To gi or not to gi, that is the question? Honestly, who cares. Both paths have their advantages and disadvantages. . I enjoy the tradition of wearing the gi and the belt. I personally think it looks really cool.
In my opinion, the gi is more “technical” ( I’m not saying no gi isn’t technical, but hear me out). In the gi, you have so many more grips to play around with. You have sleeves, collars, lapels, belts and pant grips to manipulate. You can also use most of the no gi grips in the gi. However, the biggest benefit to the gi can also be its greatest down side. As a result of having so many grips, people learn how to stall and make the matches really slow and boring. Which, if you’re down in points in a competition, could mean the difference between taking home hardware or going home empty-handed.
No gi can also be very technical and fun to watch because of the high pace of action. I have done my fair share of no gi and have really enjoyed the style change. You have less worry about in terms of collar chokes and getting wound up in lapel and sleeve grips. But it gets really REALLY sweaty! It’s hard to get anything in the way of a submission going when you can slip and slide out of everything. That being said, stalling does occur in no gi too. When you have two guys collar tying and slapping each other around or when two guys are tied up in a leg lock shoot out and can’t/won’t do anything else.
When it comes to the watchability of gi vs nogi it will 100% be up to the athlete. If you are trying to win by an advantage point, no one will want to watch you. If you go out guns blazing, whether you win or lose, people will want to watch you no matter what. Don’t be reckless and do backflips to pass guard, do actual quality jiu jitsu and tap your opponent out or beat them decisively in the points game!
At the end of the day gi vs no gi is about what you want and what you have fun doing. It’s all good. You don’t see Olympic wrestling saying judo is boring or vice versa.
I will leave you with this quote: “GI is like skiing- easy to learn but hard to master. No gi is like snowboarding- harder to learn but easier to master.”- Dan Cranny