preparation is there and it works.
- IBJJF
- and USBJJF certified academy
- Gold
- silver and bronze at local and open tournaments
Young Athletes
Children who arrive shy leave with a medal and a straight back
Our youth students take part in local tournaments alongside their peers and mentors, and have been awarded gold, silver and bronze medals at various local competitions.
The medals are the visible part. What parents tell us about is the focus, the willingness to keep trying after getting something wrong, and the respect that follows them home and into the classroom.
- 4–15
- age range of our kids program
- 2003
- year the kids' program started
Beyond the Mat
Fitness, confidence and a genuine ability to defend yourself
Students arrive for all sorts of reasons: to get fit, to lose weight, to learn to protect themselves, to find something more interesting than a gym. They stay because jiu-jitsu delivers all of it at once.
Improved conditioning and cardiovascular health, strength and core development, sharper awareness, and a real, tested ability to handle yourself against someone bigger and stronger. That last one is the whole reason this art exists.
- 6
- days of training every week
- 26+
- years teaching in Costa Mesa
