📍 Rhode Island

Separate from the Burrill branch, the Carlson Gracie name also has a presence in the state. In North Providence, Professor Steve Santiago runs a Ricardo Cavalcanti affiliate — Cavalcanti earned his black belt from Carlson Gracie Sr. in 1995 and holds a coral belt, making Santiago's academy one of the few places in New England training inside that lineage. Down in Westerly, Jorge Alves — who grew up in Brazil and has been practicing jiu-jitsu for nearly two decades — established his Carlson Gracie BRA-USA school in January 2013. He operates near the Connecticut border, serving students from both South County and the Pawcatuck area. Weissmuller Academy, also in Westerly at 271 Post Rd, offers jiu-jitsu alongside submission wrestling, MMA, and physical conditioning, making it a practical option for students in the state's southwestern corner.

For sheer density of options, Providence and the inner ring of the metro — Cranston, Warwick, North Providence, Smithfield — is where the most training is concentrated. The Renzo Gracie affiliate in Smithfield, run by Professor Marcelo Cruz, a 4th-degree black belt who trained as a teenager in São Paulo, operates out of a 7,000-square-foot dedicated facility on Douglas Pike. Team United Martial Arts Academy on Branch Avenue in Providence adds another option in the city proper. Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Warwick and Cortes BJJ cover the south end of the metro, and NAGA regularly hosts tournaments at the Johnston Indoor Recreation Center, giving competitors across the state a consistent testing ground without traveling to Boston or New York.

Rhode Island is the smallest state in the country, which shapes how the BJJ community functions here. Driving from Providence to Westerly takes barely over an hour, so it is common for competitors to train at multiple academies and to know instructors outside their own gym. The concentration of Burrill-lineage academies in particular means open mat events often cross organizational lines. For anyone new to the state, the 79 gyms listed on MatMade cover the full geographic spread — from the Providence metro cluster to the South County coast — and include options from pure competition teams to academies with deep roots in the Carlson Gracie and Machado family trees.