Middleboro, MA: The Town the Balaschis Come From
Bob and Tracey Balaschi are from Middleboro. Their kids are there, their family is there, and both of them teach at this gym. Walk into the gym on a weeknight and watch how the place runs, and you are watching a Middleboro family at work, at the desk and on the mats.
Who they are
Tracey Balaschi is the gym’s chief operating officer and head women’s instructor. Bob Balaschi is an instructor. Between the two of them that covers a lot of what a gym actually is: the coaching, the operations, and the phone calls in between. If you are a woman who has never trained and you have wondered who would be teaching your first class, here the answer has a name and a hometown.
There is a women’s jiu-jitsu class at the Raynham gym on Sunday morning at 9, and adult classes run an hour.
Marty Navis, out of Middleboro
Marty Navis is from Middleboro and came to this gym by way of Lakeville MMA. He fought a long string of fights for us, including a run on Cage Titans cards. Two towns get to claim a piece of that career, and this page is where Middleboro’s claim sits.
About eight miles up Route 44
The Raynham gym is about 8 miles from the center of Middleboro, which measures out to 12 minutes on a clear road. Most of the run is Route 44, the same road the gym sits on, so it is an easy drive to repeat three nights a week. Canton is 26 miles and about 36 minutes away, which is far enough that for most of Middleboro the answer is Raynham.
Twelve minutes is a clear-road figure from the center of town, and Middleborough is the second largest town in Massachusetts by land area, so it depends which end of it you live on. At half past five on a weekday, Route 44 through Raynham also does what Route 44 does.
Raynham is the main gym of the two, on Route 44 since early 2021, so for most of Middleboro it is the home gym as well as the nearer one.
Fitting it around a Middleboro week
Adult jiu-jitsu runs twice on most weekdays at Raynham, once at 11 in the morning and once in the evening, with a Friday night marathon class and Saturday morning sessions alongside them. If you work days and drive home that way, the evening class is the one that will stick. The gym sits on Route 44 between Route 24 and Middleboro, so it is on the way home from the north rather than a detour, which is the difference between training three times a week and training once.
What people from Middleboro train in
Adults pick between Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Kickboxing and No-Gi Grappling. Jiu-jitsu is the biggest class and the usual entry point, because technique does the work and a smaller person can be effective at it. Kickboxing is stand-up striking and the hardest hour in the building. No-Gi Grappling is the grappling without the jacket, and it moves faster than the gi class.
Kids train in age bands: Tiny Ninjas BJJ for 3 to 5, Vipers BJJ for 6 to 9, and Cobras BJJ for 10 to 13. A parent driving a six-year-old over from Middleboro is not dropping them into an adult class with a different coach watching the door.
Members from Middleboro
Members from Middleboro train here. That is not a slogan, it is a roster line, and it is why the front desk knows the town without asking twice. Book a first class and you will not have to explain where Middleboro is or how long the drive takes, because somebody at that desk has made the drive.
The first visit is not a tryout
You do not need any experience. The way in is a free intro appointment, about 15 minutes: a tour, how the classes and the membership work, and a conversation about what you want out of training. Wear shorts and a T-shirt. It ends with a short lesson on the mat, so your first class is not your first time on a mat.
If you are coming over with a kid in the car, say so when you fill in the form and the appointment can be booked for a time when the class you are asking about is actually running.
How to start from Middleboro
Fill in the form on this page: program, location, phone number. Someone from the gym will call you back and put you in a class that fits around work or school. If you would rather call, the Raynham gym is 508-219-0418. The Canton gym on Route 138 is 781-499-8302 if you are already up that way for work.
Middleboro is not a town we bolted onto a map to fill out a list. It is the town two of our people come from, and the drive is twelve minutes.