What belt should you compete at?

[the beast]

I also agree that it wouldnt be fair for him to compete at white or yellow belt level but I also think that if he is representing a school where he is awhite belt that is the belt he should wear.

[tallgeese]

I've always let guys wear whatever rank they've earned in another system when training with me. It's just a show of respect, it dosn't mean that they've accrued that rank with me, just that they have it.

As such, I'd probibly have them wear that when competing. It goes a a long way to explaning why someone is in such and such division.

[Traymond]

In my school, we allow for them to where the highest rank that they have ever achieved, but we stripe their belt with the color they should be in, in our style. They still compete with black belts if they are blackbelts, and they will still receive the respect that they have for their rank, but it will be known that an orange belt in my style has more knowledge then they would in my style.

We have a similar system at our school. Most people choose to wear the regular coloured belts. Depending on their skill level, they are sometime allowed to do multiple gradings and skip belt colours as long as they meet the requirements (In our style, each belt sort of represents a new skill e.g. yellow- elbows/knees, purple- takedowns/self defense, green- ground fighting etc). I heard the head instructor tell one new student that he wouldn't make anyone take off their black belt because that would be like saying that you have 'unlearned' everything you already know.

Yeah, my schools allow for people to do multiple testing as long as they have the required amount of time and they know what they need to know to pass it.