A rundown of the biggest headlines and news from the world of competitive grappling.
The Ruotolo brothers made their ONE Championship debuts and both managed to put on impressive displays. Kade and Tye Ruotolo took on Shinya Aoki and Garry Tonon respectively, at an event that was originally supposed to include the third professional MMA fight of Marcus ‘Buchecha’ Almeida’s career. Unfortunately Buchecha’s fight fell apart, but he was on hand in the arena to commentate on their grappling matches regardless.
Kade was up first against Shinya Aoki and he was in control of the fight from start to finish, taking Aoki’s back on several occasions. Aoki’s defense was superb however and Kade ended up winning by decision. His brother Tye made incredibly short work of Garry Tonon however. He took Tonon down, almost immediately passed his guard, and then set up a beautiful D’arce Choke to force his opponent to tap.
Full results for the event can be found here.
Elder Cruz wins $5,000 tournament at Faith and Violence Tour
Paster and grappler Dave Bevor has been steadily growing his promotion, Twisted Church, to a point where they are now able to offer a decent prize for their third event. The Faith and Violence Tour offered a $5,000 prize to the winner of an sixteen-man tournament that included three athletes who will be competing at the 2022 ADCC world championships; Giancarlo Bodoni, Haisam Rida, and Elder Cruz.
Rida suffered a huge upset in the second round when Nicholas Craton caught him with a heelhook, while Cruz submitted his first two opponents before managing to beat Craton on points. Bodoni actually submitted all three of his opponents leading into the final but lost out by the thinnest of margins against Cruz, as neither athlete was able to score points in an incredibly close match.
Full results for the event can be found here.
Gordon Ryan signs to face Pedro Marinho and Felipe Pena
Gordon Ryan started out the week by teasing ‘the biggest match in grappling history’ for when he makes his return to professional competition. By the end of it, he had actually announced two matches for upcoming Who’s Number One events and both of them have gotten fans excited. Ryan will start out by taking on WNO Light-Heavyweight champion Pedro Marinho almost three years after their first match that Ryan won by heelhook.
Shortly after that Ryan will be facing off against Felipe Pena, the only man who owns two wins over him. The pair recently agreed to two more matches with a total of $220k on the line, and the first of them will be taking place on the WNO mats without any time-limit in place. This will go some way toward settling the score between the two, along with the potential for a fourth match at the 2022 ADCC world championships.
First UK all-female grappling promotion announces debut event
Medusa became the first all-female grappling promotion a little over a year ago and now the UK have followed suit with Enyo Grappling. The promotion is getting ready for their very first event in August and have already started revealing the lineup. The event will be headlined by ADCC silver medallist Ffion Davies and she will be taking on two-time IBJJF European champion Zofia Szawernowska.
The event will also feature a number of the UK’s most talented up-and-coming female grapplers like Polaris 17 winner Abbie O’Toole and veteran black belt competitors like Chelsea Leah and Rose El Sharouni. Alongside the high-level matches that will take place, Enyo Grappling will also provide a fantastic opportunity for a number of younger female grapplers to get valuable competition experience early on in their careers.
Quick Hits
- Nicky Rodriguez has gone on record to explain the Danaher Death Squad split in further detail and attributed it to ‘animosity in the room’.
- Nine-time IBJJF world champion and BJJ legend Lucas Lepri became the latest grappler to be inducted into the IBJJF Hall of Fame.
- Amanda Nunes has explained that the arrival of Olympic and PFL champion Kayla Harrison is what sped up her departure from American Top Team.
- Footage surfaced of Former UFC Lightweight world champion Charles Oliveira competing in the gi in a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournament.