Eddie Fyvie has dedicated his entire life to teaching Jiu-Jitsu. He has owned a Jiu-Jitsu academy in Malta for the last seven years.

What You Need To Know

  • Owner Eddie Fyvie says he has guidelines in place to keep everyone safe, like a health questionnaire, temperature checks, and sanitizing hands and feet.
  • A maximum of eight students for each class with social distancing and no contact.
  • A spokesperson for Governor Cuomo’s office says violating public heath based executive orders put customers and staff at risk.
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Classes have been happening virtually for the last two months due to the pandemic. But this week, he decided to reopen, ahead of Governor Andrew Cuomo’s executive order.

“All I do is teach self-defense,” Fyvie said. “All I care about is the health and safety of everybody in the gym since I started.”

Businesses like Fyvie’s are supposed to reopen in phase four. But Fyvie says he’s been consulting with doctors over the last two months to develop safety guidelines.

For example, when students arrive, they’ll fill out a health questionnaire and have their temperature taken. Then students have to sanitize their hands and feet, before heading to a socially distant zone.

“No locker rooms, no benches, no extra equipment,” Fyvie said. “Right to their training zone with their bag, with their water, all their stuff. We do our class and they go out the door.”

He says before the pandemic, each class had between 30 and 50 people. Now there’s a maximum of eight students per class with no contact. Fyvie says Zoom classes are also continuing for those still uncomfortable with in-person classes.

“We’ve taken basically the most contact martial arts that there is and make it no contact,” Fyvie said.

Fyvie says he’s doing this because he has seen many martial arts studios closed permanently during the pandemic. A spokesperson with Governor Cuomo’s office disagrees with Fyvie’s reopening.

"If a facility like this is open to the public, it is violating New York's public health-based executive orders: both putting its customers and staff at risk and potentially slowing down the entire reopening process,” said Administration Spokesperson Jack Sterne, in a statement. “We will work with the local authorities to investigate this issue and pursue formal enforcement measures if necessary, including fines."

“My number one goal isn’t to break the law or defy the government. My number one go is to allow a space for people to restore their mental health and physical health in the safest possible way,” Fyvie said.