Brazilian jiu-jitsu rising star Meggie Ochoa turns to crowd-funding to help achieve her dream 

When chasing your dreams, who do you turn to for help? The kindness of your friends, the support of your family, and in the case of 100-pound, five-feet-tall Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) upstart Meggie Ochoa, the kindness of her countrymen on the internet.

Ochoa is turning to social media to fuel her dream of competing in the 2014 International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation World Championship in Long Beach, California from May 28 to June 1. She has a page on a site called Make a Champ to solicit funds and is about a third of the way to her goal of $4,380. The money is set to cover expenses for a round-trip flight, the registration fee, plus a month’s worth of expenses for food and lodging. Ochoa is currently affiliated with Atos Philippines, and will train and compete under Atos Jiu-Jitsu in the US.

While Ochoa is not the first Filipino to compete in the event,  she is eager to follow in the footsteps of May Masuda, who won gold as a white belt in the light feather weight category in 2008. Masuda will also be among the Filipino Jiu-Jitsu fighters competing this year, a group that includes Ochoa’s Atos teammate Eros Baluyot, and competitors from other teams such as Andrew Laxa and Jasmine Cuizon.
 Ochoa is a white belt and has her eyes on competing in the new 107-pound rooster weight class. Hopefully she will be adding another medal to her collection. In the past year she has 13 golds, one silver and three bronze medals in both gi and no gi categories across the 107-pound, 117-pound and open categories.

Ochoa began training in mixed martial arts as a hobby in 2012 and helped establish the Orion MMA and Fitness gym in Pasig. Ochoa eventually turned to BJJ because it was extremely difficult to find opponents in her weight class: she was once penciled in for a fight, only for the match to be scrapped because her opponent backed out and there was no available replacement. Deciding not to linger where there was literally no competition to be found, Ochoa ventured into BJJ later that year.

“I remember the very first time I put a gi on,” she said, referring to the traditional martial arts gear consisting of a loose-fitting jacket and pants. “They were teaching techniques that I barely got because the moves were just so foreign to me, and when we started sparring, I had no idea what I was doing. All I could do was prevent them from submitting me. After that class I couldn't move my arms. My forearms were sore and numb but I was hooked, I just wanted to keep getting better. And I loved the fact that no matter what kind of physique you have, there is room for you in BJJ. You can build your style around your strengths or work on your weaknesses to achieve a style that you prefer.”

Ochoa lives by the motto "mediocrity is a sin,” which she gained during her college days as a track and field athlete. In her church of excellence, Ochoa is serious about her role as an evangelist and preaching the perils of merely getting by. “In anything that you decide to pursue, you give your whole self to it. You don't do things half-baked, getting so-so results,” she said. Few people probably take this mantra to the extreme that Ochoa does, since she resigned from her day job in January to make more room for her training.

As an avid mountaineer and environmental advocate, Ochoa said it was a tough decision to resign from her work at a non-profit grassroots organization that dovetails with her interests, to devote more time to BJJ.
“I started playing a more important role in the foundation. I was immersing myself in the job and the advocacy much deeper, really dedicating my whole self to the job. With that, my time and dedication to my sport began to suffer.

“I stopped joining competitions, I barely trained because of the field work and I was beginning to feel the effects of giving less attention to my sport,” she said. “I made other people's problems my own; the stress was starting to get to me. I was happy doing something of service to the country I love, giving myself to the cause, but I started doubting myself and my capabilities. I reflected on the situation, and that's when I realized how important MMA and BJJ were to me.”

With a more free schedule, Ochoa logs at least two sessions a day from Monday to Friday, plus half-day work on Saturday, that covers everything from strength and conditioning, weights, technical work and sparring. How does she keep herself from burning out? Naturally, with cross-training sessions on Sundays.

But devoting more time for BJJ doesn’t mean that she has to compromise her other goals. At the same time, she hopes to continue promoting the environment through prooPH Inc., a company in its infancy that, according to Ochoa, envisions itself to be “a multi-disciplinary corporation pursuing ventures that highlight aspects of the Philippines that deserve recognition,” focusing on sustainable tourism as a means of inclusive growth.

To her, succeeding in BJJ would help her gain a broader and higher platform to talk about her environmental advocacy. “Having an impact in any field will give you a voice, will give you the power to inspire, to influence, to motivate,” she says on her Make a Champ page. “Somehow, the more I achieve in the sport, the more capable I feel to actually deliver the message and do something to help bring the Philippines nearer to that seemingly impossible goal.”

Barring any hitches in her visa application, she simply won’t entertain the possibility that she won’t step on the mats in Long Beach this May. “I won’t allow it that the reason why I won’t be able to go will be [the lack of] funding, because that’s something that I could’ve done something about,” she said.

At worst, Ochoa is making a debatable time investment, one by no means insignificant, without the handsome rewards that come with other sports. At best it’s a daring decision to push herself to the next level by exhausting all possible avenues. But what’s clear is that Ochoa, like many Filipino athletes that we’ve come to support and cheer on in the last few years, is willing to pull out all the stops for a chance to roll with the best of the world. - AMD, GMA News