Beckley, WV (WOAY) “Arte Suave” is Portuguese for “the gentle art” of Brazilian jiu-jitsu—and the name of army veteran and black belt Chris McKinney’s Jiu-Jitsu Academy in Beckley.
“Arte Suave Jiu-Jitsu Academy is like a family… We actually enjoy a challenging, tough environment. We enjoy breaking ourselves out of the comfort zone. We live by the moniker ‘same species, different animal’… So far we’ve been extremely blessed just to be consistently growing, consistently getting better and putting out consistent athletes.”
McKinney says he had a hard time finding direction in life, but thanks to a DEA officer, he found his passion and turned his life around.
“So I kind of had a rough upbringing. I got into wrestling later in life and never really fulfilled my potential. I wanted to leave and kind of run from some things—from my problems. So I left West Virginia, and I joined the military. Upon coming back, I still didn’t have much direction, and I got caught doing some bad stuff by the DEA. And the guy at the time just happened to be a jiu-jitsu practitioner, and he’s like, ‘Hey, man, I think you would enjoy this more, you know?’ …I found jiu-jitsu through that, and that’s just kind of all I’ve wanted to do.”
Arte Suave started in 2019 with just seven students, right before the COVID pandemic put a damper on growth.
“I remember being worried about being able to pay the rent.”
Now, the academy has a consistent 5-star business rating from Google, teaching nearly 60 kids and adults who bring home countless medals from competitions. McKinney attributes his success to his faith in God and hard work through the struggle every day.
“A lot of blind faith, you know, just a lot of staying consistent, a lot of cops knocking on the door, asking me what I was doing. I would just tell them, ‘I’m training.’ And a lot of times it was cops that were training with me. Also, I train law enforcement for free. So any job that you have that protects civilians, you train at arte suave for free.”
McKinney says he and his girlfriend, brown belt Sarah Faust, will be the first West Virginians to compete in the first-ever UFC Brazilian jiu-jitsu open in Las Vegas on the weekend of August 22nd.
“We’re going to come back, and I’m going to send my son to school and see him off, and then we go back for Master Worlds. That’s in Vegas as well. My girlfriend is actually the returning champion of that from last year, and every year that we go, we have a tremendous amount of success and growth. We’ve medaled every year we take people, and we’re world ranked now. No one’s doing that from this area. Everyone wants to be, you know, big here, but we want to be big international.”
Arte Suave Jiu-Jitsu academy is located at 321 South Fayette Street in Beckley, and you can learn more at artesuavebeckley.com.
“If you want to change your life, if you want a family—you know, someone that’s going to hold you accountable… If you want a brotherhood and a sisterhood, you want something that’s genuine and real, we’re here.”
