Meet Our Team!

Jeff is currently a 41 year old Black Belt hailing from Jackson, New Jersey. He began his BJJ journey under Kurt Pellegrino in 2009, continuing up through his Purple belt. In 2013, he began training with friend and mentor Professor Aron Rocha until 2014 when he moved to New York City. There, he continued to train at various schools, including Marcelo Garcia Academy, Renzo Gracie Academy and UNITY Jiu Jitsu School. 

In 2017, Jeff was awarded his Brown Belt by Professor Rocha. He then joined Unity Jiu Jitsu School as a student under Professor Murilo Santana's guidance. After 10 years in NY Jeff has moved to South Carolina where he has teamed up with a close friend and mentor, Professor Julio Salazar of “ONE LOVE JIU JITSU CLUB” to create a new community of individuals with the same “MINDSTATE”.
He was awarded his Black Belt on August 10th 2024 by Professor Salazar. 

Jeff has competed in multiple professional events in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, including various Super fights, IBJJF, NAGA, and multiple other organizations. 

Jeff has been teaching since he was a Blue Belt and served as program director for UFC GYM as a Purple Belt. Alongside his accomplishments on the mat, he has been a Senior Referee for North American Grappling Association for the past 10 years. 

With 15 years of experience and passion in teaching, competing, and refereeing, Jeff has made a name for himself in the BJJ community and is excited about bringing his expertise to the Bluffton Community to help others achieve their BJJ dreams. 

Stephanie started her journey with Movement with Dance at age 7. Falling in love with dance and choreography,  she decided to pursue her BFA from The Ohio State University in Modern Dance. After college she moved to NYC. In NYC she started cross training with indoor rock climbing and fixed gear cycling. Stephanie fell in love with feeling strong and started her training career as a Personal Trainer at Equinox in Manhattan. There she was exposed to many different types of training. To her strength training was movement. It made sense and it was fun. 

She eventually left Equinox and became an Independent Personal Trainer and experienced many different types of training. Stephanie has dabbled in Functional Training, Gymnastics Strength Training, Capoeira, Break dancing, kettlebell training, Animal Flow, Pilates, Yoga, Barbell Training, Flexibility Coaching, Old School Lifting methods and finally Jiu Jitsu.  

In NYC she met Jeff and had Sylvia, their now 2.5 year old. They decided to move to Bluffton to be closer to her Family. 

Stephanie believes training should push you and be fun so you can stick with it. At the end of the day Movement is the core of fitness. Mindstate is a place to explore new movement and get stronger and she hopes to bring this idea of training to the Bluffton community. 

Jessica has been around MMA for 9 years starting her journey in Muay Thai training at a UFC gym in the south loop of downtown Chicago. 

Jessica moved to Bluffton in 2019 and continued her Muay Thai training and eventually started training Jiu jitsu in 2022. The mat is where she met her best training partner/coach and now husband, Jhosep Velasco, who she credits much of her success to. She quickly became obsessed with training and improving her game going on to compete in several tournaments, with the highlight being placing 3rd at Newbreed Worlds in 2023. 

Jessica has been a certified personal trainer and nutrition coach since 2020 and has been training a wide variety of clients for sports specific performance, strength and conditioning, endurance, longevity, and overall fitness. 

Jessica is thrilled to lead and grow our women’s Jiu jitsu program and create a community of strong, empowered, and confident women through the art of Jiu jitsu.