They’re the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups of Brazilian jiu jitsu. Like chocolate and peanut butter, they’re perfect together, even when it comes to submission martial arts.
As a couple, Andrea Ross and Joshua Viner hit a big milestone in November when they got engaged.
But it seems like they’ve taken it a step further and hit yet another big landmark — a double win at the Copa Katana VI 2018 Brazilian jiu jitsu tournament in mid-April.
Ross claimed a gold in the division for female white belts weighing 141.5 pounds and under.
Viner took first in the white belt male master division for those weighing 181.5 pounds and under.
Both of them train out of The Sound Martial Arts in Squamish.
For Ross, having her partner enter the same competition might’ve given her some butterflies.
“It was a little nerve-wracking, to be honest, competing at the same tournament as Josh,” she told The Chief in a phone call in between dodging bullets and explosions — Ross is a professional stunt performer. As of Monday, she was in Calgary for the shooting of Wynonna Earp.
“I hadn’t been doing it for as long and he had,” the 35-year-old continued.
Ross is relatively new to the sport, having only started in January this year.
However, with a strong wrestling background — she has a national championship, among other things, under her belt — she was able to make a smooth transition to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.
“As soon as I got finished my first match, everything from my 15 years of wrestling kind of like kicked in,” Ross said. “You go into, like, warrior mode.”
The road to victory for Ross was paved with a lot hard work.
She said she put in five to eight hours of martial arts training each week, which included practising taekwondo and various Filipino martial arts.
Ross faced Monica Bonczak of Island Top Team / Caio Terra for the gold.
“I was quite nervous because I had watched her compete before,” Ross said.
But evidently, that didn’t stop her from executing her game plan, which was to draw the first blood.
“My only goal was to be the first to take her down to the ground,” Ross said.
After that, she said that many of the points she scored were based on body positioning, where her wrestling background gave her an edge.
As Ross finished up with her opponent, her partner in crime was starting on his own challenge.
He wound up facing Nicolas Eisenkraft of Gravity BJJ / Caio Terra for the gold match.
Just as Ross felt a little nervous entering a tournament with her partner, Viner also felt a little pressure himself.
“The first thing that was going through my head was, ‘Wow Andrea just won a gold medal so I better show up,’” the 31-year-old said with a laugh.
And show up he did.
“I need[ed] to make the first move to sort of establish a dominant position and then from there I need[ed] to maintain that,” he recalled.
Once he put in himself in the lead, Ross said he was careful not to overextend himself with flashy submissions that could leave him vulnerable.
“I ended up not necessarily playing it safe, but playing it smart,” he said.
He added that the training he went through enabled him to enter the ring with a focused mindset.
Leading up to the event, Viner went into “shark tank” training sessions where he would have to square off against a lineup of opponents. Each fighter grappled with Viner one-on-one for about three minutes, then another fresh athlete took his or her place. Viner, however, received no breaks in between as he cycled through up to 12 opponents.
“That’s kind of the best training you can get for a tournament,” he said.
It was a gruelling workout, but at the end of the day, it paid off.
Both Viner and Ross wound up celebrating with family who were in town to visit. The pair allowed themselves to have at least one ‘cheat’ day with respect to eating healthy. However, there may be one event that will be an even greater cause for celebration coming up on the horizon — they’re planning to get married in October.
The pair also expressed their thanks to their coaches and all those who came out to support them.
