Phil Hurst is the founder, owner and head instructor of Victory BJJ and the Phil Hurst Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Association.

Phil first became interested in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts in the mid-90′s after watching Royce Gracie tear thru the competition in the first few Ultimate Fighting Championships. Back then places to train were scarce – if you wanted to train you had to be willing to travel. So he did. Knoxville. Maryville. New York City. Las Vegas. Southern California. It was tough, and at first progress was slow.

In 2000 Phil was awarded his Blue Belt by BJJ legend Rickson Gracie and formed the first BJJ school in the Lakeway area – The Full Mount BJJ Club. The club started out in Phil’s garage, and as membership grew moved into progressively larger facilities and the name was changed to Victory BJJ.

In 2004 Phil began training under World Champion Helio “Soneca” Moriera. He also began traveling to RDMA on a weekly basis to train the staff in BJJ. In 2005 Victory moved in with RDMA in Jefferson City. When RDMA opened their flagship facility in Morristown in 2007, Victory BJJ returned to Morristown.

In June 2009 all of Phil’s years of hard work paid off, and he was awarded his Black Belt by Soneca. While karate black belts are literally a dime a dozen, there are VERY FEW BJJ Black Belts around, and even fewer that actually have the skill to impart their knowledge to others.  Phil is well-known in the grappling community for the quality of his students and their performance in competition.